Introducing Moodle Implementation: In K12 and Higher Educational Institutions

5/24/2018 Introducing Moodle Implementation: In K12 and Higher Educational Institut...

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Introducing Moodle Implementation:In K12 and Higher Educational Institutions

AbstractIn this paper, readers are introduced about Moodle with its educational philosophy, learning types and

compliance with technology standards, its features and basic components, user access types and copyright

openness (unique to Moodle). The document presents a brief review of Open Resources Repositories (OER) in

the world, various aspects of applying Moodle for education such as, Learning Activities, Assessments and use

of in-built resources. A serious consideration is the Implementation and itsderived technology glitches that an

institution gets spiraled into, producing 'institutional and educational misbehaviors' on its human communities.

To wade through such technology let-downs, the paper suggest a starter, for planning resources, framing

actions, constituting of human taskforces having policies, practical technology adoptions, course

operationalization and analyzing measured goals for their impacts. The document completes with useful

resources on Moodle (ebooks, presentations, demos, and Moodle services). Appendices provide useful

resources, such as, Moodle usage statistics, introduction to Moodle learning activities, list of selected Moodle

extensions and Moodle Taskforces for working out a course project in educational institutions.

Keywords: Moodle, Technology-aided eLearning, Social Constructivism, Moodle Accessibilities, Learning Standards and

Resources, K12 Education, Higher Educations, Moodle Extensions, SCORM, Open Education, Course Management, Learning

Activities, Moodle Taskforce, Moodle Usage Policy, Course Operationalization, Course Design and Development.

Reference: Introducing Moodle Implementation: In K12 and Higher Educational Institutions , Technology Review Document

College IQAC and Documentation Cell, Don Bosco College, Yelagiri Hills (DBCY), June 2014.

Consider a situation wherein you have been asked to draw a plan, for the first time, to implement

technology-aided educational projects in your institutions. Having been introduced to a limited

exposure on eLearning technologies and services, you would surely be overwhelmed with massivetechnological choices with meager application feasibilities for institutional services. Technology

implementation for educational services is a serious challenge for management, administrative and

teaching staff. Creating a singular-implementation plan can start with choice of Learning

Management System (LMS). Moodle, being an open-source, free, and popularly used web

application is a starting point for such focused implementation approach. This paper is a technology

review document, focusing on implementation areas, measures, approaches and policies suitable to

further research and decide on. Moodle is right application for K12 and Higher Educational

institutionsour current technology history says so.

Moodle (mdl) is an acronym for Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment.

Martin Dougiamas, an Australian Software developer, Computer Scientist and educator developedMoodle, a unique contribution to 21st century global education. Moodle as web-based software

helps educators create quality online courses and manage students and their learning outcomes. It

is multilingual and support major global languages with 60+ language packs.

As eLearning systems, Moodle is often referred to as,o Course Management System (CMS)o Learning Management Systems (LMS)o Virtual Learning Environments (VLE)o Learning Content Management Systems (LCMS) (Bryan Williams, 2005)


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As social and eLearning software, Moodle is an ideal online learning solution for K-12 Schools,

Colleges, Universities, Governmental Agencies, Business Organizations, Trade Associations, Hospitals

and Libraries and Employment Agencies. (Williams, 2007).

1. Moodle Usage

Moodle users are institutions and individuals, such as Universities, High schools, Primary schools,

Government departments, Healthcare organizations, Military organizations, Airlines, industries,

Homeschoolers, Independent educators and special educators. See: Moodle Usage Statistics

Appendix (A)

2. Educational Philosophy

Moodle is designed and developed based on "Social Constructionist Pedagogy" a strand of

educational philosophy of learning. In such pedagogy, 'a social group constructing things for one

another, creating a small culture of shared artifacts with shared meanings immersion into a

learning culture at varied level. (Bryan Williams, 2005). Moodle also provide an educational Design

Modeltriad integration, Pedagogy, Technology and Learning Content.

Moodle promotes greater learner involvement by students' active engagement in a meaningful ways

to analyze, investigate, collaborate, share, build and generate knowledge with what they already

know; rather than parroting facts, skills and processes of a subject.

Social Constructivism for students mean:

Students come to class with an established world-view, formed by years of prior experience

and learning. A students world-view filters all experiences and affects their interpretations of observations. For students to change their world-view requires work. Students learn from each other as well as the teacher. Students learn better by doing. Allowing and creating opportunities for all to have a voice promotes the construction of new

ideas(Mungo, 2005).Expanding access, alleviating capacity constraints, capitalizing on emerging opportunities and serving

as a catalyst for institutional transformation poses real changes; because, the educational service

providers have to address diverse student population and gain country-wide recognition, limitations

of small educational institutions, mergers of educational system towards developed social

transformation (Catterson, 2004). Thus, every technology-aided educative venture produces anavalanche of overwhelming choices in all eLearning participations.



3. Learning Types

Online Learning: As Moodle facilitate web-based learning, students, teachers, trainees and experts

collaborate in a virtual classroom. This is most suitable for Distance Educational scenario wherein

virtual environment enables course participants cooperate through learning activities 24x7@365.

The service-providers of Higher Education and trainings opt for online learning, providing access to

quality learning content and services on a cloud environment. The takeaways are: greater student

reachability, expert collaborations, quality content services and better student performances and

responsiveness.

Classroom Learning (Teacher-led): Moodle for classroom is highly suitable for K-12 and HigherEducations. Moodle serves as teacher-led platform for students to engage in classroom activities,

often extended to practical works. Teacher moderates the classroom learning, using Moodle as a

content presenter. In such learning, students have Moodle services right in a classroom but without

students participation, not a good idea. In K-12 Classroom learning, Moodle serves as content

platform for presentation and teacher-led interactive demonstrations. The advantages of Moodle in

Classroom are: standardization, reuse and repurpose of content, making it qualitative and best

practicable resources.

Peer-to-Peer Learning (Lab): Moodle, being social software is best-known for collaborative

learning in real-life with synchronous communication (in school or college computer lab). Practicaland project-intensive learning would need a platform wherein student collaborate with other

students and teachers on learning quests. This learning is highly practical, making even

theoretical/conceptual course domain (e.g. Arts stream), interesting and engaging to learn. Benefit

from P2P learning is that students gain cumulative knowledge, skills and competencies in a focused

learning environment' of a school or college.

Blended Learning: The best of Moodle ambition for educational institution is this: 'making BlendedLearning' a reality through both synchronous and asynchronous communication. Moodle is just for

this: making classroom, laboratory and entire campus connecting with teachers and students

communities. Moodle thus become a ubiquitous campus podiumand can possibly be extended to

homes of teachers and students, as well. Blended Learning integrates distance learning, P2P andclassroom learning.

Lifelong or Workplace Learning: Moodle is a productive learning platformwith less or no costfor workplace training or lifelong learning. Workplace learning is construed as industrial, business

and corporate trainings. This learning is largely competency-oriented and used to disseminate

knowledge and skills in a most effective way. Training institutes avail this zero-investment open

product with web deployment enabling global access for professional trainers and trainees. Moodle

is the right choice for more effective and responsive human development and knowledge solutions.



4. Educational Standards

Educational standards are organizational phenomenon that keeps evolving. The standards by

definition are the most rigorous and the slowest to be developed; it requires preferred ultimate

approval; while Specifications comes first as an initial solutions. Technology standards for education

pose challenging areas for educational service providers, namely:

Accessibility: access instructional components from one remote location and deliver them

on to many other locations.

Interoperability:use instructional components developed in one location, with one set of

tools or platform, in another location, with a different set of tools or platform.

Reusability: incorporate instructional components into multiple learning experiences.

Durability: continue using instructional components when technology changes, without

redesign or recoding.

Affordability: increase learning effectiveness significantly while reducing time and costs

(Rehak, 2003).

Broad categories of Educational Standards can be: a) Content, b) Assessment and c) Accessibility.

a) Content Standards

Some of the prominent organizations for Educational Technology Standards are:

ADL SCORM (http://www.adlnet.gov)

IMS Global Learning Consortium (http://www.imsglobal.org)

IEEE Learning Technology Standards Committee (LTSC) (http://ieeeltsc.org)

Schools Interoperability Frameworkhttp://www.sifinfo.org)

Centre for Educational Technology Interoperability Standards (CETIS)

(http://www.cetis.ac.uk)

Moodle is conforms to ADL SCORM and IMS Global Learning Consortium standards.

