To be? (A Moodle course) or not to be? (A Moodle course) That is…
Choices...a design question.
…a design question discussed at the March 5th FLN meeting which continually comes up from teachers in Moodle training.
“What format should my Moodle course be?”
The answer is it depends, what teaching need do you want to use your Moodle course for?
For flexibility Moodle courses should not be locked into any particular format so the SWSI ITEL sat down and examined the pros and cons of the formats we advocate to teachers namely:
- One Moodle Course = Individual UOC
- Moodle Course = Whole TAFE Course i.e.. contains all UOC’s in one place (Cert 1, 2, 3, 4 AQF etc)
- One Moodle Course = Focused Content (i.e Class)
- Moodle Course = Network Hub, an Emergent (Dominant?) trend.
At the moment we sit in two camps working within the limitations of Moodle 1.9.7 and the promises of new Moodle 2.0 functionality to fix all those bug-bears, the pro and cons .ppt covers these variables and some design solutions.
View: Moodle Course Format Pro and Cons .ppt (This is a Collaborative Powerpoint, contributions welcome).
Long story short SWSI has different approaches to strike a balance between flexibility and maintenance of learning design and quality control in Moodle 1.9.7 administration, I’ve added these to the FLN wiki for feedback, input is welcome.
View: Moodle 1.9.7 master course administration and learning design cycle wiki page.
Master Learners, Learning Centered Design and Master Courses
Will Richardson posts on the teacher as a master learner, inspired by some observations from George Siemen’s post ‘Teaching in Social and Technological Networks’.
This snippet gives an idea of what Will means by the teacher as a ‘Master Learner’:
“George goes on to suggest a totally different way of thinking about “teaching” one where instead of controlling a classroom, a teacher now influences or shapes a network.” And he discusses seven different roles that teachers will play, all of which are worth the read…we don’t teach subjects, we teach kids. And I’ll add to that: we teach kids to learn. We can’t teach kids to learn unless we are learners ourselves, and our understanding of learning has to encompass the rich, passion-based interactions that take place in these social learning spaces online. Sure, I expect my daughter’s science teacher to have some content expertise around science, no doubt. But more, I expect him to be able to show her how to learn more about science on her own, without him, to give her the mindset and the skills to create new science, not just know old science.“
The following are codified behaviours George advocates a teacher can adopt in the context of networked learning environments:
- Amplifying
- Curating
- Wayfinding and socially-driven sensemaking
- Aggregating
- Filtering
- Modelling
- Persistent presence
Read George’s teaching paper and Will’s ‘Master Learner’ post for an explanation of what they mean.
I’m going to try and model their ideas in Moodle 2.0, it makes sense to me, and as a teacher I’m asking myself how do l become a master learner? The answer for me is to model a learning design for myself based on my learning need.
At the moment I have a NEED TO LEARN how to grow food so I’ve therefore found an opportunity to participate in some hands on workshops organised by Sydney Carriageworks, Kitchen Garden Project, there I will learn about.
- Composting
- Planter boxes
- No dig gardens
- Seed saving
- Planting
- Harvesting
By participating in the Kitchen Garden project I am expected to share the application of my newfound skills and knowledge with a wider network (i.e. using Moodle 2.0, wikibooks, youtube, flickr networks etc.) I’ll use the opportunity to try and model the George Siemen’s approach, with a learning design based on the practical Kitchen Garden tasks.
From this I will document and share my resources and networks, found, adapted, linked, embedded or created by me in Moodle 2.0. The learning design, resources and networks together will make up a narrative of coherence‘ or ‘master course’.
(Note: It’s good to model this approach outside the context of an education organisation in that for me the point is to demonstrate a move towards self directed learning in a LOCAL AND INDEPENDENT/ REAL LIFE CONTEXT (with RPL opportunities for VocEd sector).
This diagram from http://wikieducator.org/File:KtOER-Cycle-Find.png sums up a good workflow for developing a master course:
“A master course is a complete Moodle course consisting of well designed learner centered activities and resources. A master course is typically developed by a team of teachers (with experience in learning design) and made available in a community repository.
A master course can be cloned from the repository and locally adapted to improve upon the learning design. There are regular reviews of local changes and where appropriate new learning design elements are incorporated into the master course as part of continuous improvement process.” Steven Parker 2010
Plannning & documenting the learning design approach is an important part of this master learner process and I’ll utilise some fine, easy to understand templates developed by Vicki Marchant as part of her research into learner centred design. In these templates Vicki focuses on thinking and documenting 5 elements in relation to course design.
