Will Nanogong have to adapt from Java to another platform?

Re: Will Nanogong have to adapt from Java to another platform?

by Matt Bury -
Number of replies: 2
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Hi again Paul,

I've tried out all the plugins you've listed, though not with learners yet, and everything works smoothly, logically and easily. I actually think it's an improvement on the Nanogong plugins because #1 - The audio is transcoded to MP3 so it's easier to incorporate into other activities and uses the standard Moodle audio embed features, #2 - avoids the issues with JRE versions, blocking, etc.

As you may well know, peer review writing has been gaining popularity for both first and second language writing courses over the past couple of decades, and the research on its efficacy is encouraging. A request I've had from some teachers and curriculum developers is to be able to do the same with audio recordings.

One thing I'd like to suggest, which isn't in the Nanogong plugins either, is a dedicated peer review audio assignment type. Yes, you can use the existing peer review assignment type and ask learners to embed their audio submissions using the WYSIWYG editor, but that means teaching the learners how to do it (and providing a lot of extra technical support for both learners and teachers) rather than it just being set up and working logically and easily for them.

Does that sound like a good idea?

Thanks for all your hard work and dedication and contributing a great plugin.

BTW, the WAMI Flash recorder is an MIT project: http://wami.csail.mit.edu/ I have to have a good look at the code to see how they've managed to make the MP3 transcoding run so smoothly!

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In reply to Matt Bury

Re: Will Nanogong have to adapt from Java to another platform?

by Paul Nicholls -

Hi Matt,

Thanks for mentioning the WAMI Recorder - I hadn't come across that before, so I've added it to my list of projects and websites related to recording audio online.  I'll look into it in more depth when I have time.

I seem to recall hearing that peer review was a planned future feature of the "new" assignment module - and I think that's the best place to focus any development effort on peer review, as it'd allow for peer review on any assignment with any combination of submission types (including Online Audio).

In the mean time, I'm not sure what the peer review assignment type you refer to is - a quick search only turned up an old-looking 1.9-era plugin, but the Workshop module seems to be intended for peer (and self) review.  It's not the most elegant solution, but you could potentially use the Record Audio repository plugin in conjunction with the Workshop module - you'd just need to provide some brief instructions to let students know that they can/should record by clicking on the "Add..." button in the file manager and then choosing the Record Audio option on the left.  Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to run the list of submission files through filters, so you don't get an embedded player - just a download link - which also adds to the complexity.

-Paul

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In reply to Paul Nicholls

Re: Will Nanogong have to adapt from Java to another platform?

by Matt Bury -
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Hi Paul,

Yes, I was referring to the 1.9 plugin assignment type. The Workshop module is a more comprehensive solution but creates a lot of issues with the majority of teachers in actually getting it to work, i.e. it's too steep a learning curve. Additionally, for learners of foreign languages, they need something as easy to use and intuitive and instruction free as possible. Could you imagine doing it in Hungarian?

Would be nice to have a general purpose peer review assignment type that allows teachers to specify the types of submissions and make the whole thing work that way.

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