Moodle documentation: How do you feel about student / user documentation? Does it need a category in the Docs?

Moodle documentation: How do you feel about student / user documentation? Does it need a category in the Docs?

by David Brighton -
Number of replies: 6

One thing I have noted with Moodle is that there is reasonable teacher and admin type documents & help, but they tend to be very technically orientated toward sysadmins etc. I think we have a need for student / user documentation or help but would like to gauge opionion in the community. From a conversation with Helen Foster and others who deal with users who are mid-twenties or less, there seems to be no real necessity, they just get on and find their way around. We teach adult post registration nurses and they seem to be a whole different breed and are definately not as confident or capable. (I am looking forward to the day when your capable students enrol in our courses!).

I would like to gauge your opinion -

TIA

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In reply to David Brighton

Re: Moodle documentation: How do you feel about student / user documentation? Does it need a category in the Docs?

by David Brighton -
For some bizarre reason there is an extra scanar in the link. It should be http://www.scanar.co.uk/help/SCaNaR_2_User_Guide-2.doc
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In reply to David Brighton

Re: Moodle documentation: How do you feel about student / user documentation? Does it need a category in the Docs?

by Helen Foster -
Picture of Core developers Picture of Documentation writers Picture of Moodle HQ Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Plugin developers Picture of Testers Picture of Translators
Hi David,

It was good to talk to you last Friday in London - thanks for your comments. Your user guide looks good. approve Would you like it included in Moodle Docs Moodle manuals?

I've found that certain users particularly like having a piece of paper by their side when attempting something new on their computer. This could be a printed out Word document, PDF file or Moodle Docs page.

If you'd like to create some student / user documentation in Moodle Docs then please do so - all contributions are welcome! smile


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In reply to Helen Foster

Re: Moodle documentation: How do you feel about student / user documentation? Does it need a category in the Docs?

by Darren Smith -
Would it be appropriate to have a student link on the Documentation block in the docs page then?

I am always unsure about a generic student documentation resource are we all teach students with specific needs which is why I always prefer an intro moodle course as a starting point for students.

Perhaps the Student documentation could be like the moodle manuals pages in docs where you have links to documents, courses and resources that can be tailored as required.

Darren


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In reply to Darren Smith

Student documentation (again!)

by Darren Smith -
Ok, I have made further progress on this and feel like I am getting somewhere.

There is a student documentation page which is a bit bare at the moment but it has an outline of what people wanted and what was already there. I am going down the path of providing resources that can be grabbed by institutions and used / tailored as needed rather than providing a section on the wiki which aims to be a an area that students should visit as I feel that would not work for the reasons I have mentioned above. Obviously more ideas are welcome.

I propose the generic student tutorials should be stepwise screen caps with explanation of some processes that can cause repeated questioning by students (we should not attempt to document every mouse click). There is a list up at the moment but this needs to be broken down more IMHO and possibly some lost (not sure if people need a generic tutorial to log in). This resource could then be printed out if needed as a prompt sheet or modified and, say, included in any moodle familiarisation courses that institutes run.

I have created a third page which is a student FAQ with all of the common questions that students have asked such as where have all of the weeks gone (when they click those little white squares). This could be used in courses / in house documents as suggested above. It's also a good prep for new moodle teachers.

I would like to see the student documentation now linked in the block on the left of MoodleDocs along with teacher, administrator and so on so more it can be more readily found and more people can contribute to it.

Thoughts?
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In reply to David Brighton

Re: Moodle documentation: How do you feel about student / user documentation? Does it need a category in the Docs?

by Gene Koo -

I strongly agree with the need for student- and teacher-oriented documentation and help, particularly help geared towards total web n00bs. Anyone with some savvy can figure the basics of Moodle out quickly, but I am spending my time explaining to people what a "discussion" is, etc.

I also think there is a lot of duplication going on. See my thread here, where you'd weighed in, David.

I agree with Helen for a need for some kind of cheat sheet that the really technophobic can print out and put side-by-side on their monitor to walk through things as simple as, yes, logging in. (It galls me to admit this, as I feel like I am making up for the lack of technical training in the rest of my community).

Wherever such resources are collected, I would like them to be publicized and as much as possible included in standard packages, as I rarely go trawling around looking for shared resources from others, as most Moodlers seem to be in K-12/higher education and their substantive materials have little relevancy to our work.

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In reply to Gene Koo

Re: Moodle documentation: How do you feel about student / user documentation? Does it need a category in the Docs?

by David Brighton -

Sorry for scuttling off like that, have just arrived back from holiday in Australia. Thanks Helen, yes, I think that a word version of that in the moodle docs as you propose would be good and hopefully useful for anyone that wanted to adapt it to their own need.

That rough-out of topics for the documentation student bit looks like a good start as well. I will have a look at it over the next week or so and start padding it out. My wiki skills are not so good so it will be a learning curve. Presumably there is a way of tracking how many users actually use it (once it has some content)?

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