Moodle
Moodle Functions
Administrative, Course Creation, Editing
The program’s administrative functions include different levels of access privileges and the ability to automatically grade assignments such as quizzes. In addition, courses can be organized by week or topic. This option provides flexibility for the instructor depending on how the content would be best presented. I found the features for course creation very intuitive and easy to use. Furthermore, editing a Moodle is very simple. Administrators can choose to edit the Moodle by selecting the “turn editing on” button. This feature is easily reversed by choosing the “turn editing off” button. One nice feature is being able to toggle back and forth between the student view and the teacher/administrator view. This makes editing a more efficient process.
Reflections (Pros/Cons)
Overall, I liked the variety of learning tools that Moodle provided. The wide array of available tools help instructors design courses that are interactive and that cater to the needs of each group. However, I did feel that some functions were easier to use than others. For example, adding text to a summary page, wiki, or blog was simple, but adding text to quizzes proved to be a tedious process. In addition, adding images to the site was difficult. Images could only be added by providing a URL to the picture on the summary page. This caused frustration because there were images downloaded on our computer that we wanted to use, but couldn’t because we did not have a URL for the image.
Esperanza Rising Course Description
My partner, Lily Lee Jones, and I designed a literature circle focused on the novel Esperanza Rising by Pam Munoz Ryan. The course was designed to develop reading and writing skills for 8th grade English students. We developed four out of ten weekly sessions for the entire course. The first session provided a collaborative small group project where students worked together to research the setting of the novel and share resources on a group wiki page. Students used their research to develop a short PowerPoint that they presented to the group.
Sessions two through nine were designed around each chapter and included an assignment page listing all tasks for the week, a forum where students discussed relevant topics from the novel, a glossary page where vocabulary was practiced, and a chapter quiz that provided immediate feedback to the student.
Session 10 represented the culminating project where students developed a five paragraph response to literature essay. Students worked with a partner to provide feedback and make revisions to their essays through a forum page.
VDILS Design
In order to provide learners with an instructional experience that changed according to their individual aptitude, we incorporated the following elements of effective VDILS into our overall course design.
1. Objectives were presented to the learner at the beginning of each weekly session.
2. Appropriate learning materials were listed in a logical way to provide learners with an organized list of weekly tasks to complete.
3. Learning experiences were appropriate for the aptitude of each student. Although all students were in the 8th grade, the skill levels of each student varied. The learning experiences were broad enough to cater to low and high functioning students participating in the course.
4. There were multiple opportunities for learner-to-learner interactions including group wiki and PowerPoint projects, forum postings, and peer essay review forums.
5. The intuitive design of Moodle allowed for weekly assignments to easily be adjusted in response to learner autonomy.
High Quality Online Course Rubric Results
Overall, the course components were successful with our intended audience of 8th grade English students. We piloted the Moodle course with ten 8th grade students attending Audeo Charter School, an independent study program.
Learner Support and Resources
Effective-Course provides necessary course-specific information, all contact information for instructor, and necessary resources to support course content
Students agreed that most of the necessary information was available; however, they did mention that a complete syllabus would be helpful for future courses (Our syllabus was not complete at the time of piloting the course).
Online Organization & Design
Baseline-Course syllabus is unclear about what is expected of students
At the time of piloting the course, the syllabus was not complete. Students found the grading scale and list of assignments helpful, but wanted more clarification for each assignment listed on the syllabus. Obviously, the syllabus would have been complete prior to administering a real course which would solve this problem.
Exemplary-Organization of course is easy to follow and there are no difficulties finding necessary or supplementary information
Students liked the way activities were organized under weekly sessions. For example, assignments were listed in a logical sequence that students could complete as they finished the assigned reading for the week. After reading, students completed a journal, vocabulary, and quiz activity. The repetition for each week helped students better understand what was expected of them and the order they should complete each task.
Instructional Design & Delivery
Effective-Course offers some opportunity for interaction and communication among students and with instructor
Students felt that there were multiple opportunities to interact with other students through group wikis, journal discussion forums, and group projects; however, there were not opportunities to interact directly with the instructor. This could be remedied by providing synchronous or asynchronous opportunities for students to ask questions or receive feedback from the instructor perhaps through a blog, forum, or chat feature.
Exemplary- Learning objectives are identified and align directly with the goals of the course
Students were aware of the objectives for each session by reviewing the summary for each weekly session. Overall, students felt that they knew what the purpose was for each session and that the provided activities met these objectives.
Effective- Course provides some visual, textual, kinesthetic and/or auditory activities to enhance student learning
Students liked the clean looking graphics and consistent organization of each weekly session. They felt that the text and graphics gave each week a distinct look that helped them remember the content learned. However, this could have been enhanced by adding more kinesthetic or auditory activities such as screencasts or podcasts to enhance student learning.
Exemplary-Instructional activities are closely aligned with learning objectives
Students felt that the instruction helped them gain a better understanding of the objectives listed under each weekly session. In particular, students commented that the learning objectives made them focus more on the purpose of each lesson which in turn helped them learn the concepts better than if the objectives had not been listed.
Assessment & Evaluation of Student Learning
Exemplary-Assessment activities are closely aligned with learning objectives
Students reported that the PowerPoint presentation and research project helped them demonstrate a better understanding of the setting of the novel. In addition, they felt that the reading and writing activities were good assessments of the planned learning objectives for each session.
Exemplary-Course has multiple, timely, and appropriate activities to assess student understanding of course material
Students felt that there were a variety of activities that supported their learning of the material. They reported that the workload for each week was manageable and they liked that each assignment could be customized/individualized if necessary.
Innovative Teaching with Technology
Effective-Course uses some tools to facilitate communication and learning
Although students liked the variety of tools used particularly the group wiki and forum, they wanted to see more opportunities for synchronous communication such as chat. They felt that this feature would be helpful while working on group projects at home. In the future, the incorporation of more synchronous communication tools would improve this course.
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