Note:A consortium of National Schools or High Educational network would necessarily create a

Global Educational Standards Directoryserving the confluence of educational interest across cultural

and linguistic divides and enabling Quality Open Education and Open Learning Resources/Processes.

SCORM: "Shareable Content Object Reference Model" or SCORM is a collection of standards and

specifications for web-based e-learning. SCORM package is a bundle of web content in compliance

with ADL.NET standards. Simply, SCORM is [AICC &IEEE &IMS &ADL] a convergence of traininginterests and evolution of standards. The philosophy behind SCORM is to produce interactive-rich

learning objects that can be standardized, re-purposed and re-used with less or no amount of

content development / publishing efforts and cost.

SCORM standardizes Packaging content, Metadata (for discovery and transaction), Communication

(with user and LMS), and Sequencing (Learning Pathway). SCORM defines how content may be

packaged into a ZIP file. Learning Objects (or SCO: Sharable Content Object) such as like Quiz, Lesson,

Assignment, Resources (e.g. Documents, Presentations, Images, Flash, HTML, Audio, Video) are

designed within the SCORM Package and is tracked by Moodle, for student/teacher performance

data (over SCORM content). Thus far, SCORM versions are: [1.1], [1.2] [1.3] and [2004]. Moodle is in

compliant with SCORM 1.2 (Bhavsar, 2006) only.
http://www.adlnet.gov/http://www.adlnet.gov/http://www.adlnet.gov/http://www.imsglobal.org/http://www.imsglobal.org/http://www.imsglobal.org/http://ieeeltsc.org/http://ieeeltsc.org/http://ieeeltsc.org/http://www.sifinfo.org/http://www.sifinfo.org/http://www.sifinfo.org/http://www.cetis.ac.uk/http://www.cetis.ac.uk/http://www.cetis.ac.uk/http://www.cetis.ac.uk/http://www.sifinfo.org/http://ieeeltsc.org/http://www.imsglobal.org/http://www.adlnet.gov/



IMS Content Package: IMS Consortium is developing and promoting open specifications (IMS

Content Package/CP) for facilitating online distributed learning activities, such as locating and using

educational content, tracking learner progress, reporting learner performance and exchanging

student records between administrative systems (Key Standards Organisations, 2008).

b) Assessment StandardsIMS QTI: In IMS Question and Test Interoperability (IMS QTI) terminology, tests are known as

assessments. Core structure of IMS QTI is ASI (Assessment, Section and Item model); within an

assessment, a course can have one or more questions. To deliver a question, you need to know,

score for getting it correct, layout rendering information and what feedback should be given. So

questions, with their associated data, are known as items. The person taking the test is called,

participant. At the end of the assessment a results report is generated. IMS QTI tries not to support

a particular pedagogy or method of learning. It makes available a number of commonly used

question types or item types.IMS QTI specifies a way of exchanging assessment information, such

as questions, tests and results. It uses XMLextensible markup language(Low, March 2002).

c) Accessibility StandardsMoodle's envisions to being fully accessible and usable for all its users, regardless of their ability,

including students with learning disabilities (LD). Moodle interface can be highly customizable using

themes and settings. Learning content of diverse nature can be produced by any teacher or any

student. Accessibility is 'not a state, it is a process of continuous improvement in response to our

users and the wider technical environment.' It is difficult to determine with 100% certainty, whether

a software product has total accessibility. In such a scenario, Moodle strives to improve better

accessibility in conformance to the following standards: WCAG 2.0,ATAG 2.0 and Section 508 (US).

(Moodle Docs, 2014).

d) Moodle Compliances

Moodle is in compliance with following technology standards for learning:

User Authentication LDAP, Shibboleth

Student Enrollment IMS Enterprise

Import/Export Quiz and Quiz Questions IMS QTI, XML and XHTML

Moodle Resources IMS Content Packaging, SCORM, AICC, LAMS

Syndication RSS or Atom newsfeeds

Content Management System (CMS) Integration PLONE, Joomla, Postnuke, etc.

License GNU General Public License



5. Moodle Features

Educators using Moodle host their own learning website, with dynamic courses that extend learning,

anytime, anywhere to their learning community. The features of Moodle facilitate such a technology

provisions:

Category Features

General Modern, easy to use interface

Personalized Dashboard

Collaborative tools and activities

All-in-one calendar

Convenient file management

Simple and intuitive text editor

Notifications

Track progress

Administration Customizable site design and layout

Secure authentication and mass enrolment

Multilingual capability

Bulk course creation and easy backup

Manage user roles and permissions

Supports open standards

High interoperability

Simple add-ons and plug-in management

Regular security updates

Detailed reporting and logs

Course Development and Management Direct learning paths

Encourage collaboration

Embed external resources

Multimedia Integration

Group management

Marking workflow

In-line marking

Peer and self-assessment

Integrated Badges

Outcomes and rubrics

Security and privacy

Source:(Moodle Docs, 2014)



6. Moodle Components

Basically, there are three different elements that assist the learning process using Moodle. They are:

a) Activities, b) Resources and c) Blocks.

a. Activities: Students and Teacher interact with each other using Moodle Activities. Activities canbe contributing to a forum, uploading an assignment, answering questions in a quiz or

collaborating together in a wiki. All activities can be graded (with marks for evaluation). Using

Moodle Activity chooser (drop-down menu in course edit mode), teacher can create an

(custom) Activity or a standard (pre-installed) Activity.

b. Resources: A resource is an item that a teacher can add to a course in Moodle to supportlearning. Resource can be file, audio, video or hyperlink to a website. Unlike Activities, Resource

is static, i.e. students can merely view and read rather than participate. Resource is introduced

by teacher using Activity chooser(drop-down menu in course edit mode).

c. Blocks: Moodle Block is an item that a teacher can add to the left or right of a Moodle coursepage. Blocks are Moodle 'Widgets', providing, for example, RSS, newsfeeds, quiz results,

calendar, links to blogs, glossary terms or private files and many more functionalities. Blocks are

added, removed, placed (left/right) in Course edit mode using "Add a block" drop-down menu,

usually found on the bottom right side of course page. Moodle Layout can be changed by

Administrator or a Teacher based-on course needs by adding or removing a block. Blocks

location can also be changed (Moodle Docs, 2014).

Moodle File System

Moodle Core Directory(name: 'moodle') among many subfolders, this directory or foldercontains block, course, lang (language), lib (library), mod (Modules) themes, etc.

Data Directory(name: 'moodle_data') this folder contains all uploaded files including user

pictures. The numbered folders in Data Directory correspond to course IDs. Database(MySQL or PostgreSQL) MySQL is preferable since the users' database is more.


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7. User Access Types in Moodle

Moodle can be accessed by students, staff (teaching and non-teaching), parents (guests),

admins (usually, Management staff) as per user authentication protocol (e.g. LDAP). Moodle

can be accessed on following network scenarios:

Scenario: Network Access Scenario: Technology Implementation

Local Area Network (LAN) Classroom

Web or Online Distance Education, School/College Online

Mobile Mobile Moodle apps powered by LAN and/or Online

Personal Computer (PC) or Offline Portable Moodle (PLOODLE) for Personal access to specific-

course

LAN Access: Moodle is better in performance for Classroom and Computer centers of aschool/college. Wired LAN access is faster, secure and restrictive (to labs and classroom) as

compared to Wireless (Wi-fi) LAN access. Wireless connection is conducive for ubiquitous and

mobile, campus-wide access, a best-fit for college campus. Wired LAN access to Moodle is useful for

K12 schools. LAN-based Moodle is applicable for Classroom (Teacher-led) Learning, Peer-to-Peer

(Lab) Learning, Blended Learning, Lifelong or Workplace Learning types. LAN deployment can opt for

Mash-up network for better peer-to-peer transaction.

Web/Online Access: Moodle online initiative is for larger Educational/Training organizations, suchas Universities, Colleges and Professional Training Institutions. Making Moodle online creates global

connectivity with stringent access control and activity regulations. Performance can be slower inrespect to Internet connectivity - a serious online limitation, discouraging students and their learning

experiences. Yet, Moodle capability is never constrained, while facilitating better online learning

environment.

Mobile Access: With advent of Mobile learning technologies, Moodle can also be accessed usingmobile apps (e.g. Mobile Moodle) with limited user interactions. Mobile learning to this day is a

distant possibility for resource intensive and complex learning process that an educational domain

demands. Moodle on mobile communication is an appropriate and simpler platform to 'push

information' as short message (e.g., SMS) updates over school/college activities in Moodle.

