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Moodling with Rwandan researchers

Conference at Ireland & UK Moodlemoot 2012
Apr. 12, 2012
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Moodling with Rwandan researchers

  1. Moodling with Rwandan Researchers Ravi Murugesan
  2. • INASP – “International Network for Availability of Scientific Publications” – Charity based in Oxford – Promotes scholarly information for development • AuthorAID – One of INASP’s projects – Supports developing country researchers in publishing their work
  3. Training at AuthorAID • Workshops on publishing research for university researchers in partner countries – Ethiopia, Rwanda, Zambia, Kenya, Tanzania, Nepal, Cuba… • Over 25 workshops facilitated by AuthorAID staff since 2007 – Many “cascaded” workshops as well
  4. E-learning • Initially supposed to be a set of e-learning modules put up on the website • Then a Moodle enthusiast was hired
  5. Pilot e-learning course • “Writing a Research Paper for Publication” • Set up on Moodle 2.1 • 6-week, fully online course – October to November 2011 • One instructor (me) and 28 learners – Academic staff at the National University of Rwanda
  6. Activities in the course • Forum • Lesson (most of the course) • Feedback • Glossary • Database
  7. Facing the challenges
  8. • E-learning adoption: slow in Africa • English: Second language in Rwanda • Mostly first-time e-learners in the pilot course
  9. Encouraging enrolment • Clear course description – Circulated by email well in advance • Preparatory course before the actual course • Light weekly workload (2 to 3 hours) • Self-registration and self-enrolment
  10. Accessible, interesting content • Moodle’s default theme used for low- bandwidth connections • Short sentences and simple words in the content • Questions interspersed (lesson module) – Of 118 pages in the course, 74 had questions • Not more than 200 words per page in lessons
  11. Question page in a lesson
  12. Encouraging study and completion • Preparatory course and learning guidelines • Regular announcements (news forum) • Prompt responses to questions • Monitoring learners’ progress every week • Checking with learners who fell behind • End-of-course assignment • Two-week extension
  13. Assignment with database module
  14. Glossary with questions and answers
  15. Outcomes
  16. • 25 of 28 learners (89%) completed the course • Good feedback
  17. Screenshots from analysis page of feedback module
  18. Next steps
  19. Moodle for AuthorAID; maybe for INASP too! AuthorAID community INASP community
  20. Thank you Write to me (rmurugesan@inasp.info) to see the course and give me feedback
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