How to structure topics within topics?

How to structure topics within topics?

by Night Owl -
Number of replies: 7

Okay, I'm new to Moodle...I'm the developer for my school. I am trying to convert a bunch of courses from another LMS into our Moodle account. I have courses with categories (topics), and then within each of those categories, there are several subcategories that should really be topics of their own.  What is the best way to structure these in Moodle...there doesn't seem to be a way to create a "hierarchy" of topics.  

For example, in an English course, the 4 main categories are "Grammar", "Literature", "Composition", and "Reading".  Within Composition, there is "Speech", "Creative Writing", "Research Papers", "Essays", and "Responses".  Each of those subtopics has many assignments. If I make the 4 topics, for each of the topics, the page just goes on and on, with much indenting and it's very hard to tell where the subtopics are. If I make each subtopic and "topic", there is no structure to the course menu, and you cannot tell where the main topics start and end.

So, I'd like my Moodle menu to look like this:

English

> Composition

>>Speech

>>Creative Writing

>>Research Papers

>>Essays

>>Responses

>Grammar

>>topic1

>>topic2

>>topic3

>LIterature

..and so on. Is there a way to do this without making each subcategory a topic in Moodle?  Or, is there a way to "indent" topics?

Thanks so much for any help!

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In reply to Night Owl

Re: How to structure topics within topics?

by Nigel Irwin -

One way would be to use topics for your main categories and then for each subcategory use a label and then indent the contents under each label so would be:

Topic 1 Composition

Speech (label)

     Resources for speech

Creative Writing (label)

    etc etc.

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In reply to Night Owl

Re: How to structure topics within topics?

by Derek Chirnside -

Deidre, in core Moodle, there is categories.  These contain Courses.  Courses contain topics referred to as "sections".

Topics are linear and flat.  There is no such thing as a section within a section.

Inside topics you can add structure with labels.  Labels can break up a section.

There are some fancy formats.  (Eg Collapsing topics: https://moodle.org/plugins/view.php?plugin=format_topcoll)  These are plugins, not part of core Moodle.

Tip: keep sections reasonably short.

I like the combination of Course menu (https://moodle.org/plugins/view.php?plugin=block_course_menu) with one section per page format chosen (in core Moodle).  I can let you into a course to see this.

As a first pass, you may like to consider four courses.

Just a small start to this conversation.

-Derek

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In reply to Derek Chirnside

Re: How to structure topics within topics?

by Richard Oelmann -
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With the course formats that Derek mentions above - try the flex-sections course format. I think it may be just what you are looking for. It does allow sections to be nested inside each other - although as with the collapsed topics Derek mentioned, it is a plugin and not part of core moodle.

But the other alternative, to prevent a single course getting too big, would be - again as Derek has suggested - look at splitting it over several moodle courses but then use course metalinks to ensure that the enrolments are in place correctly.

Richard

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In reply to Richard Oelmann

Re: How to structure topics within topics?

by Night Owl -

Thank you all so much for the replies. I can't really split the course into 4 courses because we are integrated with Renweb, so the courses are created from a Renweb sync and the grades need to synch into one course back to Renweb.  I do have labels set up for the "subtopics", but there are so many that the page is very long and hard to read.  I will try the flex format...can I download that from the forum? Since it is not part of the core, does that mean that I just need to keep an eye on updates and patches? 

** Bummer...just found out that our Moodle version is 2.3.3 and Flex format is only for 2.4! sad

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In reply to Night Owl

Re: How to structure topics within topics?

by Gareth J Barnard -
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Dear Deirdre,

There is not much difference in API terms between 2.3 and 2.4 so it would be worth contacting the author to request a 2.3 version.

Cheers,

Gareth

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In reply to Gareth J Barnard

Re: How to structure topics within topics?

by Marina Glancy -
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Gareth, you know better than anybody that there is a huge difference in API between 2.3 and 2.4. And by "Flex" Deirdre meant flexsections, not flexpage. Flexpage is already available for 2.3. Flexsections will never work on 2.3 simply because the API did not allow that.

Basically a lot in the new course formats API in 2.4 was inspired by Flexpage. It is very comprehensive set of 5 different plugins (framework, activity, format, block and theme). Also I doubt Moodlerooms will release the 2.4 version of it simply because now the same can be achieved much easier.

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In reply to Richard Oelmann

Re: How to structure topics within topics?

by Derek Chirnside -

I must admit that after posting the comment about Collapsed topics I saw a lot of the other formats I was unaware had entered the database.

I agree with Gareth - post and ask about flexpage for 2.4 https://moodle.org/plugins/view.php?plugin=format_flexpage

I bet you can still have other courses in Moodle even with Renweb and just keep your assessment ot the official linked course.  metalinks like Richard said can help with this.

-Derek

 

 

 

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