Engaging Staff & Promoting Interactive Usage in FE - Presented at the 2015 Moodle Moot UK held at the Dublin City University. In July 2012 Exeter College made the strategic decision to move from a Microsoft SharePoint based VLE to Moodle. Offering our staff more tools for blended delivery, assessment and explore other active learning approaches, in turn enhancing our students’ learning experience. This presentation summarises the journey and the challenges faced by the college in making this transition. The College employs over 600 teaching staff. It was identified early on that giving staff and learners the opportunity to play an active role in the planning, development and promotional stages was critical to the project’s success. We will explore the strategies, technical issues encountered and approach towards training and supporting staff resulting in how we went from no moodle in 2012 to achieving 80% faculty uptake in the academic year of 2013-14. In 2014 Exeter College was the first college in Devon and Cornwall to be rated as Outstanding by Ofsted using its new enhanced framework, this followed the previous rating of Outstanding in a no-notice pilot less than two years prior.”

1. Exeter College
Engaging Staff & Promoting
Interactive Usage in FE
Chris Chapman
VLE Applications Developer
Ian Wallace
IT Lecturer & Improvement Practitioner

2. Introduction & Institution Background
• Outstanding Ofsted inspections 2014 and 2012 No Notice
• SharePoint ‘Portal’ used as VLE since 2006
• Add value with Moodle, after Ofsted No Notice feedback
• Focus on interactive assessment tools

3. Our Approach
• Provide more interactive, assessment and tracking features for
learners and teaching staff
• Enhance, not replace
• Actively involve and consult all customers in development stages

4. The Project
• Formation of the VLE Development Group (July 2012)
• New VLE Developer role created
• Improvement Practitioner roles created
• Initial Staff Training and Resources provided (E-books etc)
• Production Moodle available from July 2013
• SLT Support

5. Cross College Awareness
• Moodle Week
• Pot Moodle Campaign
• Monthly Moodle Stats (driving force)
• Staff Development Sessions
• Animation

7. Additional Plugins/Theme
Staff and Learners had a say in the additional ‘features’ and
UI of Moodle giving them ownership.
Learners, liked the use of bright vibrant colours and ‘clean’
looking images, and easy access to courses with
notifications.
Open door policy to explore adding features and assist in
course construction
‘Key features & plugins’
Drag & Drop
OU Question types
Progress Bar
Single Sign On
Theme
Lightbox Gallery
Grid Format
Badges

8. Usage
• Allowing staff to assess in a range of different ways
• Use of quizzes, forums and assignments
• 1,114 questions added in September 2013 alone (First Month)
• One lecturer commenting a 40% time saving in the marking of a single assignment

9. 0
50000
100000
150000
200000
250000
300000
1-Aug-13 1-Nov-13 1-Feb-14 1-May-14 1-Aug-14 1-Nov-14 1-Feb-15
August 2013- April 2015 Total Monthly Activity
Staff Learners

10. Top 10 Most Active Courses in June 2013
Position Faculty/Subject Course Activity Students Activity per
Student
1st BIT/Business Unit 01 BTEC L3 90 Credit Diploma in Business (1A) 23516 22 1068.9
2nd EAA/Engineering Level 3 90 Credit Diploma in Engineering 9040 59 153.22
3rd EAA/Engineering Level 3 Extended Diploma in Engineering 8252 48 171.92
4th MAS/Computing AS Computing 5169 36 143.58
5th ILS/Learning
Centres
WINK L3-5 (What I Need to Know) 5134 1861 2.76
6th EAA/Aerospace BTEC Diploma in Engineering L3 (Aero) 4713 35 134.66
7th CON/Plumbing Level 1 City & Guilds 7202 Diploma (Plumbing) 3003 32 93.84
8th SPO/Outdoor
Adventure
BTEC L3 Extended Diploma in Outdoor Adventurous
Activities
2914 52 56.04
9th MPA/Performing
Arts
BTEC Level 3 90 Credit Diploma Performing Arts 2563 53 48.36
10th BIT/Business Unit 01 BTEC L3 Certificate in Business (Column 1) 2320 33 70.30

11. Our first year with Moodle…
• Ofsted impressed with VLE after demonstration with lead inspector
• 893 Quiz activities containing 11,956 questions in 189 courses
• 373 Feedback activities in 130 courses
• 221 Forums in 178 courses
• 2,769 Assignment Activities in 266 courses
• By September 2014 Moodle had 1025 courses, and 30,000+ logins (+250%)

12. Challenges – Teaching & Learning
• Staff time
• Training (especially new staff)
• Avoid high percentage of static content (gamify course standards for staff)
• Exam boards and the use of VLE for assessment
• Driving access in classrooms with mobile devices. (bring your own device)

13. • Keeping up/Providing new features Vs User familiarity
• Providing useful and reflective Learning Analytics
• Developing an effective year end rollover process
• Down time for Bug fixes/upgrades
Challenges – Development

14. What’s Next?
• Integration with other services (Office 365, MIS)
• UI Bootstrap Redesign with Moodle 2.9 ready for Summer 2015
• Anti-Plagiarism Tools
• Complete SharePoint course migration and introduce ‘Course Standards’

15. Any Questions?
chrischapman1@exe-coll.ac.uk
@chappers11050
Chris Chapman - VLE Applications Developer
ianwallace@exe-coll.ac.uk
@IanWallace79
Ian Wallace - IT Lecturer & Improvement
Practitioner (ILT)