Notifications, Grade reports, Course status, Student attendances, etc. can be 'messaged' using

Moodle.

Moodle Mobileis the Moodle official mobile application for Android and iOs. It's available in Google

Play and Apple Market designed for phone and tablets PCs. Moodle Mobile as a platform is secure,

can work offline, makes some Moodle operations faster and more convenient; supports notifications

on all platforms (coming soon), Moodle website branded by CSS, customizable and expanded as per

institution. First version of our new HTML5 Moodle Mobile app was released on Google Play (for

Android); only Moodle version 2.4 supports Mobile Moodle App (Mobile App, 2014).

Personal Computer (PC) Access: In a given educational circumstances, when Moodle should beaccessed offline (not online), PLOODLE (or Portable Moodle), helps students download their course

from school/college Moodle and host in their personal Ploodle. Ploodle can be carried in portablememory sticks or cards (USB or SD Card) or in students' laptop. Students have personal access to



their course resources anywhere without having to access Moodle online or in computer labs. The

disadvantage is that students cannot participate in evaluative and collaborative learning activities.

8. Moodle Openness

Moodle towards Open and Free Education with Open Educational Services, Content and Format

would weed-out commodification of knowledge and positively provide emergent educational

paradigm. Practically, online education from organizational perspective is to do with resource and

process management than learning itself. Learning/Knowledge products forces to get skirt around

Intellectual Property and Copyright issues. The copyright violations are often centered on learning

objects, textbooks and use of resources (technological and people).

Providing institutional support in implementing Open Educational Service Initiatives is personally and

technologically challenging to enforce credibility and satisfying sense of learning achievements,

rather than cheapening organizational services and resources. The alternate knowledge, skills and

competencies, personal accreditations (other than institutionalized qualification ceilings) in a self-

interested, but domain-rigorous learning process requires open learning approaches. This openinitiative promotes access, equity and quality in the spirit of rightfulness to knowledge capabilities of

one's appropriate orientations.

Creative Commons: an organization that provides ready-made licensing agreements that are less

restrictive than the "all rights reserved" terms of standard international copyright. Creative

Commons are more pertinent to educational products and services than software applications of

business domains.

GNU General Public License: from FOSS: free and open-source software community. Moodle is

distributed under GNU license.


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9. Open Resources Repositories (OER)

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) defines OER as: "digitized

materials offered freely and openly for educators, students, and self-learners to use and reuse for

teaching, learning, and research. OER includes learning content, software tools to develop, use, and

distribute content, and implementation resources such as open licenses".

Repository Description

Internet Archive

http://archive.org

(Since, 2001). Internet Archive is a non-profit digital library

with the stated mission of "universal access to all

knowledge". It provides permanent storage of and free

public access to collections of digitized materials, including

websites, music, moving images, and nearly three million

public-domain books.

MIT OpenCourseWare

http://www.oeconsortium.org

(Since 2002). OCW Projects is online publication of high-

quality MIT course materials of graduates and

postgraduate programs for free

Wikimedia Foundation

http://wikipedia.org

(Since 2003). Wikimedia is non-profit charitable

organization whose goal is to collecting and developing

free educational content and to disseminate it effectively

and globally. WikiEducator Project suggests that OER

refers "to educational resources (lesson plans, quizzes,

syllabi, instructional modules, simulations, etc.) that are

freely available for use, reuse, adaptation, and sharing'.

Wikipedia ranks in the top-ten most visited websites

worldwide since 2007.

National Council of Educational

Research and Training (NCERT)

http://nroer.gov.in/home

NCERT of India digitized all K12 textbooks (i.e. 1st standard

to 12th standard) and made it available online. NROER

(National Repository for Open Educational Resources) host

variety of content.

Open Course Library (OCL) Project Effort by the State of Washington to identify and make

available digitally, to community and technical college

instructors and students across that state, free textbooks,

interactive assignments, and videos. But not free.

Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) (Since, 2012). An online course aimed at unlimited

participation and open access via the web. In addition to

traditional course materials such as videos, readings and

problem sets, MOOCs provide interactive user forums that

help build a community for students, professors, and

teaching assistants. MOOCs are a recent development in

distance education which began to emerge in 2012.
http://archive.org/http://archive.org/http://www.oeconsortium.org/http://www.oeconsortium.org/http://wikipedia.org/http://wikipedia.org/http://nroer.gov.in/homehttp://nroer.gov.in/homehttp://nroer.gov.in/homehttp://wikipedia.org/http://www.oeconsortium.org/http://archive.org/



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Repository Description

MERLOT II

http://www.merlot.org

MERLOT or "Multimedia Educational Resource for

Learning and Online Teaching" is a program of the

California State University System partnering with

education institutions, professional societies and industry.

Source: (Open Educational Resources, 2014)

Open Archive Initiatives(OAI) is the popular global initiative hosting vast knowledge resources online

using open standards.
http://www.merlot.org/http://www.merlot.org/http://www.merlot.org/



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10. Applying Moodle for Education

User Management

User management in Moodle includes: Administrator, Teachers and Students. Managing user

community involves enabling access to information about learners in a course; Ability to segmentparticipants into groups; Site, course and user calendar event scheduling and so much more. For

example, applying scales to different learner activities, managing grades, tracking user access logs

and uploading external files for use within the course etc. (Mungo, 2005). User Registration: User account is created with a self-registration authentication process by

which user account gets activated, when following Moodle activation link sent to their email

address. This authentication in Moodle is Email-based Authentication, less moderated by Site

Admin. This registration is useful for Online and Distance Education scenarios. Administrators of

Moodle themselves create individual or bulk user accounts. Such a user creation process in

Moodle is, "Manual Accounts Only. To create multiple users (teacher/student), administrator

uses a text file (.csvor comma separated value, file format) with fieldnames (in correct order):username, password, firstname, lastname, email. The first row should contain the following

mandatory fields. A [.csv] file should have records as given below (rows) in text file with file

extension .csv.

username password firstname lastname email

In this way, an administrator can upload bulk user records automatically. Basic user information

in Moodle is: User Name, User type (admin, teachers, students, guests) User profile, Description

about User, Contact Address, Mobile, Email Addresses and Photo.

User Group: Moodle allows Administrators and Teachers to separate students into groups on a

specific course purpose; e.g. projects assignment to student groups in a class (Group Studies,

Project works, etc.)

User Assignment: Teachers and students are assigned to course(s) by Moodle Administrator

using Editing Permission with a course environment.

User Views: Based on User type (Admin, Teacher, Student, etc.), Moodle can be viewed with

features pertaining to user rights. The available Moodle views are: Administrator, Course

Creator, Teacher, Non-Editing Tutor, Student and Guest. A Moodle view is reversed by clicking

on Return to Normal Role... option in course.

Course ManagementUsually Admin creates courses in Moodle (while, Course Creators too can create course with

permission). To create a Course in Moodle, Admin/Course Teacher(s) should provide the following

information for course settings:

Course Category (Standard, Class, Class Section, Subject Groups)

Course Full Name e.g. Business Administration

Course Short Name e.g. B.Admin

Course ID e.g. BA-2014



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Course Summary Summary of the course

Course Format Topic, Weekly, Social (Moodle Course format)

Course Start Date When course begins?

Enrolment Period During when course can be enrolled (self-enrolment)

Enrollment Key First time student access only. (Enrolment key is given on payment ofcourse fee)

Group Mode No, Separate, Visible (Student Groups)

Course Availability Hide or unhide course from student view

Force Language What is the course language? (based availability of language pack

The course in Moodle is administered by Course Teachers. A teacher would have the following

options in customizing a course by Turn editing on in Course. A school or college can create a

mandatory Course Plan prior to creating them in Moodle.

A Course Plan would align with Moodle specifications for course, such as:

Course Settings

List of Teachers in Course

List of Students in Course

List of Learning Activities (not needed for creation of course)

Course Backup and Restore

Course Scales (excellent, good, average)

Grades (Items, Categories, Strategies)

Activities Log (history)

Files (uploaded files in course)

CommunicationsMoodle can be an educational Communication Network for Schools/Colleges, bringing together,

people, content and pedagogical practices). For example: CoSN (Consortium for School Networking),

USA (http://www.cosn.org).

