Introduction to front-end Moodle Management. Brenda Mallinson July 2015

1. About Moodle …
Brenda Mallinson
Bella Vista Moodle workshop
July 2015

2. Outline
Structural approach
Demo & Practice
Support (Proactive & contextual)
Q & A Session

3. User Levels  Roles  Permissions
Site level:
• Administrator -> can do everything
• Manager -> subset of admin permissions (safer)
• Course Creator -> creates courses
Course provision:
• Teacher -> manage course and edit (add content)
• Non-editing teacher -> same as teacher, but not edit
Course access:
• Student -> access & engage with visible activities &
resources; can’t change content
• Guest -> access, but not engage

4. Activity 1
• Purpose: Build a conceptual framework of the
Moodle roles and their capabilities.
• Task: Explore the functions and capabilities of your
identified primary Moodle role
• Resource: https://docs.moodle.org/29/en/Standard_roles
• Guidance: Using the link provided to Moodle.org,
investigate the functionality of your role, recording
brief notes.
• Feedback: Share your understanding with the group
• Duration: 30 mins

5. Demonstration & Practice 1
Demo:
– Defaults for roles setup at site level
– Roles assigned at course level
– Roles can be changed at activity level
Signon & practice on the Mount Orange site:
– http://school.demo.moodle.net/
– Site reset every hour
Supporting Resource:
Enrolling users

6. Front-end site organisation
Site front page:
– Institutional branding and useful links and information
Categories: group your courses logically
Note: Some roles can be assigned at category level
– Manager, Course Creator
Supporting resources:
– Course and category management video (1m 55s)
Examples of branding, categories & access:
– Open University of Tanzania - eLMS
– UKZN – Learn@UKZN
– Rhodes - RUconnected

7. Demo:
– Course creation, backup and restore
Practice on the Mount Orange site:
– http://school.demo.moodle.net/
– Site reset every hour
Supporting resources:
– Creating and restoring a course (video 10 mins)
– Adding a new course: Moodle docs
Demonstration & Practice 2

8. How would you like your course to look?
– Standard settings: who, what and how
– Implications of choices; Flexibility
Examples:
– Themes: Show variety on Saide site
– Format: ‘Collapsed Topics’ at OUT
– Layout: ‘Show one section per page’ at Types of
Sport at Mount Orange School Demo site
Course Settings

9. Demo:
– Standard settings: who, what and how
Practice on the Mount Orange site:
– http://school.demo.moodle.net/
– Site reset every hour
Supporting resources:
– Moodle Course Settings (video 5 mins 44 secs)
– Course Settings: Moodle docs
Demonstration & Practice 3

10. Course Home / Landing Page

11. Course Layering – Example Structure

12. Course Sections, Blocks, Activities & Resources
Top section (mandatory)
– News Forum (mandatory)
– Add your course / module front matter
Central Sections
– Summary area
– Add activities & resources
Blocks – can be added to left or right sides
Supporting resources:
– Course Sections Moodle Docs
– Activity Chooser video (2min 32 secs)

13. Getting started …
Teacher - turn on editing to develop a course
– Top left hand corner of your course home screen
– Also from Administration block on LHS
– Content editor (HTML)
Teacher & Student - site level actions / facilities:
– Edit user (own) profile
• Administration block / My profile settings
• Personalised settings
– Blogs Blog menu block; Can be associated with course
– Private messaging – from profiles

14. Managing your users
Site registration methods
– Manual, self, LDAP
Course enrolment
– Manual, self with key, …
Groups – at course and activity levels
– No groups, separate groups, visible groups
Basic Reports and Grades
– Administration block (LHS) / Reports and Grades
Analytics
– ‘Learning Analytics in Moodle’ Doc in Google Folder

15. Tool tips
‘How to’ Information – pops up
– Icon appears next to almost all settings choices &
boxes
Moodle Docs for this page
– Icon links to contextual help appears at the bottom on
each page
Moodle Contextual Support

16. Moodle.org - Moodle user and developer support
– Moodle Docs https://docs.moodle.org/29/en/Main_page
– Mount Orange site http://school.demo.moodle.net/
– Courses, free downloads https://moodle.net/
– Free Moodle Fundamentals course (HRDNZ):
http://www.moodlebites.com
YouTube
– Moodle for Teachers (M4T - Nellie Deutsch)
– Moodle Bites (HRDNZ)
SlideShare, Vimeo, IT4ALL, …..
Supporting Resources

17. How to keep up?
• Signup to Moodle News
• Search for a certified Moodle Partner
• Frequent the Moodle Community Forums
Free digital books on Moodle include:
• Moodle 2.5 eBook (2013) by Mark Repp (pdf 68 pages 4.4Mb)
• Using Moodle (2008) by Jason Cole & Helen Foster 2nd Ed.
(pdf 284 pages 6.3Mb)

18. Question & Answer Session
• What do you need to know right now?
• What would you still like to find out later?

19. Thank You
Brenda Mallinson
brendam@saide.org.za
SlideShare: http://www.slideshare.net/brenda6
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported License.