Presentation on using Drupal for a classroom site at ScienceOnline 2011, #scio2011

1. Making a classroom site with
Drupal
Sandra Porter, Ph.D.
Digital World Biology
www.Digital-World-Biology.com 1

2. Why not use Blackboard?
Hard for students
✦ problems uploading images
✦ can’t tell if assignments were turned in
✦ forums hard to use
✦ depressing colors
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3. Why not use Blackboard?
Hard for instructor
✦ hard to make pages
✦ can’t tell if assignments were handed back
✦ forums hard to use
✦ hard to download assignments
✦ can only use students’ school email
✦ hard to get to know students
✦ no continuity - always rebuilding the same
thing!
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4. With Drupal, I can
• “see” my students
• keep previous work
• add what I want
• experiment
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5. What is Drupal? Why use it?
Drupal is a content management system - a collection
of modules and tools for building an interactive web site
• Very flexible
• open source
• lots of help available
• good documentation & support
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6. Database-driven sites
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7. What are the downsides?
• takes time to learn
• flexible but complex
• do have to manage it
• You may be better off adapting a blog
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8. The first steps
• Set up a Drupal site on your computer for
experimentation
–http://acquia.com/downloads
• Bookmark www.drupal.org
• Find a local Drupal user group
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9. When you’re ready to go online
You will need:
• A place to put your site - hosting company
– need to be able to host Drupal
– Fantastico
– cPanel
– more info: http://drupal.org/hosting
• A name for your site
– purchase a domain name
• A way to move files
– FTP program - e.g. Transmit
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10. Displaying information
• A page is built from blocks & menus
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11. Displaying information
– blocks & menus
– 12 blocks
– collapsible
– similar colors and
images from old
site for similar look
& feel
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12. Displaying information
• Where information gets displayed
–blocks - control position, pages, and access
–menus
• Who sees the display - how does it look?
– permissions and display - logged in vs. logged out
– access controls, publishing controls
» sticky, teaser, front page
• How information is displayed
– controlled by views , content fields, css
– list, table, links, grid, map
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13. My site’s organization
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14. My site’s organization
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15. My site’s organization
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16. My site’s organization
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17. My site’s organization
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18. My favorite modules
• CCK & Views
• Access control: ACL, Content Access, Forum
Access
• Copying pages & content type: Node clone, Add
another
• Communication: Mass contact
• Gathering info & quizzes: Webform, Quiz
• CKEditor - for formatting text
• IMCE - image handling
• Workspace
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