In a networked educational community, Moodle communications is structured as per its Users:

namely, Admin (Managing), Course Managers (Non-Teaching), Teachers (Teaching), Students

(Learning), Parents (Mentor) and Guests (Visitor).Moodle communication levels are: Campus only Web/Online (campus and online)

Mobile only (campus and online)The asynchronous communications are Email, Discussion Forums, Messaging, Survey, Feedback,

Blogs, Workshop and so on. Synchronous communications in Moodle features chat, instant

notifications for discussion post, recent events/news, grade reports, course status, student

attendances and learning activities. Moodle communications are more effective when it is online

than campus-wide access, because of wider coverage of message recipients, thus making learning

community network informed in real-time.
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11. Learning ActivitiesA typical Moodle course has Resources and Activity. Moodle activities are Assignments, Book, Chat,

Choice, Dialogue, Forum, Glossary, Journal, Lesson, Quiz, SCORM, Survey, Wiki and Workshop.

Student/Course Experience Designer (Students XP Design), Course Strategies and Teachers should

refer to Moodle Guide for Teachers,(one page pdf document) when planning to implement a course.

This guide can be downloaded at www.cats-pyjamas.net or www.eit.ac.nz. See Appendix (B) that

provide brief introduction to standard Learning Activities in Moodle.

12. Assessments in Moodle

Assessment activities in Moodle are in conformance with IMS QTI. Learning activities that can be

assessed for student learning performances are: Quizzes, Assignments, Lessons, Choices, Glossaries,

Workshops, Books, Discussion Forums and Journals (Smith, 2005). The Grades feature in Moodle

provides a quick view of all assessable learning activities. The grading scale app lied to a learners

submission is shown, along with a cumulative total, on a single page (Mungo, 2005).

Gradebook automatically updates students marks for a Moodle course. Gradebook has following

elements:

Item:Student Marks for course Assignment/Revision Quiz etc. (Weighted grade items)

Category:Grouping grade items together (All Quiz Grade)

Multiple Grading Strategies:Not Graded, Error Banded Grading, Criterion Grading and

Rubric Grading

Grade Report can be viewed for single student or for entire class highlighting passes or fail scores.

Teacher/ Student can generate Report Card and export as Excel Spreadsheet.

13. Moodle Resources

Apart from Learning Activities and Blocks, Moodle has got standard Resources. A resource is an item

that a teacher can use to support learning, such as a file or link. Moodle supports a range of resource

types, which teachers add to their courses: They are,

Resource Name Description

Label Used to display Titles or Captions with/without image. Also used toseparate resources and activities in a course topic section, or feature a

lengthy description or instructions in course content area.

Web Page A single, scrollable web page that a teacher creates with Moodle in-

built HTML editor (e.g. TinyMCE).

Hyperlink to file / website By inserting hyperlink, teacher direct students to any web locations or

websites: (e.g. Wikipedia).
http://www.cats-pyjamas.net/http://www.cats-pyjamas.net/http://www.cats-pyjamas.net/http://www.eit.ac.nz/http://www.eit.ac.nz/http://www.eit.ac.nz/http://www.eit.ac.nz/http://www.cats-pyjamas.net/



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Resource Name Description

Folder Files helps to organize files; one folder may contain many sub-folders;

useful to display folders with documents and presentations for

student/teacher downloads.

Book Multi-page resources with a book-like format. Teachers can export

their Books as IMS Content Package. Book may include File, Picture,

PDF, Spreadsheet, Sound or video file.

IMS Content Package Hosting static course material from other sources in the standard IMS

content package format.

14. Moodle Implementation Guide

Elearning as such is born with hype and it will persist so, until its maturation in complete technology

actualization for education. The educational ecosystem is changing as the digitalization trend gets a

firmer grip on learning technologies, enabling new educative models. Educational service providers

are forced to make tough choices about technologies and improve flexibilities at the speed of

change by developing the infrastructure into an exostructure. Education (be it direct, distance or

online) is wrapped with unusual management hype and one need to take into account the evolving

technological trends in educational domain. The following Gartner chart present an abstraction

evolving educational trends tied-up with techno-and management hype (Lowendahl, 2013).

For technology deliberations, among other guides, one may refer to Gartner Technology ResearchDocument HypeCycle for Education". This research report highlights possible use of gadgets and



P a g e | 16

services such as, Mashware, Education Tablet, Campus App Store, Adaptive eBooks, Student CRM,

Digital Preservation of Research Data, Mobile Learning Low Range/Mid-range Handsets, Mobile

Learning Smartphones, eTextbook, Cloud Mail, Virtual Worlds, Virtual Desktop, Lecture Capture and

Retrieval Tools, Media Hubs and ebook readers.

Gartner research document briefly highlights topics such as Open Source Financials, Web-basedOffice Productivity Suites, MOOC, SIS International Data Interoperability Standards, Social Software

Standards, Open Micro-credentials, BPO, Citizen Developers, Learning Stack, Adaptive Learning,

Quantum Computing and Affective Computing (Lowendahl, 2013).

To implement Moodle learning solutions, an institution deliberate on the areas of requirements:

No. Deliberation Areas Remark Check

1. Project Plan and Budgetary

Proposal

Not under document scope.

2. Steering Action Framework Personnel, Technology and Infrastructure

Integration, Project Execution Modalities,

Reporting Mechanism, Deliverables, Innovations

and Achievements.

3. Technology Deliberations:

Hardware and Software

A real investment pain, based on the choice of

physical network (in campus/online) software:

a. Hardware and Software Requirements

b. Implementation of Repository for Moodle

c. Acquisition of Course Development Toolkits

d. Integration of Moodle Extensions

e. Web-based Productivity Environment

f. Network Deployment (not under doc. scope)

4. Constitution of Moodle

Taskforce

School or college taskforce to conduct course

research, design, development, operationalization

and evaluation.

5. Course Operationalization

Process

Framing Operational Process for courses:

Administration, Management, Moderating,

Assessment and Analytics.

6. Framing Policy and

Guidelines

Framing user-based policy framework at

management level.



P a g e | 17

i. Project Plan and Budgetary Proposal

Note:Not under document scope.

ii. Steering Action Framework

Institution shall create Infrastructural Implementation Visionwith achievable Milestones and

Tasks. Tools such as Balanced Score Card (BCS) help to frame realistic and measurable goals and

indicators (Strategymap: BCS software, free for limited use) for project success. Also, the Project

Team identifies risks and limitations to address at every implementation stages. The Action

Framework may constitute, Service Personnel, Technology and Infrastructure Integration,

Project Execution Modalities, Summarizing and Reporting Mechanism, Keeping track of

Deliverables, Eliciting Innovative ideas for future enhancements and Assess Project Goals with

measurable achievements.

You will find useful project resources, guidelines and tips online to help manage your

institutional project in a business-like manner. You may also consider a project management

tool, for example, OpenProj (a simple project management tool) or choose a web-based complex

project management tools to address stipulations of Steering Action Framework.

iii. Technology Deliberations

a. Hardware and Software Requirements: On a Technology deliberation for Hardwarerequirement, one should consider the following aspects (completely subject to revision

as per institutional situations):

Hardware Aspects of Configuration (not exhaustive)

Server Processor, RAM ( critical performance factors) Hard Disk Space (1/ 2 TB, not GB) (real content challenge)

Multimedia Support (Monitor, Media Card, Speakers,

Scanner, Biometrics)

Networked Printer (restrictive use)

Clients (Staff Students

Computers)

Processor, RAM, Hard Disk (in GB)

Multimedia Support tools

Software Requirements (not exhaustive)

Server Operating System: (Choice of Windows/Linux)

Server Stack (Open Source): WAMP/LAMP

Database (Open Source): MySQL

Learning Management System: Moodle

Repository (Moodle supported)

Web Browsers (Internet Explorer, FireFox, Chrome)

Media and Flash Players

PDF Reader

Office Suite (ideal is MS Office)

Digital Library

Clients: Staff Students Operating System: (Windows)



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Computers Learning Management System: Moodle

Web Browsers (Internet Explorer, FireFox, Chrome

Media and Flash Players

PDF Reader

Office Suite (ideal is MS Office)

b. Implementation of Repository for Moodle: The repositories supported by

Moodle are Merlot II, Alfresco Repository (Community Edition), Google Drive,

Flickr Public, Picasa Web Album, Amazon S3, Dropbox, File system (FTP), Legacy

Course Files, Microsoft OneDrive (earlier, Skydrive), WebDAV and EQUELLA.

