Hey all. My name is Michael Tanczos and I have recently been placed in the position of having to figure out how to introduce Moodle to our local school district (K-12). I'm curious to hear some of the stories as to how you get Moodle to "catch on" as going from having teachers with zero experience with the system to using it regularly seems to be a daunting task to undertake. But I think this is a major opportunity to introduce Moodle not only to our district, but potentially to neighboring districts as well.
I wanted to give some thoughts as to the approach I'll be taking and if anybody here has some ideas as to what I may experience or what worked for them, please let me know.
My first thoughts are that since teachers don't really know or understand the Moodle system, the best approach to getting them introduced to it would be to get them into a course. I created a Moodle course called "Technology Support" which contains all the documentation that we publish for teachers to use things like their laptops, specific software, our student management system, webmail, and other pieces of district technology. I figure if I can get them to naturally use the system, they will at least understand what it can do on a higher level.
So right now I am introducing Moodle to a few individuals that I would like to use as support trainers for the system who will use Moodle within their classrooms. Then at least I can work with these select few on a personal basis and help them through any problems. My main goal is to create some advocates also in favor of the system who can act as "seed" users. I was very open about having them help out in a training capacity before extensive training began.
From my research I see that early teacher use of any LMS seems to be
primarily for pragmatic concerns. That is, teachers will probably just
use the system to post course announcements, a syllabus, and homework.
This requires no real modifications to their style of teaching and is
the easiest for them to achieve.
So I'm thinking that the next step after we have our base set of trainers is to establish a set of basic 1 hour courses. The first of which would simply be to introduce the Moodle system and what it does, how to navigate through it's UI, and three basic functions (editing section descriptions, adding web pages, and adding assignments).
The second course would probably recap the basic functions and continue exploring other features. Some of the key ones I know that will require early training on though is things like changing your avatar, instant messaging, managing blocks, etc. And that's without even getting to learning resources yet.
What concerns me though is how you get from the introduction to the actual implementation of the system within the class. I'm concerned that I'll be doing this training, but that teachers are going to feel too "on their own" in terms of using the system. I do plan on having a number of levels of courses, but the support concerns I think need to be addressed. What steps have some of the more successful schools done to overcome these issues? What types of support did you create?
Our moodle implementation is at http://www.easdonline.com
Thoughts?
---
Michael Tanczos
Michael,
We teach three hours at a time. The first hour, our teachers learn to do something and talk about when one might want to do it. Ex: They learn to create a forum or a database, and then we discuss situations in which we might want to use a forum or a database. The rest of the class, they work on their own courses. Most teachers seem to like it pretty well and it seems to meet both my needs and theirs.
Have to commend you for this, by the way. Very nice!
You are obviously a guy with vision.
I am sure that other Moodlers will share their successful approaches with you.
Hope that helps a bit.
-- Art
We teach three hours at a time. The first hour, our teachers learn to do something and talk about when one might want to do it. Ex: They learn to create a forum or a database, and then we discuss situations in which we might want to use a forum or a database. The rest of the class, they work on their own courses. Most teachers seem to like it pretty well and it seems to meet both my needs and theirs.
Have to commend you for this, by the way. Very nice!
It is no secret that educational institutions, especially on the
post-secondary level, are turning to the web to teach students in both
a fully virtual environment (100% online) or in some mix of in-class
and online instruction. Many colleges turn to expensive solutions such
as Blackboard or WebCT. But will our students be ready to function in
a world of online learning? The Easton Area School District is proud to introduce the Moodle learning management system, a program similar in many respects to Blackboard or WebCT. Moodle differs from Blackboard and WebCT in one very significant factor, price. Moodle is absolutely free for anybody to download and use without the per-seat expense of the larger enterprise-level learning management systems. So at no taxpayer expense we are able to offer students of Easton advanced hybrid instruction using state of the art course management software. But does free mean it isn't as good as it's commercial counterparts? No way! Study after study has shown Moodle to be superior to Blackboard and WebCT and a preferred learning environment for both students and teachers alike! The Moodle system will begin it's first large scale pilot rollout in Fall of 2006 with Easton Area School District leading the way in our area with bold new steps to bring technology, the classroom, and students together. |
You are obviously a guy with vision.
I am sure that other Moodlers will share their successful approaches with you.
Hope that helps a bit.
-- Art
How do you get teachers to participate in the training? Is it voluntary? We have a requirement in our contract where teachers are supposed to do so many hours of in-house inservicing before the end of the year.. so they get awarded time for each hour of training. I do like the idea of discussions on possible uses along with some dedicated time for teachers to work on their own courses. I think that would leave them at least with something "in hand" when the leave the first course, giving them something to build off of.
How many trainings do you do, how many people per training, and how often? (sorry, a lot of questions.. but I really appreciate the feedback)
---
Michael Tanczos
How many trainings do you do, how many people per training, and how often? (sorry, a lot of questions.. but I really appreciate the feedback)
---
Michael Tanczos
Hi, Michael,
Our teachers can choose between staff development courses offered by our school district or graduate courses offered by an accredited university (at least two every five years). This is how they keep their teaching certificates valid.