- Task Design (Learning Activity, Sequence)
- Tutoring (Feedback, Discussion)
- Teamwork (Collaboration)
- Topics & Tools (Content/Resources/Tech)
- Reflection (Review, explanation)
As part of my SWSI work training teachers in innovation and technology enhanced learning I advocate teachers document and share their learning designs as part of the course they deliver to students. Students can then explore and understand as to why? they are asked to do the learning tasks/ activities. Students may also see the value in developing their own learning design approach as part of their trade/business/ studies?
As said the platform I’m going with for my ‘growing food’ master course is Moodle 2.0 for its new network friendly features AND direction towards the community hub/ repository functionality. Also refer: http://tinyurl.com/repositoryexample .
http://docs.moodle.org/en/Community_hub
As somebody who works day to day with learning platforms, learning design and networked technology I already have the prerequisite skills and knowledge to understand where George Siemens’ is coming from, when teachers new to networking technologies clone my Moodle course they will have exposure to a variety of the networks which they can explore and connect to if they wish.
- Design a master course for myself on growing food (based on Kitchen Garden tasks) and publish to Moodle + Wikibooks.
- Explain my learning design.
- Share my master course.
- Open up lines of communication for feedback from others.
- Let others clone a master copy of my course to build upon & adapt for their own learning needs.
- Participate/ give feedback…learn more about growing food.
It’s a draft for me but feedback is welcome.
Related: Watch this recent presentation from Leigh Blackall for practical examples of the principles discussed - http://webconf.det.nsw.edu.au/p13103637/
“Leigh Blackall developed open education at Otago Polytechnic New Zealand over a period stretching 2007/2009. The Polytechnic signed progressive IP and copyright policies, and encouraged staff to use popular internet and social media to aid teaching and learning. Leigh is completing research measuring returns on this investment, and will describe the process and initial findings.”
Yammer closed micro-blogging vs open micro-blogging (i.e. Twitter)
I have just had a play with http://yammer.com, marketed as the twitter for corporate organisations. What this means is anybody who has the @det.nsw.edu.au email (i.e. Everyone at TAFE) can easily log in and be a part of a DET microblogging network, no wrestling with set up .
What I liked about Yammer :
- Enables easy access to a http://yammer.com using existing DET email
- Provides networked communication between many as apposed to 1 to 1 communication (i.e Office Communicator)
- Not blocked (Touch wood) via DET network
- Enable file attachments
- Enables threaded discussions around posts which can be hidden or expanded.
- Enables creation of groups (i.e I created a DET group for the MUG Moodle User Group).
- Yammer provides a desktop client for real time updates on DET network posts and targeted publishing to Yammer groups (built with Adobe Air), it’s really user friendly.
- Yammer provides an Outlook integration app for updates and publishing to network (Not as user friendly as Desktop app).
Yammer - Desktop Client Software - Very useful
What I dislike about Yammer:
- It’s a ‘Free’ CLOSED Environment, if you don’t have a @det.nsw.edu.au email you can’t join the network.
- To manage the DET account more granually i.e to add guest accounts for users without DET email, change administration settings etc. it costs….$3 dollars per person per month! (They have to make their money I guess).
- Posting directly to groups does not seem to be possible without downloading the Yammer Desktop Client.
Conclusion “Have your cake and eat it” - Publish to open and closed networks
Yammer as a closed Environment is both good and bad. Yammer is good for DET employees who want to talk shop on DET stuff in a closed environment and bad for those who recognise the benefits of being visible in open networks such as http://twitter.com but like everything it’s your individual choice what you want to do. Fortunately there are many tools which make publishing to your favorite open, closed space (Including Yammer) a sinch.
I like http://www.shareaholic.com/ with the plugin you can post to the network of your choice (Open or closed) via your browser of choice (IE or Firefox), you choose.
Shareaholic - Publish to your Network of Choice
Have your cake and eat it
FLN MEETING 5 March 2009
Please add Agenda items:
Update from Ron Wright
Update from TeLS (10.30 to 11.30)
CLI Update
Learning Design Capability Development
Learning Standards Update (Evan Bailey)
Conducting an Adobe Connect Webinar
image by sridgway
The October FLN f2f meet up was held in Kurri Kurri on October 31st. Throughout the day a number of sessions were conducted in Adobe Connect as weninars. Tony Loriman from Hunter Institute has asked me to provide an overview of the set-up I used to broadcast the audio and video so I thought I would do my response as a blog post.
