Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment

• Moodle Screen Layouts
• Where to start in Moodle Editing
• Theme Box Editing Controls
• Function Block Editing Controls
• Function Blocks Available
• Administrative Block Explained

What is Moodle?

Moodle is an acronym for Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment. Moodle is a Course Management System (now often refered to as well as a Learning Management System). Moodle is thus of a similar type of software as products like WebCT and Blackboard. Unlike these commercial and proprietary products however, Moodle is Open-Source software. Each site can modify and use Moodle freely, as they participate in the world-wide community of Moodle users. The price will never be raised, nor will the vendor withdraw the product from the market or make changes that ignore users' needs.

Moodle is an ongoing project which was originally started by Martin Dougiamas of Perth, Australia. Today an active community of educators and developers contribute regularly to the ongoing evolution of the software. (You may read more about the Moodle community at Http://moodle.org Moodle was created not just as a free replacement for software like Blackboard or WebCT, but as a tool for pedagogical enhancement was well. Martin Dougiamas conceived Moodle around the principles of social constructivism. (from: http://thinkingdistance.org/questions/)

As a Course Management System, Moodle provides tools that allow the instrutor to "manage students, activities, homework, quizzes, grades, discussions, and resources across the internet to any computer with a browser" (http://thinkingdistance.org/questions/). It permits teachers to "present a course containing information resources (textual and tabular information, photographs and diagrams, videos, audio recordings, web pages, acrobat documents and many others) and student activities such as uploadable assignments, quizzes, user polls, forums and others" (http://www.muprivate.edu.au/moodle/mod/resource/view.php?id=10).

"But because Moodle was built around pedagogical concepts, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Moodle isn't a fancy gradebook or a discussion board on steroids; rather, it is an integrated environment where students and teachers share materials and engage in thoughtful dialogue. Traditional classrooms are bound by time: neither the teacher nor the student has much time to consider before responding to each other. With Moodle, teachers construct activities for students to explore at any time of day. Students and teachers enjoy the time and space to provide thoughtful, detailed, and uncompromised feedback to each other." (http://thinkingdistance.org/questions/).

Moodle is currently available in 37 languages and boasts 1200 registered sites worldwide. (http://elmstreet.gda.org/New_Look/MoodleMoot_NE/what.php)

The word Moodle can also be seen as a verb, describing "the process of creatively meandering through the various activities of a course, an enjoyable tinkering that often leads to insight and creativity. As such it applies both to the way Moodle is actively developed, and to the way a student or teacher might approach studying or teaching an online course." (http://thinkingdistance.org/questions/)