Our staff development courses consist of 45 contact hours. I do fifteen three-hour sessions. I try to work in at least one "remote" session, so that they experience distance learning as a student. They usually do not like it, by the way.
I have found that there is a constant tug of war between the teachers and me. It is always good-natured, but it is always there:
First, they want the nuts and bolts of Moodle, but often do not care to discuss pedagogy very much. I, on the other hand, think we should spend most of our time talking about how we will apply this magical gift we have been given. I don't want to talk so much about how to create a wiki, I want to talk about what to do with it once we have done so.
Second, they want what Martin has called the shiny stuff. I love the coolest mods too, but I would like them to walk before they run, so I have to try to hold them back a bit. Before they dive into the feedback module, they need to be able to create a simple choice, no?
The bottom line is that the classes have been very rewarding for me and my colleagues really do like having a product (their own course) when they leave.
By the way, have you seen the demo course at http://demo.moodle.org/course/view.php?id=4 ? You may find it useful.
Regards,
Art
Our teachers can choose between staff development courses offered by our school district or graduate courses offered by an accredited university (at least two every five years). This is how they keep their teaching certificates valid.
Our staff development courses consist of 45 contact hours. I do fifteen three-hour sessions. I try to work in at least one "remote" session, so that they experience distance learning as a student. They usually do not like it, by the way.
I have found that there is a constant tug of war between the teachers and me. It is always good-natured, but it is always there:
First, they want the nuts and bolts of Moodle, but often do not care to discuss pedagogy very much. I, on the other hand, think we should spend most of our time talking about how we will apply this magical gift we have been given. I don't want to talk so much about how to create a wiki, I want to talk about what to do with it once we have done so.
Second, they want what Martin has called the shiny stuff. I love the coolest mods too, but I would like them to walk before they run, so I have to try to hold them back a bit. Before they dive into the feedback module, they need to be able to create a simple choice, no?
The bottom line is that the classes have been very rewarding for me and my colleagues really do like having a product (their own course) when they leave.
By the way, have you seen the demo course at http://demo.moodle.org/course/view.php?id=4 ? You may find it useful.
Regards,
Art
I should add my experience to this mix to say that Art is right when he says:
Last year, I mistakenly proposed to my district that I could train my colleagues in a 6 hour session during the summer. I spent every last bit of my time in this session telling teachers how to do things instead of why. It was a mistake for two reasons:
Attendence at my training session was voluntary. Of 76 staff members, 32 showed up (not bad). Of the 32 that attended, 6 are now using Moodle. I can't help but think that a more 'theoretical' approach to training would have been more useful.
Most teachers at my school just aren't getting the big picture - that Moodle can actually make their course better! Had I spent the time to make teachers want to use Moodle (by showing them practical reasons to use it), they would now be finding their own way through the technical aspects of the software. I assumed that all teachers had my foresight, when, in fact, they didn't.
I think small sessions that include a very short how-to followed by a discussion of use is the way to go.
... we should spend most of our time talking about how we will apply [insert any moodle module here]
Last year, I mistakenly proposed to my district that I could train my colleagues in a 6 hour session during the summer. I spent every last bit of my time in this session telling teachers how to do things instead of why. It was a mistake for two reasons:
- Moodle is too vast to explain every last setting. Not to mention, settings are boring - that's what documentation is for.
- Most teachers don't see the benefit of assigning a wiki, forum, workshop, or blog. They could use the opportunity to share ideas and brainstorm possibilities.
Attendence at my training session was voluntary. Of 76 staff members, 32 showed up (not bad). Of the 32 that attended, 6 are now using Moodle. I can't help but think that a more 'theoretical' approach to training would have been more useful.
Most teachers at my school just aren't getting the big picture - that Moodle can actually make their course better! Had I spent the time to make teachers want to use Moodle (by showing them practical reasons to use it), they would now be finding their own way through the technical aspects of the software. I assumed that all teachers had my foresight, when, in fact, they didn't.
I think small sessions that include a very short how-to followed by a discussion of use is the way to go.
That is probably my biggest fear.. that we have this great software at our disposal and it goes underutilized. I think that ideally I'd need to create more teachers like me first and foremost.. just so that I have advocates of the software who do have an understanding of what it can do. If I can get teachers excited about it enough to share their experiences with other teachers, that's where I think I may see success.
To me it seems like lifting a mountain to go from nothing to more pervasive use. I think this is great feedback too, and probably worth starting up perhaps a section in the documentation even just to start collecting implementation strategies for Moodle implementation architects (for lack of a better term). I mean, we have all this documentation, but we all have to go from teachers who know nothing about the software to getting them interested enough to read the documentation. And this isn't an individual problem, because *WE* are motivated already and self-driven to make this work.