Over the past couple of years I have experimented with a range of methods to conduct webinars, sessions where there is a combination f2f and online audience. This scenario poses a number of challenges.
- How do the online attendees hear the f2f speakers with good audio quality
- How do the f2f audience hear the online attendees when they are not wearing any headsets
- How do you get better video quality than a webcam into AC
- How do you make simultaneous audio recording for podcasting
Most people use Adobe Connect with a USB/Analogue headset, however there is no technical limitation to audio sources coming from range of inputs all mixed together into one feed and then fed into adobe connect.
Below is the set-up I have settled on and used successfully on many occasions.
Wireless Microphones
For large webinars a wireless lapel mic and a roving hand microphone for audience questions etc. is an effective and flexible solution to capturing good quality audio from all the f2f audience.
There are lots of commercially available wireless microphone systems available, so long as the gear you choose is a quality unit it does not matter which one you use.
I have opted for a Shure PG1288/PG185 Vocal/Lavalier Combo Wireless System. This has a wireless lapel mic and a hand held roving mic paired to a receiver unit. They sell for around $1000
Mixer
This your standard mixing deck into which the wireless receiver is fed, along with any other additional microphones you may wish to include into the mix. I will sometimes add a standard wired lapel mic for me so that I can talk to the online audience for audio testing or facilitation. Here I use a Sony ECM44B lapel.
The mixer allows significant control over the level of each microphone input and the mixed down final output, it is also easy to mute a mic if it is introducing noise etc.
We use a Behringer XENYX 1204 which retail for around $300 but any good quality mid range mixer would be fine.
M-Audio Mobile Pre-USB
It is possible to feed the output of the mixer directly into the Line-in of the computers sound card however there is one more component I add to improve quality and versatility to the set-up by adding a M-Audio mobile pre USB mixer to the final stage. This USB based sound encoder essentially replaces your computer sound card and does all the sampling in high quality 48 Khz. This bypasses any poor quality you might have in a laptop soundcard. The output of the mixer is fed into the line-in on the rear of the unit and it is chosen as the microphone by windows and Adobe Connect. This way all the wireless/wired mics connected to the mixer are fed into the computer. The nice thing about the unit is that it also provides a mixed output of the audio input and the computer audio output, perfect for a simultaneous podcast of the online and f2f participant audio. They sell for about $300.
Podcast Audio Recorder
I like to make a high quality audio of the adobe connect session for a separate podcast. I do this using a Maranz PMD661 solid state audio recorder plugged into the mixed down output of the mobile Pre USB. I love this unit however they are expensive @ around $1500. You can alternatively use any recording device including an ipod/Belkin combo or an Iriver etc.
Video Camera Input
As most of you would know Adobe Connect will only accept usb based webcams as input to the camera pod, so how do get a standard video camera to operate as the video source? Well through some experimentation I have found that cheap usb DVR video converters work a treat with a windows based computers essentially treating them as a webcam. These are typically utilised to digitise a composite video/audio source from a camcorder into a computer for conversion to DVD. You simply plug the video in one end and the usb connector on the other end into the computer and it’s treated as a webcam. This would also be an ideal way to have a POV camera feed into Connect. Ours is a Belkin DVR purchased from Dick Smith Electronics for around $129. I only had to install the software to set the input to PAL as it came set by default as NTSC, other than that it is treated as a standard USB camera by connect and other applications such as Adobe Prem Elements.
Examples
image by sridgway
Well that about it, it’s not for everyone and as you can see from the images in my flickr stream you do need top be a tad techie to set it up and troubleshoot any glitches but once you have the hang of it it’s not too complicated. It’s really the only way to ensure quality audio and video for a large online webinar, I have been to one to many sessions where they have used a head set mic held to the speakers mouth and the questions from the audience are inaudible to the online participants.
Here is a recording done recently using this set-up
The benefits of a TAFE NSW openwiki and creative commons licencing
Link - Benefits of an open mediawiki and open content licencing for TAFE NSW , presented at the last FLN meeting.
Covers some of the http://openwiki.illawarra.tafensw.edu.au design solutions that came out of discussions with teachers and elearning technologists on the benefits of an open mediawiki, namely:
- Cecile Bower’s proof of concept for resource creation - “Briki project“
- How to utlise Wikipedia Books tool for quickly pulling together rich underpinning content with creative commons licence in a nice PDF book format.
- Exporting and importing wikimedia content and recontextualising in openwiki to TAFE speak.
