A STRUCTURE FOR THE INTEGRATION OF EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES BASED ON CLOUD COMPUTING AND INTERNET OF THINGS

In recent years, Cloud Computing and Internet of Things have become popular topics which attract both scientific researchers and industrial giants. Many fields have been implementing reforms based on newly-emerged information technologies. University Education is no exception. There are several famous universities in China trying to make some difference with Cloud Computing and Internet of Things. Thus it has become a hot spot in the education research area that education reforming based on Cloud Computing and/or Internet of Things. In this paper, we present the features and functions of Cloud Computing and Internet of Things, analyze the educational resources problems that exist in most universities of China, which are (1) unfamous universities are deficient in educational resources, (2) famous universities have reduplicative educational resources, and (3) it is not only inconvenient but also insecure to share educational resources among universities. Based on the analysis, we propose a structure to integrate the educational resources of different universities with the help of Cloud Computing and Internet of Things. From bottom to top, there are three layers in the structure. (1) Sensor layer includes such as sensors, radio frequency identification devices (RFID), two-dimension codes, and so on. (2) Network layer consists of Cloud and Internet of Things and is responsible for data storage, data communication and high-performance data processing. (3) Application layer provides with supports such as distance education, digital library, virtual laboratory, massive open online courses (MOOC) and so on. In the end, we point out the problems that may appear during the integration of educational resources, which should be considered by university administrators and educational government departments. We hope the structure proposed in this paper will be implemented in the near future in China, because the educational resource-unshared problem has seriously impacted the overall development of Chinese university education.