I am willing to concede from the beginning that teachers won't be using the software on levels where they are using Wikis, Discussions, Quizzes, etc. (more interactive stuff) purely based on research of first-year teacher use of other LMS's. If this is the case, then my primary task is just to get them used to using the system to post a syllabus or homework assignments. Based on what I'm hearing from you guys, I may be better off just previewing some of the other features of the system early on rather than getting teachers right into every little detail.
---
Micael Tanczos
To me it seems like lifting a mountain to go from nothing to more pervasive use. I think this is great feedback too, and probably worth starting up perhaps a section in the documentation even just to start collecting implementation strategies for Moodle implementation architects (for lack of a better term). I mean, we have all this documentation, but we all have to go from teachers who know nothing about the software to getting them interested enough to read the documentation. And this isn't an individual problem, because *WE* are motivated already and self-driven to make this work.
I am willing to concede from the beginning that teachers won't be using the software on levels where they are using Wikis, Discussions, Quizzes, etc. (more interactive stuff) purely based on research of first-year teacher use of other LMS's. If this is the case, then my primary task is just to get them used to using the system to post a syllabus or homework assignments. Based on what I'm hearing from you guys, I may be better off just previewing some of the other features of the system early on rather than getting teachers right into every little detail.
---
Micael Tanczos
Hi, again,
You might want to encourage your teachers to post their lesson plans, etc., to a forum. That way, there would be the possibility of a little interaction.
Just a thought! (Maybe a dumb one, I admit.)
-- Art
You might want to encourage your teachers to post their lesson plans, etc., to a forum. That way, there would be the possibility of a little interaction.
Just a thought! (Maybe a dumb one, I admit.)
-- Art
I was thinking about that actually.. in particular about the idea of resource sharing. I'll need to sit down and look at it a little harder, but I think with the granular backup capabilities it shouldn't be terribly difficult to reuse the backup API to backup individual activities to a zip file without requiring the rather daunting 18 gazillion things to worry about the current process seems to have (particularly when restoring). I'm thinking more of a one-click publish to repository and one-click repository restore to your course type of deal. (maybe more than one click, but you get the idea)
I'd bet money that if there was a healthy supply of pre-made content available, teachers would use it pretty readily. But I can't seem to have much luck in finding large open (source) repositories of secondary level materials..
---
Michael Tanczos
I'd bet money that if there was a healthy supply of pre-made content available, teachers would use it pretty readily. But I can't seem to have much luck in finding large open (source) repositories of secondary level materials..
---
Michael Tanczos
> But I can't seem to have much luck in finding large open (source)
> repositories of secondary level materials..
Just a matter of time.
-- Art
> repositories of secondary level materials..
Just a matter of time.
-- Art
Yeah, I have found that very few teachers see the unlimited potential of Moodle. To many, it is just another info delivery system. In fact, it is just one more burden to many. I find it odd, but it does seem to be so.
In the future, I will surely organize lessons around case studies: Teacher X's students are working on reports about this or that. As part of the research process, they must blah, blah, blah. How can Moodle help them do this better?
-- Art
In the future, I will surely organize lessons around case studies: Teacher X's students are working on reports about this or that. As part of the research process, they must blah, blah, blah. How can Moodle help them do this better?
-- Art
To build on the concept of case studies - ask teachers in a training session for common problems they face in their classroom. You could guide them to the type of answers you're looking for - motivation, record keeping, fruitful discussions, or poor writing. All of these could easily be turned into a solution in Moodle.
Well your solution sounds like it works though. One of the reasons that many teachers would use the software for practical purposes only is because they don't have to modify their courses at all to accomodate the new software. It's basically one big online bulletin board.. but using it as an actual pedagogical tool requires real effort and modification of how things are taught.
When using Moodle for pedagogy you end up replacing certain approaches with Moodle activities, so teachers need to be certain that the tradeoff is worth it.. that the end result education-wise is the same or at least equivalent to what they have done before.
I think really to make it work you're also going to need teachers who aren't set in their ways. Who knows.. I'll post on how things are going from time to time just to give an idea of what I'm experiencing.
---
Michael Tanczos
When using Moodle for pedagogy you end up replacing certain approaches with Moodle activities, so teachers need to be certain that the tradeoff is worth it.. that the end result education-wise is the same or at least equivalent to what they have done before.
I think really to make it work you're also going to need teachers who aren't set in their ways. Who knows.. I'll post on how things are going from time to time just to give an idea of what I'm experiencing.
---
Michael Tanczos
Let me jump in here and give you my experience with Moodle over the last 18 months. We rolled out Moodle knowing that in the beginning we would have an under used resource, but for those early adopters that really saw the potential it would impact at least one classroom of students.
I tried the 6-8 hour 1 day training and just totally fried those 24 teachers that attended. Of those that attended the training in August of 2005 only about 6 used the tools over the course of the year, with two going gang busters; a 5th grade teacher and a high school geometry teacher. We did use it a lot for staff collaboration activities and for community forums with some of our community committees.