- Teacher Training in the use of Mediawiki to enable participation and contribution to TAFE openwiki and hopefully other open wikimedia projects.
- Integrating federated search across open content repositories and enabling creative commons licencing for records in Equella resource repository, available on the open internet.
- Supporting a culture of cross institute collaboration in both open and closed mediawiki spaces.
- Use of wikimedia templates and interwiki linking for cross referencing openwiki pages as a sister project of open wikimedia content.
- Cross Institute aggregation of ‘How To ‘ use eLearning technolgy info.
- Linking the openwiki to http://wiki.tafensw.edu.au
I think there needs to be more discussion on cross Institute work flows in the mediawiki, it’s early days with implementing outcomes and objectives but I think the proof of concept has good potential with support from other flexible learning teams. Ideas and suggestions are welcome in particular other open mediawiki projects and links to training resources, screencasts for utilising the mediawiki platform.
Transitioning between IP to free up content
iFramed LRR resource in Mediawiki with DET authentication.
Video: Transitioning between IP to free up content
The video demonstrates how to embed content from the Learning Reference Repository (LRR) into the resource mediawiki. The LRR requires a DET username and password and the resources contained within are under a variety of IP conditions. CLI is working on LRR functionality whereby authenticated users will be automatically able to view the LRR resources stored on the CLI server within resource mediawiki pages. There is ALOT of really good existing stuff with new resources streaming in everyday. The authentication to view frees up the LRR content to be used within the resource mediawiki within the IP constraints. It would be really good if Institutes could work together to get the best stuff embedded and categorised within the resource mediawiki pages esp toolboxes. David Gilchrist has recommended re-categorising content under Industry Qualifications which I think is a good idea.
Calling all open mediawiki champions! A tabula rasa site has been set up at http://openwiki.illawarra.det.win with a view to developing an open resource Mediawiki proof of concept model. Put your visions into a blog post. The design aim is to come up with a solution whereby an open Mediawiki sister site can be accomodated with an DET authenticated resource Mediawiki. Make it work!!!!!
Rethinking the LMS administration with the Moodle Sharing Cart and Community Hub
Video: Rethinking the LMS administration with the Moodle Sharing Cart and Community Hub
I really like the direction that Moodle is developing with the new Sharing Cart block and emergent Moodle Community Hub functionality.
Consider a teacher reviewing a variety of existing Moodle courses from their colleagues and browsing the content to find the good stuff.
Copy to Sharing Cart
The Sharing Cart block enables them to copy the most useful Resources and Activities to their Sharing Cart block and drop into their own Moodle course with a couple of clicks, so easy to use.
Copy to Course
The only thing missing is the Sharing Cart doesn’t enable the copying of a complete topic in one hit; this would be really useful in significantly freeing up Moodle administrators in supporting teachers in backing up and restoring course content (Hopefully this will become available in the future development of this great new feature).
Setting up Moodle Hub Connection
And there’s more…with the Sharing Cart, Moodle can be connected with a Moodle Community Hub. A Moodle Community Hub is a more sophisticated repository system which enables multiple Moodle installs to network and share content, the Hub has some nice bells and whistles like user rating, most popular downloads, points systems for user who upload Moodle artefacts and more… a Community Hub example has been set up at http://ept3.sgu.ac.jp
Moodle Community Hub Interface
With the Sharing Cart Block and Community Hub I really like that individual resources and activities are freed up to be used between teachers no longer locked up and inflexible within a Moodle course and reliant on backup and restore. After reviewing the new features I’ve had a complete rethink on Moodle Administration with the view to creating a new administration system with Master courses for qualification stored in a Community Hub these can continually maintained and updated by a community of teachers with the best bits and pieces from their own courses using the Sharing Cart Block hmmm that would mean less grunt work for the Administrator…these new Moodle features are great!
The benefits of a closed Mediawiki for Collaboration
Authenticated Login to view Mediawiki
Mediawiki is designed for open viewing of content but it is possible to turn on a username and password requirement before users can view content. Check out Illawarra Institute resource mediawiki with DET authentication at http://wiki.illawarra.tafensw.edu.au , it works quite nicely.
All Resource Mediawiki content is now behind a DET username and password. Moodle will also be integrated with the DET Single Sign On (SSO), i.e. students and staff will log into one system to access both Moodle and Mediawiki. To top the VLE off I’d also like to see a file repository that seamlessly integrates through SSO with Moodle and Mediawiki now that would be nice!
Mediawiki has worked well for teachers and staff in developing their resources (after a bit of training in the basics). Click here for an example course (Diploma of Children’s Services) developed with Jennifer Hopkins and based on this model.
