What is a Sharable Content Object (SCO) in an instructional design context? The frequency with which this question is asked is symptomatic of a much larger problem: There is no accepted alignment between units of instruction and units of technical standards.

The Sharable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM) community has tried to create alignment by starting with a SCO. For example, models have been proposed that equate a terminal learning objective with a SCO. These models are not compatible with the inner workings of SCORM and the practice is discouraged by the Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL) Initiative (Roberts & Blackmon, 2006). Another approach is to give up on lower levels of granularity and simply equate a course with a SCORM content package. This does not help create reusable content that takes proper advantage of SCORM capabilities.

This paper starts with two observations. First, most proposed alignments consider levels of granularity defined by SCORM but do not consider the units of granularity inherent in instructional design theories. Second, reusability (a key business driver behind SCORM) occurs more often at the level of a complete instructional strategy than at the level of an instructional event. From there, the paper constructs a proposed alignment and discusses its properties and benefits.