During the spring of 2006 I received a grant to do some additional technology training and I selected Moodle as our subject. I had enough money that I could pay 12 teachers for for about 15 hours of training. We set it up so that we met once a week for 10 weeks for 90 minutes at a time. We spent about 60 minutes on how to configure a module in every way possible each week. The last 30 minutes were entirely dedicated to the instructional use of that module; brain storming ideas on how it could be used at all grade levels. We then spent the rest of the week discussing some of the uses in a forum environment.
After about 3 or 4 weeks the lights started to turn on as to how much potential there is within the Moodle system. Of the 12 teachers that took the training all of them are using Moodle extensively in their classrooms this year with great amounts of success.
This is definitely the way to go. We started with a class on just the interface in the first week, covered resources, blocks, choices, forums, assignments, glossaries and the quiz module in that order. The last two weeks for individual help and questions from me. We did do one class entirely online using the chat module. It worked great!
The key now is to keep them thinking out of the traditional classroom box. I encourage them to ask me questions and I help the design some uses for Moodle based on their content.
Things are now rolling along quite well and we have nearly 1000 users in the database and 3 schools have teacher lounge courses for teacher collaboration, the English department at the high school does pre-meetings via their department Moodle to make better use of fact-to-face time at actual meetings. I showed Moodle to our communications consultant (public relations) and we are developing a very customized theme that our district web site will be run on by January of 2007 using the cms module. There is currently discussion at the high school about requiring the use for all teachers in the next year or so as we get new computers and training in teachers hands.
Don't be afraid to roll it out fearful of under utilization. Somebody will use it, and for the price, even 1 teacher impacting their students is a real bargain compared to the other options out there. Provide the training and real world examples with a vision of someone in the district and you will be surprised how fast it will grow.
Randy Orwin
I tried the 6-8 hour 1 day training and just totally fried those 24 teachers that attended. Of those that attended the training in August of 2005 only about 6 used the tools over the course of the year, with two going gang busters; a 5th grade teacher and a high school geometry teacher. We did use it a lot for staff collaboration activities and for community forums with some of our community committees.
During the spring of 2006 I received a grant to do some additional technology training and I selected Moodle as our subject. I had enough money that I could pay 12 teachers for for about 15 hours of training. We set it up so that we met once a week for 10 weeks for 90 minutes at a time. We spent about 60 minutes on how to configure a module in every way possible each week. The last 30 minutes were entirely dedicated to the instructional use of that module; brain storming ideas on how it could be used at all grade levels. We then spent the rest of the week discussing some of the uses in a forum environment.
After about 3 or 4 weeks the lights started to turn on as to how much potential there is within the Moodle system. Of the 12 teachers that took the training all of them are using Moodle extensively in their classrooms this year with great amounts of success.
This is definitely the way to go. We started with a class on just the interface in the first week, covered resources, blocks, choices, forums, assignments, glossaries and the quiz module in that order. The last two weeks for individual help and questions from me. We did do one class entirely online using the chat module. It worked great!
The key now is to keep them thinking out of the traditional classroom box. I encourage them to ask me questions and I help the design some uses for Moodle based on their content.
Things are now rolling along quite well and we have nearly 1000 users in the database and 3 schools have teacher lounge courses for teacher collaboration, the English department at the high school does pre-meetings via their department Moodle to make better use of fact-to-face time at actual meetings. I showed Moodle to our communications consultant (public relations) and we are developing a very customized theme that our district web site will be run on by January of 2007 using the cms module. There is currently discussion at the high school about requiring the use for all teachers in the next year or so as we get new computers and training in teachers hands.
Don't be afraid to roll it out fearful of under utilization. Somebody will use it, and for the price, even 1 teacher impacting their students is a real bargain compared to the other options out there. Provide the training and real world examples with a vision of someone in the district and you will be surprised how fast it will grow.
Randy Orwin
> Don't be afraid to roll it out fearful of under utilization.
> Somebody will use it, and for the price, even 1 teacher
> impacting their students is a real bargain compared to
> the other options out there.
Amen!
-- Art
> Somebody will use it, and for the price, even 1 teacher
> impacting their students is a real bargain compared to
> the other options out there.
Amen!
-- Art
We have been using a voluntary approach to use of Moodle for the past several years and we have seen highly varied results. This year, every teacher in core subject areas is required to present at least one quarterly assessment using the quiz module. This is to prepare our students for high stakes state level assessments. During training, many were moved along (fidgeting and whining- not quite kicking and screaming) only to find that it was no big deal to create the materials for the quiz. We did one group session on the quiz module and followed up with one on one tutorial assistance for each teacher who requested help preparing their first quiz. There is still some anxiety from some about conducting the test. It seems, for us that some must be pushed into the shallow end of the pool before they are willing to get wet. But having done so, they declare that the water is fine. 
In reply to Michael Tanczos
Re: Moodle Rollout on a School District Level - technical side
by Tina Piper -
Hello Everyone,
I am also looking into Moodle rollout for one of our clients. They have about 40,000 students.. I am mostly interested in the teachnical implementation part:
Does anyone have or recommend a large Moodle implementation example? What hosting we need to have if we were to host it ourselves? What personnel will e have to have to run it ourselves?
