Version control for teaching materials

Which version did that cohort actually use.

Materials are revised continuously and the question that arises later is specific: what were these learners assessed against. Providers routinely cannot answer it, because the current version is the only one held.

The minimum is a version number visible on the document, incremented on change, with superseded versions retained and the period each applied recorded. That is a filing convention rather than a system.

It matters most for assessment tools, since a challenge to an assessment decision is a question about the tool that was used, and producing the current version when a different one applied is not an answer.

Where materials are held in a learning platform that overwrites, the retention has to happen outside it, since most platforms hold only the current file.

A short change note per version, saying what was altered and why, is worth more than the version number and takes a line. It is also what allows somebody to decide whether a cohort was materially affected.

It is worth adding that version control has to extend to the mapping document, which is frequently maintained separately and updated on a different cycle. A current resource with a mapping that describes the previous version is a specific and common failure.