This document appears to be slides from a presentation on Moodle. The agenda includes discussions on Moodle 2.3 and private files, the lesson module in Moodle 2.2, and a catch up on what attendees have been doing. Additional topics in the presentation include administration of private files, the structured lesson feature, and learning tools interoperability (LTI) which allows integration of external applications into Moodle.

1. Moodle User Group
Phil Hardcastle
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www.rsc-em.ac.uk November 15, 2012 | slide 1
RSCs – Stimulating and supporting innovation in learning

2. Agenda
 9:30 – 10:0 Coffee
 10:00 – 10:15 Welcome
 10:15 – 11:00 Moodle 2.3 and Private Files
 11:00 – 11:20 Coffee
 11:20 – 12:00 The Lesson Module in 2.2
 12:00 – 12:30 Catch up - what have you
been doing?
 12:30 Lunch
November 15, 2012 | slide 2

3. Moodle 2.3
 New features:
– Improvement to file systems
• Drag and drop, file picker
improvement, icons, thumbnails, alias/shortcuts
– Repository improvements
• Equella supported
– Course pages
• Courses can show sections on individual pages
• AJAX editing cleaned up
• Direct editing of course element names
– Assignment, Book, Quiz, SCORM and Wkshop updated.
http://docs.moodle.org/dev/Moodle_2.3_release_notes
November 15, 2012 | slide 3

4. Private Files
 New to Moodle 2.x
 Allows personal storage of files – could be for use
in courses, but not necessarily so - learners could
store files on the system also
 Issues:
– Control of amount of files stored on the system
– Moodle becomes its own repository
 Potential benefits – one file can be stored and
linked to. Changes to this file will be replicated
elsewhere (2.3)
November 15, 2012 | slide 4

5. Administration of Private Files
 The size limit for each user's private files area is
set by a site administrator in Settings > Site
administration > Security > Site policies.
 If a file is uploaded into your private files area, it is
possible when using it elsewhere on Moodle to
select it as an alias/shortcut. This means that if
you update the file in your private files area, it will
automatically update elsewhere on Moodle.
 Issues regarding a transient tutor population –
their/other courses may depend on private files.
November 15, 2012 | slide 5

6. Structured Lesson
 The Lesson activity
– Allows content – text, pictures or video, to be mixed with
questions and branching.
– Needs planning before and testing afterwards
 Could be used
– as a revision aid for a particular topic
– as an introduction to a topic
– to recap material already covered in a session
 Takes time to plan and set up
– Only invest time and energy in a Lesson activity when it
is going to be re-used
November 15, 2012 | slide 6

7. Lesson Module
 Demo from:
– http://moodle.rsc-em.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=124
November 15, 2012 | slide 7

8. LTI
Learning Tools Interoperability
 The future for Moodle?
– Moodle as a bridge to
wider web tools
– Don’t create more tools
– Simplify and add
external tools as
needed
November 15, 2012 | slide 8

9. Moodle 2.2 supports LTI v1.1
 LTI is a standard way to securely and
seamlessly integrate an external learning
application with a VLE
 A user logged into Moodle can connect
to, say, an external wiki or blog and be
automatically authorised
 The blog/wiki and account can automatically be
provisioned
 There is a plugin for Moodle 1.9+:
basiclti4moodle
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10. How does this work?
 LTI is simple to use, it is just an activity in a
course. As a teacher, turn on editing and add an
“External Tool”
 Three items are required
– Launch URL
– Consumer key
– Consumer secret
The above are supplied by the learning tool provider
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11. Add External Tool
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12. Privacy
 LTI can send user’s role (e.g. student or
teacher) and so remote tool can use this
information, e.g. different privileges in
WordPress
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13. Some LTI enabled Tools
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14. Benefits
 Benefits for learners and teachers:
– seamless integration of VLE and external products
– empowerment of teachers
 Benefit for administrators and developers:
– administrative efficiencies
– single integration will support any VLE
 Scale Benefits
 LTI Demo with Noteflight:
– http://moodle.rsc-em.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=124
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15. Anchors
Returning in 2.4?
 Alternatives for avoiding the long scroll to a topic:
– Collapsed topics: It allows students to collapse or
expand the topics’ contents so that all the list of topics
can be easily identified.
– Tab course format: This is probably not good if you have
15 topics, as it creates a tab for each topic.
– Grid format – but has problems – fouls up the backup
system
– You might consider creating your own links using
hyperlinks and adding the section number by adding
"#section-3" or "#section-16" etc in the URL, e.g.
yourmoodle.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=24#section-3
November 15, 2012 | slide 15

16. What’s been happening?
 What have you been doing over the summer?
November 15, 2012 | slide 16

17. Next Term
 Next Meeting: Wed. March 6th
 Venue
 Topic suggestions: Linking to Google Docs
 phil.hardcastle@rsc-em.ac.uk
 http://moodle.rsc-em.ac.uk
November 15, 2012 | slide 17