Thanks
Tina Piper
In reply to Tina Piper
Re: Moodle Rollout on a School District Level - technical side
by Myles Carrick -
hi Tina,
Sorry that no one seems to have replied to this yet.
There are a great many installations 40 000 - and larger (up to 200 000+)!
A great place to start for queries like yours is to search the Moodle Servers and Performance Forum (http://moodle.org/mod/forum/view.php?f=94) and to read the Moodle Performance Docs (http://docs.moodle.org/en/Performance).
Good luck!
Myles
Sorry that no one seems to have replied to this yet.
There are a great many installations 40 000 - and larger (up to 200 000+)!
A great place to start for queries like yours is to search the Moodle Servers and Performance Forum (http://moodle.org/mod/forum/view.php?f=94) and to read the Moodle Performance Docs (http://docs.moodle.org/en/Performance).
Good luck!
Myles
Dear Michael,
I am in charge of a similar project for our school district, here in Modena (Italy).
We start to think about our project in 2002 and it is operational since 2003. The aim of our project is to use e-learning techniques in order to introduce more collaborative and cooperative teaching methodologies in the 32 secondary schools of our district (about 26,000 students aged 14-19).
We started with a home-developed platform focused on the exchange of teaching materials and communication (forum, chat, …).
However, despite the several introductory courses that we had run for teachers, we did not reach any significant impact. Therefore, at the beginning of the 2004, we decided to completely revise our approach (in Italian we would say: ‘taking the other horn of the problem’, but I do not know if there is a similar saying in English 
) and to reach the teachers “through” the students.
We start a community site, based on phpnuke, a sort of virtual “agora” where students and teachers can meet, discuss, share ideas, etc…. This has helped us in overcoming several of the teachers’ fears about the on line environment and to accept the idea of extending the class outside the physical and time limit.
In November 2004, inspired by Freinet’s ideas, we start also a community newspaper managed by an open, mixed “staff” (students and teachers).
In October 2005 we felt ready to restart the e-learning “adventure”, so we set up - aside to the community tools, the students’ newspaper and a news service - Moodle.
In order to facilitate the introduction of Moodle we have run two edition of a blended course for teacher based on four seminars on why use e-learning and several laboratory session where teachers can test their own courses.
Since then we have seen a not extraordinary but steady growing of the use of moodle with the students and several request for replicating the teacher’s course.
At the moment there are more than 50 courses addressed to students, at a different stage of development or already finished, nearly a thousand students involved and more than 500,000 log entries.
You can look at the whole project at the address http://ted.scuole.provincia.modena.it/ but I am afraid all the documents available are in Italian. 
Stefano
Michael,
As a fellow K12 District, I do recommend that you disable the messaging module. The kids like to use it to chat amongst their friends during classes. We ended up locking down the messaging module with a couple hacks. Everytime a message is student, it will check to see if the person the student is messaging is a teacher of any of the courses they are enrolled in. Yes, then it allows the message, otherwise it will block it. However, Teachers are allowed to message any person on the whole system.
Teacher training is a pretty huge hurdle, but I think you're on the right track. We started our moodle implementation by rolling out to a few "slightly savvy" teachers in the district. These teachers adapt easily to new technology systems, and the transition was natural for them. Of course, when we get a new toy, we like to brag =). The savvy teachers bragged about it, and now we've got teachers biting at our ankles to get ahold of Moodle.
Good Luck!
--Richie Foreman
Mesa Public Schools, Mesa Arizona.
As a fellow K12 District, I do recommend that you disable the messaging module. The kids like to use it to chat amongst their friends during classes. We ended up locking down the messaging module with a couple hacks. Everytime a message is student, it will check to see if the person the student is messaging is a teacher of any of the courses they are enrolled in. Yes, then it allows the message, otherwise it will block it. However, Teachers are allowed to message any person on the whole system.
Teacher training is a pretty huge hurdle, but I think you're on the right track. We started our moodle implementation by rolling out to a few "slightly savvy" teachers in the district. These teachers adapt easily to new technology systems, and the transition was natural for them. Of course, when we get a new toy, we like to brag =). The savvy teachers bragged about it, and now we've got teachers biting at our ankles to get ahold of Moodle.
Good Luck!
--Richie Foreman
Mesa Public Schools, Mesa Arizona.
A philosophical question ...
Why do you care if students are using the message system to "chat"? I consider this part of the 'glue' that keeps students returning. It's a hook (to use a teaching term).
I'm the lead administrator for my school's Moodle and a teacher. I find it a relief to think that students are chatting in a school setting as opposed to someplace else.