The open Mediawiki has had good traffic for marketing courses from outside TAFE (6000 + views of front page) and some positive feedback on the content model but I don’t think the cross Institute collaboration aims have been realised as envisioned.
In a way the openness of the Mediawiki resources has been a big barrier to uptake and collaboration between Institutes. Culturally the people who have put in the hard yards and contributed to the Illawarra Institute Mediawiki Resources want their great work visible to TAFE students and teachers just not on the open internet and that’s understandable, from experience this is the common viewpoint especially with management who are concerned about commercial interests.
Initially the idea for making the resources available on the open internet was based on removing barriers which seemed quite radical a few years back. Power-law distribution and openess asserts that 80 percent of productivity and collaboration within an organisation will be done by 20 percent of employees, the open Illawarra Institute Mediawiki was meant to make existing resources highly visible in one location and remove access barriers for the 20 percent of productive teachers from other Institutes to collaborate. (At least that was the plan :-)).
I’ve been asked several times why is a Resource Mediawiki needed when Wikispaces is available, so much more user friendly and feature rich? Mediawiki’s strength is that it’s designed for openness and mass collaboration between many users. Wikispaces is working well but is generally used for smaller classes and groups, many Wikispaces are private with locked up content so there are issues with visibility and limited opportunities for members only collaboration.
Working in an open internet environment is my personal preference and I’ll continue to do so for the benefits of networking but my conclusion is a closed TAFE NSW Mediawiki bridging solution is needed that affords opportunity for mass collaboration between those “20 percent” Teachers who do not want to be publishing to the open internet. A resource Mediawiki in one location is well worth investing in; resources can be used across multiple delivery platforms for example linking to Sakai as well as Moodle resolving the issues of catering for multiple delivery platforms.
Success will come down to strategic support and coordination from Management for projects where the commercial interests between Institutes are best served through collaboration, for example sponsoring the existing Flexible Learning Toolboxes and new LRR ‘How to’ use technology learning objects to be linked and categorised in the Mediawiki.
As discussed at the last Moodle User Group meeting there has also been some trial work in consultation with TELS on setting up a Moodle Community Hub for collaborating and sharing courseware in anticipation of new Moodle 2.0 functionality. I recommend Checking out David Gilchrist and Diane Van Berlo’s New England ‘Moodle for Beginners resources’.
The Illawarra Institute is just starting some “trial balloon” case study projects with CLI, North Coast and New England on cross Institute collaboration work. The plan is to create some exemplars in utilising the resource Mediawiki and Community Moodle Hub:
- Alexander Miller of North Coast Institute has contributed the QuickE Moodle resources to add to the ‘Moodle for Teachers’ Mediwiki Category
- Rory OBrien is contributing the CLI Social Learning and some of TAA Diploma eLearning Units and LRR ‘How To’ technology guides to the Moodle Hub and Mediawiki.
- David Gilchrist and Diane Van Berlo have contributed a new LAW Learning Activity Wizard course.
- I’m looking at the integration of Flexible Learning Toolboxes into Moodle and Mediawiki other resources may be included over the coming weeks.
A conversation on Alfresco Repository, Mahara, Mediawiki
Vicki and myself caught up with David Gilchrist, Dianne Van Berlo and Don Tainsh of New England Institute in Adobe Connect this morning to have a look at Alfresco - The Open Source Repository to which Dianne’s feedback on it’s features were along the lines:
Gosh this makes me excited for a Monday morning!
Yes Alfresco is well worth a look and integrates with Moodle 2.0 out of the box. I easily installed the application on my computer to show during the meeting, check out the recording you’ll have to fast forward to 17 min to see the demo though. Some things shown and discussed where:
- Alfresco’s easy to use clean interface
- Smart Spaces with Alfresco Share
- Auditable Content, Simple Check-In/Out and Version Control
- Easy Workflow Management
- Categories including tagging
- Permalinks to files
- File format conversion to Flash format (.swf) of uploaded media files to solve bandwidth limitations
- Easy File management (like Windows explorer) to upload files
- Tight integration with Moodle, Sharepoint and Microsoft Office.
- Ability to manage public private digital rights and licensing for different types of content.
- Federated search capabilities, ability to search simply across multiple
- Alfresco repositories and external wikis (Including Mediawiki), blogs and news feeds
Based on initial feedback I think it would be interesting to get teachers to trial the product as part of the Virtual Learning Environment project.
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