Note: It is advisable to choose a locally hosted repository than availing cloud-

based repositories.

Wiki (Educational Content Repository):A wiki is a web-based repository that supports

the easy creation and editing of any number of interlinked web pages using a simplifiedmarkup language or a WYSIWYG text editor, within a browser. The collaborative

encyclopedia Wikipedia is one of the best-known wikis. Wikis are typically used to

facilitate the exchange of information within and among teams or a user community.

Content in a wiki can be updated quickly, with little or no administrative intervention,

and being web-based, the content is available in real-time from anywhere.

However, like any other software tool, wikis have limitations that need to be understood

prior to making the decision to implement one. Benefits of Wiki are: Ease of Use,

Collaboration, Access Controls, Edit and Approval Cycles, Versioning and History. Wiki

needs to improve on issues such as Structure and Organization, Importing Content,

Multiple Output Limitations, Information Accuracy and Internally Focused (Info Pros,2009).

c. Acquisition of Course Development Toolkits: The common educational content

creation and hosting applications are:

Content Management System(CMS) Plone (http://plone.org)- open source teaching

environment and Joomla (the leading open source

CMS). Plone is suitable Content Management System

(CMS) for Educational Content and Services for Moodle

integration than with Joomla, Drupal or WordPress or

any other CMS.

Moodle HTML Editor (By default Tiny MCE) is a ubiquitous HTML editor in

Moodle. The settings of which can be defined by the

Moodle Administrator. With Moodle HTML Editor,

students/teachers can create content and apply

formats, create lists, insert links, table, images,

emoticons, audio, video, mathematical equation and

symbols, perform spell-checks, redo and undo like a

Word Processor. User can also switch between Full

Screen and Normal Screen; between HTML Source and

back.
http://plone.org/http://plone.org/http://plone.org/http://plone.org/



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Multimedia Authoring Adobe Creative Suite (Commercial, Expensive) and

Portable Apps (3D Blender, FotoSketcher, Inkscape,

LibreCAD, PDFTKBuilder, MuseScore, Marble,

Mnemosyne, Oposoft Video-Editor, PencilProject,

Songbird, Stellarium, VLC Player) and so on.

SCORM Content(Free) RELOAD, Recourse, eXe, MOS SOLO (MindOnSite),

XERTE Elearning, CourseLab, Microsoft Learning

Development System, eLML and so on.

HTML/XHTML Editors Dreamweaver (commercial), KompoZer, Amaya,

Bluegriffon and so on.

Assessment Tools Moodle Question Editor, iSpring Quiz Maker (Free),

HotPotatoes, QeDoc Quiz Maker and so on.

You can consider any of the above tools or only consider aforementioned

categories for better deliberations. Most of these tools are free to use and does

not burden financial allocations of institute or department.

d. Integration of Moodle Extensions: Moodle learning activities are useful for

Course Design, Students Activities, Teacher Tools, Multimedia and Games,

Students Counseling, Project Management, Communications, Rooms and ResourceManagement, Reports and Analytics and Document Management and Repository.

Moodle.org has got vast number of Modules, Blocks and Plugins (most of which are free

of charge for download and extend your Moodle educational capabilities. You may

consider Moodle Extensions that fits your educational need. You can find a selected list

of Moodle Extension under the following categories: Course Design, Student

Activities, Multimedia and Games, Teacher Tools, Learning Project Tools, StudentCounseling, Communications, Rooms and Resource Management, Reports and

Analytics and Document Management and Repository. SeeAppendix (C).

e. Web-based Productivity Environment: A redistributable, free-cloud, Web Office isideal for educational productivity environment accessible over web and mobile

extending eLearning services (Moodle) in a professional way. The UNG project is

developing UNG Docs is the Next Generation Web Office (in Prototype stage). It is

bundled-up with Calendar, UNG Docs (file manager), Text Editor, Spreadsheet Editor and

SVG Editor. The cloud tool has got basic functionality of modern Office Suites. UNG Docs

is pure Javascript, document-oriented, serverless interaction, data access abstraction

and content collaboration. It is useful to integrate a Web Office with Moodle services (as

External Tool) to have productive environment for students in collaborative learning

activities. For more detail, visit:http://www.ung-project.org/project/ungdoc

f. Network Deployment:Not under document scope.

iv. Constitution of Moodle Taskforce

A School or Higher Educational Institution, when for the first time setting-up a Moodle-oriented

educational infrastructure in the campus, should invest its deliberation on constituting a

Taskforce for successful follow-up of technology-aided initiatives. Here, the constitutedtaskforce is primarily (and only) for iterative course research, design, development,
http://www.ung-project.org/project/ungdochttp://www.ung-project.org/project/ungdochttp://www.ung-project.org/project/ungdochttp://www.ung-project.org/project/ungdoc



P a g e | 20

operationalization and impact evaluation. See Appendix (D) for Moodle Taskforce constitution

with Tasks, Roles and Responsibilities.

v. Course Operationalization Process

Every course project should address its operationalization process standardized by the

educational institutions. A Moodle-based course deployment manager may consider the

following process for implementation or tailor a successful course process available as standard

practices.

Operation Milestone Description

Course Administration Course Management Only Moodle Administrator can create a

course (or bulk courses), delete course(s),

taking periodic course backup, restoring

course backup, importing course data and

resetting a course.

Course Enrolment Admin enrolls users with several enrolment

methods; or unroll users (teachers and

students).

User Management Admin can create user groups, import user

groups and define cohorts.

Course Layout Admin/course teacher can customize

Moodle Layout using Blocks. Some of the

Standard Blocks are Main menu, Navigation,

Courses, Activities, Blog menu, Calendar,

Comments, Course completion status,

Course overview, Feedback, Latest news,

Messages, My private files, Recent activity,

Search forums and Upcoming events.

Course Content

Management

HTML Content Editor

(TinyMCE)

HTML Editor is used to create and update

content in Moodle. It features Toolbars that

can be customized. The tools includes Color

Pickers, Images and Media, File Upload,

Math Equation Editor, Character symbols,

emoticons, Tables and Spell Checker

Moodle Resources Book, File, IMS/SCORM Content Package,

Label, Page and URL.

Course Content

Management

It involves Working with Files, Repositories,

Portfolios, Working with Media, Filters,

Licenses and Plagiarism Prevention.



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Operation Milestone Description

Moderating Learning

Activities

Standard Activities Course-related learning activities supported

by Moodle are: Assignments, Chat, Choice,

Database, External tool, Feedback, Forum,

Glossary, Lesson, Quiz, SCORM, Survey,Wiki, and Workshop.

Assessment and

Evaluation

Quizzes Moodle Quiz comes with question types

namely, Calculated, Simple Calculated,

Calculated Multi-choice, Description, Essay,

Matching, Embedded Answers (Cloze),

Multiple Choice, Short-Answer, Numerical,

True/False, and Third-Party Question Types.

Student Performance Student Performance tracking is achieved in

Moodle using Gradebook. The Gradebookfeatures Settings, Scales, Grade Letters,

Import and Export and Learning Analytics

using Advanced Grading Method.

Learning Analytics Course Progress

Tracking and

Reporting

Teacher or Administrator works to track

progress of course-specific Activities and

their adherence, till course completion and

certification.

vi. Framing Policies and Guidelines for Moodle Usage

Basic roles in Moodle are: Administrator, Teacher, Student and Guest. However, you can create

new roles, such as,

Moderator: a person who can edit or delete a forum post;

Seminar-Leader: a student who can make activities in a single course, but cannot view

or change grades;

Quiz-maker: students can make quizzes but no other teacher functions;

Super-Teacher: a teacher with limited admin functions can add/edit users, etc.

Since assigning permission to roles is complex, you should read documentation in Moodle Docs.

You will assign *people* to the role you create in the specific context (i.e. course, not website),where they will use the role (Don Hinkelman et al., 2007).

The usual Policy focus would be Administrators, Teachers and Students. As an extraordinary

level, an institution may include 'Parents' as one of the Moodle users (usually, as guest users).

The below checklist can serve to consider, while framing Moodle Usage Policy for your

school/college.

a) Policy Consideration for Administrators

Administrators' policy is to be framed based on the aspects of responsibilities that Admin finds

suitable in congruence with Moodle-based educational services.