For example, my students understand that I don't look through their messages, but that if they are ever flamed, threatened, etc. by another student, I can audit the messages, find the offensive use and take punitive action. That sort of "learning" environment (I feel) prepares students for the real web - where such sanctions will not be given. Some students have a very warped concept of what is acceptable on the net. They sometimes feel they can act "freely." I like the idea that I can teach them responsibility on the web. While this is something very passive that goes mostly unnoticed by teachers and students alike, it is one of the many features of Moodle I feel should stay in a K12 environment.
You may want to try the Message System restriction add-on. This would allow you to automatically restrict messaging during school hours (if that were something of interest to you).
http://moodle.org/mod/data/view.php?d=13&rid=293
Why do you care if students are using the message system to "chat"? I consider this part of the 'glue' that keeps students returning. It's a hook (to use a teaching term).
I'm the lead administrator for my school's Moodle and a teacher. I find it a relief to think that students are chatting in a school setting as opposed to someplace else.
For example, my students understand that I don't look through their messages, but that if they are ever flamed, threatened, etc. by another student, I can audit the messages, find the offensive use and take punitive action. That sort of "learning" environment (I feel) prepares students for the real web - where such sanctions will not be given. Some students have a very warped concept of what is acceptable on the net. They sometimes feel they can act "freely." I like the idea that I can teach them responsibility on the web. While this is something very passive that goes mostly unnoticed by teachers and students alike, it is one of the many features of Moodle I feel should stay in a K12 environment.
You may want to try the Message System restriction add-on. This would allow you to automatically restrict messaging during school hours (if that were something of interest to you).
http://moodle.org/mod/data/view.php?d=13&rid=293
I was interested that our librarian was postive about the Moodle chat function. Students have stopped looking about for holes in our network to chat outside our school and seem to enjoy the new feature, posting notes and reminders to teaching staff and other students.
It has been pointed out to our school community that all Moodle chat is authenticated (not anonymous) logged (a record is kept) and to be treated as potentially public so the same rules of good school behaviour apply. We have involved the parents and have an appropriate response in place to deal with any abuse or misuse.
Whilst talking face-to-face with the friend that you are sitting next to is probably just as disruptive to the current learning activity, the Moodle chat module has become for us the Internet with training wheels so they can learn about appropriate language, usage and managing the distraction so that they can stay on task.
It has been pointed out to our school community that all Moodle chat is authenticated (not anonymous) logged (a record is kept) and to be treated as potentially public so the same rules of good school behaviour apply. We have involved the parents and have an appropriate response in place to deal with any abuse or misuse.
Whilst talking face-to-face with the friend that you are sitting next to is probably just as disruptive to the current learning activity, the Moodle chat module has become for us the Internet with training wheels so they can learn about appropriate language, usage and managing the distraction so that they can stay on task.
I have a slightly different story but the same challenges. I had a teacher come to me last year wanting to use the Internet for class activities. I did some research and finally installed moodle for him to try out. I knew next to nothing about it, other than the reviews that I read and, furthermore, I didn't really have the time to help this teacher with it much. But he took off! He raves about it and uses it for all his English classes. I would say that now we have about ten folks using it on a regular basis, but all for very differnt purposes. Out of this group, I would say that maybe two or three really see the potential and are doing exciting things. The others use it to post homework or URL's.
If I had the time --my job fuction has changed since I got moodle up and running-- I would get the few teachers who understand the potential of moodle to do a workshop for some of the other teachers using moodle. I strongly believe that you've got to hook people... show them something that will make their lives easier or their teaching better or their students do better. I would start by showing teachers some cool and effective moodle courses and then, of course, be sure that the support was in place to help these teachers get going.
If I had the time --my job fuction has changed since I got moodle up and running-- I would get the few teachers who understand the potential of moodle to do a workshop for some of the other teachers using moodle. I strongly believe that you've got to hook people... show them something that will make their lives easier or their teaching better or their students do better. I would start by showing teachers some cool and effective moodle courses and then, of course, be sure that the support was in place to help these teachers get going.
So far so good on the rollout. I seem to be discovering teachers who REALLY get into it. I'm providing them specifically with tons of support with the hopes that they can advocate Moodle use down the road. Some have even offered to offer training to other secondary teachers in their specific subject area.
The teachers that are using it are REALLY using it now, which is definitely a very positive thing.
Most teachers in my school are now online at least to get access to tech support. I'm trying to create an online community of teachers though using forums to start but I think that will take a little time and training to get the ball rolling there.
So far so good.. I'm thinking that it might be worthwhile down the road to create a moodle spotlight section (or send out an email) that highlights various things teachers are doing with their Moodle. It may spark initiative from other teachers.
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Michael Tanczos
The teachers that are using it are REALLY using it now, which is definitely a very positive thing.
Most teachers in my school are now online at least to get access to tech support. I'm trying to create an online community of teachers though using forums to start but I think that will take a little time and training to get the ball rolling there.
So far so good.. I'm thinking that it might be worthwhile down the road to create a moodle spotlight section (or send out an email) that highlights various things teachers are doing with their Moodle. It may spark initiative from other teachers.
