Hello, everyone!
I am looking forward to teaching online courses on moodle! Anyways, since I am new, I was wondering if anyone could tell me how the best way is to basically start up teaching communication courses to students would be? Thanks!
In reply to Jason Becker
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Thanks for the advice Alan! Anyways, as I was asking Wayne in the discussion forum, what is the best method, in your opinion, of attracting new students to my courses? When I teach online for my local college online, I don't have to recruit any students, because I'm employed by them, whereas here with Moodle, I plan on offering my own communication courses to the general public (meaning students from all over the world), so I was just wondering some of the ways you might suggest I use?
Also, I've taught online for three years now, teaching via Blackboard, Angel and Desire to Learn (D2L), but no Moodle. Since Moodle is free to use, I thought it would be a great idea to start some online college communication courses to students that wish to take them and improve their skills. In saying that, I was also wondering about any accreditation relating to courses on Moodle, including the ones I plan on offering? Thanks!
Hi Jason,
Interesting discussion. Try 'advertising ' your free courses on Moodle Share
Thanks John for your input, I really appreciate it. What's Moodle Share? Is that on Moodle's site? Also, I love the idea of advertising my courses, but the question I have is, do I not charge for any of my courses at first, and then eventually charge after establishing credibility? Thanks!
Perhaps this is not the right area to discuss business promotion....
try http://moodle.org/course/view.php?id=32
Moodle Share is for admin users not end users....go across to the Moodle for Business. cheers
Jason,
One of the best ways to learn about teaching with Moodle is to attend one of the Moodle Moots (conferences) where you can engage with other Moodlers and participate in workshops and presentations.
Montana Moot, May 30 - June 1: http://www.mountainmoot.com/
Midwest Moodle Moot, July 25-27: http://midwestmoot.com/
West Coast Moot, July 31- Aug 3: http://www.moot-us.com/home
There are also excellent books about teaching with Moodle- check Amazon.com and Packt Publishing (http://www.packtpub.com/books/moodle)
-Floyd
And don't forget the iMoot this weekend - I'm sure its not too late to register!
Thanks Floyd! Is there any training of this sort online by any chance? I've taught online for the past three years via Blackboard, Angel and Desire to Learn (D2L), but not Moodle. I'm comfortable with teaching online as I've done it long enough and noticed that Moodle is free to teach on and I thought it'd be a great opportunity to offer college-level communication courses for students across the globe that want improve their skills.
Thanks for your input!
Jason,
The Moodle Partners have online training. Three I'm familiar with are Remote-Learner, HRDNZ (New Zealand) and Moodlerooms. Moodlerooms has branded their Moodle product as joule; there will be some differences between their version and plain core Moodle.
Lynda.com has excellent videos on how to use Moodle, and you will find a lot of videos on YouTube.
-Floyd
Thanks Floyd! I'll definitely check into this.
Hi Jason and welcome to Moodle!
If you're not familiar with elearning, it's well worth reading up on some of the differences between face to face and distance learning. The best work I know of is at the University of Alberta led by Randy Garrison, Terry Anderson and Walter Archer: http://communitiesofinquiry.com
You'll also have to work out which learning and teaching approaches work best for your learners. Be prepared to make a lot of mistakes - it's a long and difficult learning curve, a bit like learning to teach all over again. Having support and feedback from your learners is invaluable and I've found that it's much easier to get on an informal basis, face to face with learners in a blended learning (i.e. part online, part face to face) context.
For a theoretical grounding on Moodle and why it is how it is and elearning in general, you can read Martin Dougiamas' and others' papers and articles : http://lsn.curtin.edu.au/tlf/tlf2000/contents.html
For some Moodle "How to guides" and quick starters, I think, among these books, you might be able to find something useful: http://www.packtpub.com/books/moodle
I hope this helps!
Matt,
Thanks for the advice, really appreciate it! Anyways, as I forgot to mention, I have taught online for three years now, teaching on formats, such as Angel, Blackboard and Desire to Learn (D2L). However, I haven't yet taught online via Moodle and am excited about it.
The difference, however for me is that I teach online for colleges using those different formats and am employed by them and with Moodle, I plan on offering my own online communication classes for those students (college) that want to improve on their skills.
For me personally, I'm a quick tech learner and shouldn't have too much trouble getting used to Moodle, but just want some effective guidance before I jump right into it. Thanks Matt, talk to you soon.
Hey, Jason! Welcome to the Moodle extended family! It looks like you've already gotten some good advice and recommendations.
I'm a classroom teacher who's been working with Moodle for a few years, and have helped a few other teachers who were getting into Moodle. The way I suggest you get some experience is to dip your toe into the waters before you dive full-tilt-boogie in and get over your head, literally and figuratively.
Since you didn't say which version of Moodle you're going to be using, it's hard to refer you to a specific book - if it happens to be version 1.9, I'd suggest you get Jason Cole's book: Using Moodle. For version 2 and up, I'm trying to learn the books as well, so someone else will have to point to a good reference.
What I have my trainees do is to decide the first way they want to use Moodle - and usually it's as a bulletin board, where students can get reference materials (Word docs, .pdf's, movies, references to other web pages, audio files, etc.). That will get you used to figuring out how to upload materials, set 'em up for downloading or reading online, and getting the students into Moodle (there are several ways of students enrolling and getting into your class, for example), and getting them where they're comfortable using the Bulletin Board.
Running quizzes is often the next thing - learning the different styles of quizzes, and learning the ways to input the questions (Moodle offers a web interface for doing questions one by one, and there's also a format called GIFT, where you use a text editor to type your questions/answers in a specific format, and upload them all at one time - quite a time saver over the web interface, for example).
After all that, you're probably ready to experiment some with the different types of activities and other things to do, diving into the book to see how to do it, and how to fix the things that inevitably go wrong. But, in no time flat, you'll find that Moodle has become an indespensible aide to your teaching.
Anyway - the major hint is to not try to do everything all at once, and to lean on your fellow Moodlers, whether they're local, or virtual neighbors!
How's that?
Wayne
Wayne,
Thanks for the advice, I really appreciate it! I will definitely take it smoothly and get used to everything before I go full tilt. Anyways, I have been teaching online for three years now, using online formats, such as Angel, Blackboard and Desire to Learn (D2L), but this is my first time with Moodle.
Also, with those online formats, I was teaching for different universities, whereas with Moodle. I plan on offering my own communication classes on my own time, so I'm just trying to get some advice from that standpoint.
I was also wondering, at least in your experiences with Moodle, how to attract and get students to sign up for my courses. And then do you charge those students to take those courses? In your opinion, what's the best way to attract new students to my Moodle courses? When I teach online for the different colleges, I don't have to recruit students, whereas I will have to for my own courses on Moodle. Any suggestions? Thanks!
Well, in my case, since I teach at a public high school, the students were instructed to enroll in my Moodle class, and weren't given much choice in the matter if they wanted to pass the course.