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Policy Scope Policy Pointers

Installation, Upgrading &

Management

Apache Server, PHP, MySQL Database (LAMP/WAMP)

Moodle Web Hosting and Maintenances

Software and Tools pertaining to School/College

Educational Initiative

Moodle Administration Moodle Website Configurations Policy

Main Configuration Properties

Settings

Themes (appearance)

Language

Modules of learning activities (hide, unhide, installing,

removing)

Blocks of learning information (hide, unhide, installing,

removing)

Controlling Moodle Services Glossary Auto-lining terms Resource/Activity/Wiki Names Auto-linking

AlgebraTeX notation

Multimedia Plugins

Word Censorship (posting abusive words in Moodle)

Multi-language content (multi-lingual support)

Email Protection (against spam)

User Management Activities Authentication and (username, password policy)

Add, Edit, Upload User accounts (management,

teacher, student, parents, guest...)

Enrolments (internal and External) User Assignments (as teacher, course creator,

students)

Course Management Creation of Course Categories

Generating Course Logs (course and student, date-

wise or specific activity reports)

File Management Managing Site files (creating folders, uploading,

moving, deleting and zipping files)

File Format Support and Maximum File Size (site-wide)

Backup Courses and user data for reuse

Security Measures Hacking

Site Policy Violations

Help Desk Course Support Services

Help Manuals (teachers and students)

Issue-Tracking (troubleshooting)

Suggestions and Grievances Forum



P a g e | 23

b) Policy Considerations for Teachers


Profile Update Updating Teacher Profile

Course Administration Course Settings and Editing Course Maximum File Size (for upload)

Course Plan and Course Page

Design

Moodle Layout Design (blocks, labels, content

sections arrangements)

Choice of Course Format (topic, week, social, etc.)

Course Content Management

Services

Use of Resources (label, image, video, web page,

hyperlink) in Moodle

Manage Course Files (uploaded)

Class Activities Administration Norms for Learning Activities (assignments, forums

and forum participations, wiki, blog, glossary, chat,choice, journal, quiz, workshop, etc.)

Assessments Assessment (quiz creation, question categories,

question bank)

Grade Strategy

Grade (grading activities)

Backup and Restore Course Backup

Course Restore

Evaluation and Reporting Course Logs (students activities)

Survey and Feedbacks

Teacher Communication Students

Peer Teachers

Administrator (Moodle)

License and Copyrights Use of Educational Content

Use of third-party Educational Tools

Source:(Baker University School of Professional and Graduate Studies, 2010)

c) Policy Considerations for Students


Personal Data Student Registration in Moodle

Profile (name, image, contact data) in Moodle

Personal Blog

Course Access Enrolment in Course

Communications Behaviors Forums (Post, Wikis)

Messaging (Chat, SMS)



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Student Participation In Learning Activities: Wiki, Database, Glossary,

Workshop, etc.

Assessment Grade Regulations

Academic Violations Plagiarism, etc.

Student IT Ethics Hacking

Spam

Moodle Access Violation

Abusive Content (word, image, Audio/Visual)

Online Stalking

Cyber Bullying

Abuse of Social Networking External Tools, etc.

Source:(Crawford, 2009)



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15. Moodle Resources Online

Official Sites

Official Websitehttp://moodle.org

Moodle Releases and Extensions (Plugin, Blocks, Modules) Downloads

http://download.moodle.org

Moodle Documentations (For Moodle Training Content)

http://docs.moodle.org/25/en/Main_page

Discussion Forum (Teaching with Moodle)

https://moodle.org/mod/forum/view.php?id=41

Open Educational Resources (free and licensed courses on various domains)

URL:www.moodle.net

Moodle Help Manual (on Installation of Moodle)

http://localhost/moodle/help.php?file=index.html

eBooks on Moodle

Jason Cole and Helen Foster, Using Moodle: Teaching with the Popular Open Source Course

Management System, 2nd Edition, O'Reilly Community Press, Cambridge, 2008.

Radana Dvorak, Moodle for Dummies, Wiley Publishing. Inc., Indianapolis, 2011.

William Rice, Moodle, Elearning Course Development: A Complete Gide to Successful Learning

Using Moodle, Packt Publishing,

http://www.packtpub.com/moodle/book/mse

Brandon Hall Research, Learning Technology Products 2009: Authoring Tools, Learning

Management Systems, and Learning Content Management Systems, March 2009.

www.brandon-hall.com

Michael Spector, David Merrill and et al, Handbook of Research on Educational Communications

and Technology, 3rd Edition, Taylor and Francis Group, New York, 2008.

http://www.taylorandfrancis.com

Jan-Martin Lowendahl, Hype Cycle for Education-2013, Gartner, Inc. G00251104.

https://www.gartner.com/doc/2559615

Presentations and Demonstrations

Teacher Demoshttp://demo.moodle.com
http://moodle.org/http://moodle.org/http://download.moodle.org/http://download.moodle.org/http://docs.moodle.org/25/en/Main_pagehttp://docs.moodle.org/25/en/Main_pagehttps://moodle.org/mod/forum/view.php?id=41https://moodle.org/mod/forum/view.php?id=41http://www.moodle.net/http://www.moodle.net/http://www.moodle.net/http://localhost/moodle/help.php?file=index.htmlhttp://localhost/moodle/help.php?file=index.htmlhttp://www.packtpub.com/moodle/book/msehttp://www.packtpub.com/moodle/book/msehttp://www.brandon-hall.com/http://www.brandon-hall.com/http://www.taylorandfrancis.com/http://www.taylorandfrancis.com/https://www.gartner.com/doc/2559615https://www.gartner.com/doc/2559615http://demo.moodle.com/http://demo.moodle.com/http://demo.moodle.com/https://www.gartner.com/doc/2559615http://www.taylorandfrancis.com/http://www.brandon-hall.com/http://www.packtpub.com/moodle/book/msehttp://localhost/moodle/help.php?file=index.htmlhttp://www.moodle.net/https://moodle.org/mod/forum/view.php?id=41http://docs.moodle.org/25/en/Main_pagehttp://download.moodle.org/http://moodle.org/



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How To

http://www.howtomoodle.com

Moodle Presentations

http://docs.moodle.org/26/en/Moodle_presentations

Moodle Online demonstration Websites (Mount Orange School, Moodle Sandbox, QA Testing

Site)

https://moodle.org/demo

105 Free Moodle Video Tutorials

http://elearningindustry.com/105-free-moodle-video-tutorials

40+ Great Moodle Tutorials for Teachers and Students

http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2013/01/40-great-moodle-tutorials-for-teachers.html

Moodle Video Courses and Tutorials from lynda.com

http://www.lynda.com/Moodle-training-tutorials/257-0.html

Moodlerooms Video

http://www.youtube.com/user/MoodleroomsVideo

Free Online Moodle Tutorials

http://www.wiziq.com/tutorials/moodle

Faculty Moodle Guide

http://www.law.lsu.edu/medialib/tutorials/moodle/Faculty_Moodle_Guide.html
http://www.howtomoodle.com/http://www.howtomoodle.com/http://docs.moodle.org/26/en/Moodle_presentationshttp://docs.moodle.org/26/en/Moodle_presentationshttps://moodle.org/demohttps://moodle.org/demohttp://elearningindustry.com/105-free-moodle-video-tutorialshttp://elearningindustry.com/105-free-moodle-video-tutorialshttp://www.educatorstechnology.com/2013/01/40-great-moodle-tutorials-for-teachers.htmlhttp://www.educatorstechnology.com/2013/01/40-great-moodle-tutorials-for-teachers.htmlhttp://www.lynda.com/Moodle-training-tutorials/257-0.htmlhttp://www.lynda.com/Moodle-training-tutorials/257-0.htmlhttp://www.youtube.com/user/MoodleroomsVideohttp://www.youtube.com/user/MoodleroomsVideohttp://www.wiziq.com/tutorials/moodlehttp://www.wiziq.com/tutorials/moodlehttp://www.law.lsu.edu/medialib/tutorials/moodle/Faculty_Moodle_Guide.htmlhttp://www.law.lsu.edu/medialib/tutorials/moodle/Faculty_Moodle_Guide.htmlhttp://www.law.lsu.edu/medialib/tutorials/moodle/Faculty_Moodle_Guide.htmlhttp://www.wiziq.com/tutorials/moodlehttp://www.youtube.com/user/MoodleroomsVideohttp://www.lynda.com/Moodle-training-tutorials/257-0.htmlhttp://www.educatorstechnology.com/2013/01/40-great-moodle-tutorials-for-teachers.htmlhttp://elearningindustry.com/105-free-moodle-video-tutorialshttps://moodle.org/demohttp://docs.moodle.org/26/en/Moodle_presentationshttp://www.howtomoodle.com/



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References

Key Standards Organisations.(2008). Retrieved from http://www.aictec.edu.au/aictec/browse

Mobile App.(2014). Retrieved from Moodle Docs: http://docs.moodle.org/en/Mobile_app.