---
Michael Tanczos
Michael I am doing the same thing in Minneapolis. My first thought is to go 6-12. I am also fortunate enough to have our curriculum and instruction dept on board but training is going to be huge. I would be happy to share with you what we do as it goes and hopefully I can learn from you. I am driving it more from the curriculum side.
Wow, I don't know how I managed to miss this discussion. The subject interests me very much.
Michael: You gave us the URL of your district's Moodle site. May I ask why? (Hint: see screenshot below)
Let's say we all posted the URLs of our schools' Moodle sites. Wouldn't they all look the same? I.E., a list of courses with the familiar "This course requires an enrollment key" icon next to each and every every one of them?
(chorus of voices) Well of course we need an enrollment key! Otherwise, we could be disclosing sensitive student information, which could be construed as a violation of FERPA. We could all go to jail!
Every real K-12 course here in the US is protected by an enrollment key (except for those which have accidentally been left open). Published courses, or courses contributed to course exchanges, are of uneven quality, often "throw-away" efforts representing one or two hours of actual work. As a result, teachers who are learning Moodle almost never get to see REAL courses developed by REAL teachers.
I believe that the most valuable resource that we could possibly have for learning Moodle is a collection of actual courses that illustrate good practices. These courses would need student data because half their value lies in what the students give back to the course.
I question the value of teacher training workshops offered for Professional Development hours when they are just one or two sessions in length. Since you can only teach the basics in that much time (how to upload a file, how to link to a Web site), most participants will never get a glimpse of Moodle's full potential. When they report to their colleagues, the belief will quickly spread that Moodle is just another tool for building a class Web site (yawn).
Michael: You gave us the URL of your district's Moodle site. May I ask why? (Hint: see screenshot below)
Let's say we all posted the URLs of our schools' Moodle sites. Wouldn't they all look the same? I.E., a list of courses with the familiar "This course requires an enrollment key" icon next to each and every every one of them?
(chorus of voices) Well of course we need an enrollment key! Otherwise, we could be disclosing sensitive student information, which could be construed as a violation of FERPA. We could all go to jail!
Every real K-12 course here in the US is protected by an enrollment key (except for those which have accidentally been left open). Published courses, or courses contributed to course exchanges, are of uneven quality, often "throw-away" efforts representing one or two hours of actual work. As a result, teachers who are learning Moodle almost never get to see REAL courses developed by REAL teachers.
I believe that the most valuable resource that we could possibly have for learning Moodle is a collection of actual courses that illustrate good practices. These courses would need student data because half their value lies in what the students give back to the course.
I question the value of teacher training workshops offered for Professional Development hours when they are just one or two sessions in length. Since you can only teach the basics in that much time (how to upload a file, how to link to a Web site), most participants will never get a glimpse of Moodle's full potential. When they report to their colleagues, the belief will quickly spread that Moodle is just another tool for building a class Web site (yawn).
Some good points. I do think that part of the solution to this dilema is to post some case studies of Moodle in action - http://docs.moodle.org/en/Case_studies
I admit that the idea never really has caught on though...
-- Art
I admit that the idea never really has caught on though...
-- Art
..except for those which have accidentally been left open
- As admin I run in phpadmin a simple SQL script to detect forgotten keys and then put a very longgggggggggggggggggggggggg key on that course. (a teacher must replace it with a correct key for that course.)
- Teachers who still wish to have open courses for some reason, can mention their key in the longname of that course.
- I store this and other scripts in a Moodle Book module..
You could store such scripts (which need rights on the database) behind a button on the admin page, or run it as a cron (easier?)..
UPDATE mdl_course SET password='slot34567654707077073567654567876587887' where id>1 and password="";
(could be improved with a randomis3ed key for each run..)
Hi,
Like John, I did appreciate this thread : a few days ago, I marked it in my mailbox.
About the subject of giving closed Moodle site adress, once again I do agree with John. For my part, after one year of Moodle practice, I created a site (french speaking http://moodest.virelibre.eu) cloned from my real K12 school site (http://virelibre.eu). Both are forbidden to guests (hidden button and closed courses) but :
From then, I experienced a very good surprise : to update demo courses from real ones when a new activity is worth it or valuable social development has occured, I backup from real and restore to demo : The demo identities remain unrevealed !
THis demo site costed me some job, but it is worth it :
Like John, I did appreciate this thread : a few days ago, I marked it in my mailbox.
About the subject of giving closed Moodle site adress, once again I do agree with John. For my part, after one year of Moodle practice, I created a site (french speaking http://moodest.virelibre.eu) cloned from my real K12 school site (http://virelibre.eu). Both are forbidden to guests (hidden button and closed courses) but :
- In the demo site, I created two virtual identities, which are published on site home page : one for my class -call it C3- non editing teacher (profc3 profc3) and one for a C3 virtual pupil (eleve eleve).
- The demo site has been anonymized (sorry for my approximative english), as far as pupils are concerned. Adult identities remain real.
