Future of content production: lesson module, quiz questions and book module

Future of content production: lesson module, quiz questions and book module

by Ralf Hilgenstock -
Number of replies: 6
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Hello

I will try to start a discussion about future of content production within Moodle. For a long time there isn't a maintainer for the lesson module driving development.

Here's a list of problems:

  • import from powerpoint is not working for complex ppt files, included graphics and  languages with special characters
  • questions from Moodle course can't be used in lesson
  • inattractive question pages
  • lesson pages are not fully designable by theme
  • lots more

Since lesson module development some things changed:

  • quiz questions are independent from quizes and can be used for other activities
  • quiz module was standardized with 2.1
  • book module was developed for creating multi page documents with two level hierarchy by Petr.
  • expectations for content presentation by students have changed dramatically

Thinking about  content production within Moodle I see requirements for these features:

  • system with page templates for simply editing content
  • adding page background for visual attractive pages
  • tree hierarchy for pages
  • access to questions in system (same question types as in quizzes)
  • export of lessons to IMS Content package, SCORM 1.2, Common cartridge
  • resuability of lesson pages between lessons.

I would like to read if there are other requirements and if it will be possible to restart development of a content creation tool within Moodle. Please contact me if you see options for funding such development.

Ralf

 

 

 

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In reply to Ralf Hilgenstock

Re: Future of content production: lesson module, quiz questions and book module

by António Gonçalves -

Thank you Ralf for this message.

This last items that you mentioned are ver very very interesting issues, specially the "tree hierarchy..." and the last one, because the reusability its critical in MOODLE: in my opinion its the fragile part of it. But, since I do not use MOODLE 2.0 yet, I don't know what is new with the LESSON.

The tree its very important, because when you try to apply a educational instructional design its crucial to have it in order to follow the design principles and, second, to create alternative paths to fulfill the adaptative environment principle without being lost.

There is a third and fourth point, in my opinion, its the grade part, the lesson designer doesn't have total control of it and the browser issue: in IE same questions don't work, we have to use MOZZILA or CHROME.

Perhaps this are issues to put on Moodle Tracker. What do you think, MOODLER?

Thanks

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In reply to António Gonçalves

Re: Future of content production: lesson module, quiz questions and book module

by Ralf Hilgenstock -
Picture of Core developers Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Translators

Hi Antiono,

personally I wasn't aware of problems with IE and question types.

Give Moodle 2.0 a chance specially the conditional activities that allow to create the whole course as a learning path. You can define for each ressource and for each activity requirements for access based on time or other activities. For this you can define when an predecessing avctivity is ready.

The whole course also gets an menu in tree view. May be that this covers soem of your needs.

 

Ralf

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In reply to Ralf Hilgenstock

Re: Future of content production: lesson module, quiz questions and book module

by Astrid Davine -

I'm not sure if you're interested in this feedback in this forum, but...

Our organisation is about to move to Moodle 2 (from WebCT), and now that I have a test site, I was really excited to play around with the Lesson module.  It is very close to meeting our needs re: presenting PBL/Medical cases.  The major issue is that we cannot auto-grade the essays.

We want to use these cases for self-assessment/self-directed type learning and just present a model answer as the feedback for their essay input, as well as record their submission in the GradeBook.  The short answer (with a *wildcard to enable grading) isn't large enough (and currently not all of the student response is captured in the Lesson report).  If we could numerically auto-grade the essays (as well as record their answer) it would solve our problem, but our best case scenario would be an option where the grade for each essay (and the Lesson) just says 'Completed' or 'Submitted' or something similar.

A Lesson report (downloadable to Excel, etc.) that then gave a summary of each student's submission and their answers would also be required.

I believe auto-grading essay questions has been mentioned in the Quiz forum, but for us, the recording and reporting of student responses (within Lesson reports and GradeBook) is also important.

Thanks, Astrid

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In reply to Astrid Davine

Re: Future of content production: lesson module, quiz questions and book module

by Ralf Hilgenstock -
Picture of Core developers Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Translators

Hello Astrid,

yes really an interesting scenario. I'm not a programmer, but I think its a new type of question.

Lets try requirements now and then we will see.

ralf

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In reply to Astrid Davine

Re: Future of content production: lesson module, quiz questions and book module

by Sandra King -

This may not be the best answer but if anyone else is out there with this problem, the simple answer is to change the maximum size of your short answer field.  We did this in the database, and you may also want to change the type of text box for short answers.

 

Sandra

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In reply to Ralf Hilgenstock

Re: Future of content production: lesson module, quiz questions and book module

by Itamar Tzadok -

The database activity already offers page templates for content editing. Thus for instance it may be used for constructing a book (well, not really the database activity as we know it, but an improved version of it wink). An entry template with a title field and a content field makes for a simple content page. The collection of entries can constitute the book pages. One challenge is the multi-level hierarchy (compare with the 2-level hierarchy of the book module). The challenge is not so much with the tree view as it is with constructing the hierarchy. Here is a preliminary attempt:

 

 

Of course the TOC will consist of links to the chapters/pages which may be displayed one or more per page according to settings.

This is just a stub and much more could be done, more or less work depending on what yui 3 can offer us.

smile

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