Moodle Docs.(2014). Retrieved from Moodle.org: http://docs.moodle.org/25/en/Main_page

Open Educational Resources.(2014). Retrieved from Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_educational_resources

Baker University School of Professional and Graduate Studies. (2010). Faculty Moodle Tutorial.

Bhavsar, J. M. (2006). Moodle Support for SCORM.Retrieved from mailto: [email protected]

Bryan Williams, M. R. (2005). Moodle For Teachers, Trainers and Administrators.Free Software

Foundation, Inc.

Catterson, A. (2004). Understanding the Implications of Elearning in Higher Education Using Moodle.

Paper presented to the Department of Instructional Design and Technology.Emporia State

University.

Crawford, S. (2009). Moodle: A Student Guide to Using Moodle.Oshki Education and Training

Institute.

Don Hinkelman et al. (2007). Tailoring Moodle to Your Own Needs.JALTCALL International

Conference.Tokyo: Waseda University.

Info Pros. (2009, August). Understanding Wikis: Solution for Your Documentation Needs?

Whitepaper.

Low, N. S. (March 2002). IMS Question and Test Interoperability: An Idiots Guide, Version 0.5.CETIS

Assessment Special Interest Group.

Lowendahl, J.-M. (2013). Hype Cycle for Education-2013.Retrieved from Gartner, Inc.:

www.gartner.com

Mungo, R. (2005). The Case For Moodle: Using Moodle for Course and Content Management in 21st

Century Schools and Organizations.

Rehak, D. (2003). eLearning Standards, Questions, Decisions, Actions. Carnegie Mellon University.

Smith, D. (2005). Using Your Moodle.

Williams, B. (2007). Introducing... Moodle! PowerPoint Presentation. www.moodle.com. Retrieved

from www.moodle.com



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Appendices

(A)Moodle Usage Statistics

(B) Standard Learning Activities

(C)Moodle Extensions

(D)Moodle Taskforce

(A) Moodle Usage Statistics

Statistics as on June 02, 2014

ITEM STATISTICS

Registered Moodle Websites 64,219

Countries 235

Courses 7,416,969

Users 71,247,429

Teachers 1,155,559

Enrolments 100,934,311

Forum Posts 129,206,480

Resources 68,398,217

Quiz Questions 215,606,132

Source:https://moodle.org/stats
http://moodle.org/sites/http://moodle.org/sites/http://moodle.org/sites/https://moodle.org/statshttps://moodle.org/statshttps://moodle.org/statshttps://moodle.org/statshttp://moodle.org/sites/http://moodle.org/sites/



P a g e | 29

(B) Standard Learning Activities

Assignment Is an activity that allows students to submit (online), files like Microsoft Word,PowerPoint, Excel or any other file format. Moodle can be used for Offline

assignment submission in the classroom, as well. Optionally, Assignments can be

graded on submission for assessment. Creating Assignment activity in Moodle

requires following:

Assignment Name, Description, Assignment Type, Allow Resubmitting, Grade, Maximum (File)

Size, Due Date

Chat Students and Teachers can participate in real-time synchronous communication inMoodle. Classroom chat, usually in a distance education, is useful to better

understand topics or concepts in a course. Chat can be moderated and past sessions

can be viewed or downloaded for analysis and decisions. Chat time and date is

displayed automatically in Course Calendar.

Chat Name, Description, Display Description on Course, Chat Sessions

Database Is an activity for both teacher and students to build, display and search a set ofrecord or entries on a given topic in a course. The format and structure of database

entries (records) is almost unlimited. Users can include numbers, text, images, files

and URLs.

Database Name, Description, Entries (fields), Availability (Data and Time)

Choice In Choice, Teacher(s) posts a question with a choice of multiple responses duringclassroom (online)/lab session on a topic. Students respond to the question as a

quick poll. Choices are useful for voting on a course activities or provide feedback

for a research. Results can be viewed by students and teachers.

Choice Name, Description, Display mode, Allow choice to be updated, Limit number of responses,

Availability, Restrict answering, Results, Publish results, Privacy of results

Forum Students and Teachers participate in discussion on a given course topic. Discussion isinitiated by teacher(s) and students submit their questions and answers as posts,

sometimes with attachments. Discussions help to construct and share new

knowledge. The posts are given peer/teacher rating for auto-grading. Discussion

Posts can optionally be forwarded as email to teacher/students.

Forum Name, Forum Description, Forum Type, Attachments and Word Count, Subscription and

tracking, RSS Feed, Post Threshold for blocking, Grade, Ratings, Roles with permission to rate,

Group Mode

Glossary Is a kind of collaborative dictionary, relevant to Course that students would like tolookup into. Students can submit new terms with definition (and comments) that are

reviewed, approved and graded by teachers. Glossary entries are exportable to

another course in Moodle. Terms in Glossary are auto-linked into words occurrences

throughout the course with pop-up glossary definition.

Glossary Name, Glossary Description, Is this glossary global?, Glossary type, Glossary Entries,

Appearance Settings

Lesson Is a Web (HTML) content having multiple pages simulating self-paced learning. Eachpage features a question and a set of answers. Based on student comprehensions,



P a g e | 30

lesson can progress to next page or back to previous page. Students are assessed for

their knowledge and comprehension of the subjects based on their responses to

questions. Lesson helps to apply teacher-tailored, Learning Path (a.k.a. learning

design), workflow fashion. A typical Lesson page contains: Page Title, Page Contents,

Answer 1, Response, and Jump to (next/previous page).

Lesson Name, Appearances, Availability, Lesson Flow control, Grades, Password protected lesson,Prerequisite Lesson

Quiz Moodle features in-built Quiz Editor to design and conduct online objective-type

assessments. Quiz Editor supports Multiple Choice Questions, True/False Questions,

Short Answer Question, Numerical Question, Matching Question, Description

Question, Random Set, Random Short Answer, and Embedded Question (Cloze).

Questions are kept categorized in Question Bank to be re-used in a course or

exported to another course. Students are allowed to attempt more than once,

depending on teacher's choice and receive feedback for correct answers. On

completion of a test, grade is automatically marked. Moodle supports questions

from Blackboard, WebCT and IMS QTI, AON, GIFT, IMS/QTI and Missing wordformat.

Name, Description, Timing, Grade, Layout, Question behavior, Review Options, Appearance, Extra

restrictions on attempts, Overall feedback

SCORM 1.2 SCORM activity in Moodle allows teacher to upload SCORM 1.2 package as learningactivity in the course. On completion of their attempts on SCORM Content Package,

students are awarded grades, based on their performances. SCORM Content

Package is created using third party applications, many of them are free/open

source.

Name, Description, Display description on the course page, Package, Appearance, Attempts

management, Compatibility settings

Survey Moodle provides pre-defined survey instruments capable of assessing andstimulating students' learning. Teachers gather data from students to learn class

performance and their teaching impact. The available surveys are ATTLS (20 item

version), Critical incidents, COLLES (actual), COLLES (preferred and actual), COLLES

(preferred). However, Teacher can opt to create their feedbacks instruments with

several Feedback extensions available in Moodle.

Name, Survey type, Description, Display description on the course page, COLLES - Constructivist

On-Line Learning Environment Survey, ATTLS - Attitudes to Thinking Learning Survey

Wiki Students or Teachers work as a group or as individual on Wiki activity to create webpages and change content. Every revision of content is maintained (never get

deleted) and any version can be restored again. Moodle wiki is based on Erfurt Wiki

which uses HTML Editor (TinyMCE) to customize pages. Wiki is a great collaborative

tool for students as well as teachers in authoring learning content. Wiki wiki in

Hawaiian language is "superfast". Wiki is a simple HTML-oriented markup language

to create and edit web content within web browser. Every modification of content is

versioned with editor name and can be reviewed for acceptance or revert to original

content. Wikis are open to general public (anyone can edit/contribute).

Wiki name, Wiki mode, Wiki description, Display description on course page, First page name,

Format.