- To create it from scratch, I just created a subdomain, dumped and imported my real database, copied moddledata structure to new subdomain place, modified config.php and replaced any pupils identities by their Initials, and suppressed pupils' photos.
From then, I experienced a very good surprise : to update demo courses from real ones when a new activity is worth it or valuable social development has occured, I backup from real and restore to demo : The demo identities remain unrevealed !
THis demo site costed me some job, but it is worth it :
- To know it opened pushes me to have a second sight toward my practices.
- In Moodle french community, this demo site revealed to be appreciated by Moodle technical advisers to schools, who developped from its Moodle dedicated to K12 pupils implementation structure. That's why I share with you this Moodle forbidden-to-guests-welcome-to-workers trick !
Hi Fred,
What you did is extremely innovative. It was also a lot of work. I applaud you for your effort! I also like the word "anonymize".
I recently entered an issue into the Moodle Tracker, MDL-8148. It suggests that Moodle should do the anonymization for us. I would appreciate it if you would add your valuable comments to this issue.
I have also done "anonymization." I teach Moodle workshops at local community colleges, and I use "real" courses as case studies. I found these courses by "asking around." When I contacted the teachers and explained what I was doing, they were glad to make course backups for me, but without student data. So I lost 50% of the value of the course.
It then occurred to me that an option could be added to Moodle course backup that would cause Moodle to anonymize the backup by removing all personal information, anonymizing names, replacing e-mail addresses by example.com addresses, etc. This is the first half of MDL-8148.
Automatic anonymization during backup solves only part of the problem. If we want more courses to allow guest login, Moodle must also be able to enforce anonymization of sensitive information that is currently visible to guests. For example, Moodle could provide a switch at site (or course) level that forces students to use an alias (the alias would appear in forum posts, etc.). This is the other half of MDL-8148.
Please comment or vote on MDL-8148.
What you did is extremely innovative. It was also a lot of work. I applaud you for your effort! I also like the word "anonymize".
I recently entered an issue into the Moodle Tracker, MDL-8148. It suggests that Moodle should do the anonymization for us. I would appreciate it if you would add your valuable comments to this issue.
I have also done "anonymization." I teach Moodle workshops at local community colleges, and I use "real" courses as case studies. I found these courses by "asking around." When I contacted the teachers and explained what I was doing, they were glad to make course backups for me, but without student data. So I lost 50% of the value of the course.
It then occurred to me that an option could be added to Moodle course backup that would cause Moodle to anonymize the backup by removing all personal information, anonymizing names, replacing e-mail addresses by example.com addresses, etc. This is the first half of MDL-8148.
Automatic anonymization during backup solves only part of the problem. If we want more courses to allow guest login, Moodle must also be able to enforce anonymization of sensitive information that is currently visible to guests. For example, Moodle could provide a switch at site (or course) level that forces students to use an alias (the alias would appear in forum posts, etc.). This is the other half of MDL-8148.
Please comment or vote on MDL-8148.
I created an account on virelibre Demo (http://moodest.virelibre.eu/) but was unable to find any courses which permit guest access (see screenshot).
In reply to John Isner
Re: How to log in forbidden to guests moodest.virelibre.eu demo site
by Fred Quay -
Hi, John,
I voted and commented for aliased courses backup, since it gives an advanced application to a practice I promote, and extends the ability to share valuable pedagogic resources. Great idea, thank you.
I voted and commented for aliased courses backup, since it gives an advanced application to a practice I promote, and extends the ability to share valuable pedagogic resources. Great idea, thank you.
- "In the demo site, I created two virtual identities, which are published on site home page : one for my class -call it C3- non editing teacher (profc3 profc3) and one for a C3 virtual pupil (eleve eleve)."
In reply to Fred Quay
Re: How to log in forbidden to guests moodest.virelibre.eu demo site
by John Isner -
Fred,
I visited your demo site as both prof and eleve. Very nice! Are you using students' real initials (C Q)? I like the way you used silhouettes for the profile pictures.
I visited your demo site as both prof and eleve. Very nice! Are you using students' real initials (C Q)? I like the way you used silhouettes for the profile pictures.
In reply to John Isner
Re: How to log in forbidden to guests moodest.virelibre.eu demo site
by Fred Quay -
Hi, John
Yes Initials are real. In real site, I use black and white photographies, in memory of photographic argentic old times, and as evocating inner qualities (light) rather than outer appearance (colour). In a numeric environment, It's for me reminder of human prevalence upon techno-centered rules.
Theses photos shouldn't be visible on demo site, but I experienced a problem of permission rights which made them non accessible before I changed them, without checking consequences, so as I'm now to cut them off...
Yes Initials are real. In real site, I use black and white photographies, in memory of photographic argentic old times, and as evocating inner qualities (light) rather than outer appearance (colour). In a numeric environment, It's for me reminder of human prevalence upon techno-centered rules.
Theses photos shouldn't be visible on demo site, but I experienced a problem of permission rights which made them non accessible before I changed them, without checking consequences, so as I'm now to cut them off...