Our MOOC with Moodle

This paper, written by some of the Moodle Community's finest, describes how Moodle can be used for MOOCs (Massively Open Online Courses). The paper reports on a case study that showed the measured use of Moodle as a MOOC platform and describes a pedagogical approach that was employed to see the MOOCs success.

The paper begins by introducing Moodle and how the "original MOOC" was based around Moodle in 2008. Since then, other MOOC-focussed platforms have emerged, including some based on Moodle, while Moodle continues to be used around the world as a self-hosted LMS and as a MOOC platform in its own right.

The study described in the paper aimed, in part, to challenge the conception that Moodle is not suitable for courses with 'massive' numbers of students. To do so, a MOOC was offered, with the subject matter being Moodle itself. The MOOC was enrolled in by 9,522 people from over 150 countries and included forums and other Moodle activities to discover how they would fair with the large number of participants. Participants, as learners, were also offered the chance to create and share their own Moodle courses and 2646 practice courses were created and evaluated by peers. The MOOC employed a number of standardised and specific surveys to measure learning as participants progressed and to gather the impressions of participants. Badges were used as incentives and as a measure for participation and completion. In practice, this showed that Moodle was equipped to deliver all the ingredients needed for a MOOC and more.

The paper reflects on the success of the MOOC. Although this MOOC did not reach the scale of some of the largest around the world, the Moodle platform performed admirably in this large-scale case. Of the enrolled participants, about one third participated in initial stages and about 7% of participants persisted, completing all activities, which is comparable to levels of completion reported in other MOOCs and admirable when knowing the Moodle MOOC was not associated with a higher education institution. The case study claimed that Moodle's activities encouraged engagement and peer learning. There were several advantages pointed out including the openness of Moodle, low cost deployment and proven robustness.

The pedagogical approach described in the paper is one that others can follow. The study showed that the constructionist model employed by Moodle is one that can work at scale. Feedback and other measures showed that the approach taken in the Moodle MOOC can be successful.

People wishing to emulate the approach can find out more at https://learn.moodle.net and there will be repeat sessions of this MOOC run in future.

The paper is linked above and was presented at the HOME conference and presentation slides are available.