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Workshop Is a peer assessment activity with number of choices for student to assess students'project works. It provides greater students' participation effort and yes, has a

learning curve.

Name, Description, Display description on the course page, Grading settings, Grading Strategy,

Grade for Submission, Grade for Assessment, Decimal places in grade, Submission settings,

Maximum File Size, Assessment Settings, Feedback

Feedback Using Feedback, teachers can create and conduct surveys to collectstudents/teachers' feedback. Unlike Survey took, Feedback module allows you to

create questions, using list of pre-written questions. Feedback module helps you

create non-graded questions, which is not possible in Quiz tool. Feedback activity is

ideal for Learning Outcome, Student/Teacher Performance and Course Evaluation.

Feedback Name, Description, Availability (Allow answers from date), Allow answers to date,

Question and submission settings, Show analysis page, Completion message

Journal Journal is a private communication for students to reflect on a course topic/concept.

Students edit and perfect their answers over a time. Responses are private and onlyteacher reads and offer feedback with grade on a journal entry. It is a good teaching

practice to have one journal activity every week.

Book Module allows you to setup indexed multi-page study material very useful forpresenting non-linear content (e.g. PowerPoint or Web Pages). Chapters are

numbered and content sections are titled. Students are allowed to print book

content (Bryan Williams, 2005).



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(C) Moodle Extensions

All these extensions are downloadable atwww.moodle.org

Course Design

Learning Outcome Wizard The Learning Outcome Wizard is a plug-in to help lecturers choose

which activities to add to their course based on intended learning

outcomes for the course. This is the main components to the plug-

in, the wizard. There are also two support plugins the generator

and the outcome sequence list page.

Learning Outcome Generator The generator of flowcharts for use in the Learning Outcome

Wizard. The Learning Outcome Wizard is a plug-in to help

lecturers choose which activities to add to their course based on

intended learning outcomes. This is done in cooperation with

educational developers that create sequences based on research

into pedagogy. Lecturers can easily step through these sequences

and eventually be taken to the appropriate activity creation page.

This plug-in was created to replace existing sequences that were

difficult and time-consuming to manually generate. There are

three main components to the plug-in, the wizard, the generator

and the sequence list page.

Learning Outcome Sequence List The Learning Outcome Wizard is a plug-in to help lecturers choose

which activities to add to their course based on intended learning

outcomes for the course. There are three main components to the

plug-in, the wizard, the generator and the sequence list page.

Learning Plan This plugin serves as a database and plan for all learning activities

in the organization for a structured learning program, including

management reports.

Lesson objectives Displays current lesson objectives in the side-bar. Ability to display

a large version of the objectives, when teaching from the front of

a class room (click on the 'expand' icon). Students can view all the

objectives, a week at a time, to help keep track of what they have

been doing (and will be doing).

Student Activities

Mindmap / Advanced Mindmap The advance Mindmap module enables students create Mindmap

in Moodle as learning activity.

Flash Card Set The flash card set enables teacher to organize learning content as

decks of cards which can be viewed in an interactive and

interesting way.

Realtime Quiz This is a type of quiz designed to be used in face-to-face lessons,

with a classroom full of computers.

FN - My Progress The Progress Report block provides students with an overview of

their progress in regards to activities in a given course.
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Progress Bar A time management tool for you and your students; A time-

management tool for students, Shows progress in activities /

resources, Color coded to quickly see completed / viewed,

Teachers select which pre-existing activities / resources are to be

included, Order by times / deadlines or order in course, Overview

page shows teachers the progress of all students.

Multimedia and Games

Eduplayer The eduplayer module allows to playback .mp4, .flv video files and

.mp3, .m4a audio files

MDID The Madison Digital Image Database (MDID) is a freely distributed,

open source web application developed at James Madison

University. MDID is a digital media management system with

sophisticated tools for discovering, aggregating, and presenting

digital media in a wide variety of learning spaces.

Lightbox Gallery This resource allows you to create 'Lightbox' enabled imagegalleries within your Moodle course. As a course teacher, you are

able to create, edit and delete galleries. Smallthumbnails will then

be generated, which are used for the thumbnail view of the gallery.

Games The game module enables students engage in Hangman,

Crossword, Cryptex, Millionaire, Sudoku, Snakes and Ladders,

Hidden Picture, Book with questions.

Mootyper MooTyper implements the typing instructor functionality into

Moodle.

oohoo - Text to Speech OOHOO Text to Speech is a Moodle block that reads out loud the

content of a resource. This block adds text to speech functionality

to Moodle.

SWF The SWF Activity Module is a Moodle plugin extension for

deploying Flash learning applications, also known as Flash

templates.

Teacher Tools

Crot Plagiarism Checker FREE plugin is aimed at digital plagiarism detection: it uncovers

assignments copied from peers at the same institution. The module

is language independent and standalone.

Question Practice The basic idea is that the teacher sets up a bank of questionsorganized into categories. Then the student can then choose what

questions they want to practice when. This is about student-

centered learning based on the capabilities of the Moodle question

bank.

Teacher Diary Teacher diary allows teachers to write a summary for each lecture

they have adding the amount of time they spent on that. for

Moodle 1.9.

Appointments This block provides a form for teachers to book 1 to 1

appointments with Students on a class. The student can be notified

of the appointment, and it will be added to both users' calendars.



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Scheduler An appointment scheduler for planning face-to-face meetings

between teachers and students. Teachers can set up time slots,

and students can choose one of these on Moodle.

Enrolment Key Generator Enrolment Key Generator (EKG) is an administrative block (usable

by teachers and above) which creates random course enrolment

keys from lists of words, but with a number of configurationoptions if you are not keen on the defaults.

Learning Project Tools

Technical Project Managing Technology Projects (Science, Computers or Arts) as part

for learning activity.

PBLTool This block implements a project management tool create to be

used with collaborative learning. It is integrated with group forum

and chat. The main idea is that students and teacher plan their

activities together.

Student Counseling

My Mentors Shows a students mentors/parents with profile picture, messaging

link, and online status.

My Mentees This block is a feature-rich version of the core Mentees block.

Student profile picture: Online status indicator, Links to student's

grades, forum posts, and blog posts and Messaging link.

Communications

jMail jMail is an internal mailing (a.k.a. internal email) tool for Moodle 2.

It supports features like: labels (folders), attachments, reply,

forward, print, read and unread messages, etc... This plugin doesn't

work in Moodle 2.0.

Rooms and Resource Management

MRBS Based on the stand-alone MRBS project

(http://mrbs.sourceforge.net), this allows users to book rooms and

other resources from within Moodle. Resource Scheduling.

Reports and Analytics

Certificate The certificate module enables teachers to design and issue

certificate online for the students.

Configurable Reports This block is a Moodle custom reports builder. You can create

custom reports without SQL knowledge. It's a tool suitable for

admins or teachers.

Activity track This block show the total no. of activities pending and completed in

percentage and number in a course where course completion is

activated.
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My Stats A student dashboard for the My Moodle page. Shows statistics

about site-wide student activity. Shows charts and statistics for

forums, quizzes, blog posts, and more.

Analytics and Recommendations The Analytics and Recommendations block is a tool for students

and teachers. It visually shows the student participation in each

course activity and it shows recommendations for students aboutwhat activities they should work to improve their final grade.

Dashboard Graphic, one query dashboard element using MIT library JQplot

and other libraries. The dashboard element bloc is of use with

flexible Moodle page formats allowing free setup of the dashboard

page layout using blocks. Data table output, Graphic plotting using

JQPlot, Geographic plotting (using GoogleMaps API), and Time

special plotting: Integrating SIMILE Timeline plugin, Data output

additional features, Performance features.

Document Management and RepositoryShared Resource Shared resource provides Moodle with a full-featured central

resource repository handling full indexing with LOM based

metadata schemas. Central library front-end and search engine.

GroupDocs GroupDocs is a next generation Document Management solution

that makes it easier for businesses to collaborate, share and work

with documents online. So, organize, view, annotate, compare,

assemble and share all your documents with Moodle. This block

was created to provide Moodle users with a modern PDF / PPT /

DOC / DOCX Viewer.

GroupDocs Annotation The Moodle GroupDocs Annotation extension lets you embed

documents complete with GroupDocs Annotation into Moodlesites. GroupDocs Annotation is an online application for annotating

and commenting on documents. With this powerful tool, teachers

and students can

Introducing Moodle Implementation: In K12 and Higher Educational Institutions

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