How can Moodle change a school
Posted by Tomaz Lasic on 6 August, 2008
Before starting to work as a part-time technology integrator at our school this year, the principal asked me to come up with one ‘thing’, one key strategy for staff and students to ICT to improve their teaching and learning. After seeing the flexibility, robustness and ‘organic’ nature of Moodle the choice was pretty simple to make.
The video, shown here in two separate clips, is not so much about the technical features of Moodle but about people using it. I am forever indebted to our wonderful network administrator Russell Clarke, my colleagues from Moodle champions to Moodle beginners, and the students, who have taken to it so well (well, a healthy majority of them at least). Without them, none of the things shown in the clip would happen.
The focus of the first clip (9:58 min) is on the ways different, mostly standard features of Moodle have been used by various teachers and students at our school. If you can’t see this video (Part 1) please click here.
The second clip (5:43 min) shows the positive and in some cases very significant changes the establishment of Moodle has brought to our school in terms of using ICT to improve our core business – teaching and learning while modelling, establishing and maintaining healthy human relationships. If you can’t see the clip (Part 2) please click here.
I end this post with an anecdote from a teacher at our school. Over the last couple of weeks of holidays, my colleague Kim Bebbington built a fantastic course on Australian History, now shared by four other Year 8 classes. The course includes an assignment, due in week 3 of the upcoming term.
Deliberately or not, Kim left the course open to students to enrol and look at as he was building it. Imagine his (pleasant) surprise when he received a fully completed assignment (due in week 3) by one of the students in his class two days before the start of term.
But as wonderful and useful as Moodle has been, it is the people who are making the difference. It is not the technology itself - it is what we do with it.
If you are a ‘moodling’ teacher yourself, looking into it, or a person responsible for getting (particularly) teachers up to speed with Moodle and ICT in general I would love to hear from you - there is much to share and learn from each other.
August 7th, 2008 at 9:00 pm
Great video - thanks a lot Tomaz
Hope you don’t mind it being included in the Moodle Buzz database - http://moodle.org/mod/data/view.php?d=19&rid=1728
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August 8th, 2008 at 6:16 pm
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August 8th, 2008 at 10:08 pm
An excellent presentation - I look forward to showing it to colleagues as we introduce moodle this year. And I look fward to reading more on your blog.
Am interested to know how you turned the messaging on and off during the school day and why this was necessary?
August 9th, 2008 at 1:34 am
Tomaz,
We’ve just got Moodle up and running so your video is very useful and inspiring. Is it on TeacherTube?
August 9th, 2008 at 2:18 am
Okay - found them at TeacherTube (YouTube is blocked by the NSW DET filter at school) and have posted in my blog for staff at the school to see. We have installed Moodle on it’s own server last month and are ready to pursue our plan for Rudd’s laptops and the digital revolution:
http://darcymoore.wordpress.com/2008/07/25/the-digital-revolution-at-dhs-laptop-proposal/
August 9th, 2008 at 8:51 am
That’s great Tomaz
I like the way you have talked in front of the relevant screenshots of Moodle. It must have taken a lot of effort to plan and prepare but it really gets the point across and shows Moodle’s features very effectively.
A great story and a very compelling case study for thos spending big bucks on portals.
Bryn
August 10th, 2008 at 10:55 pm
Tomaz,
Congrats on the success. I am implementing moodle in some classes at my school and i was intrigued by the flash bakery module you had in your video. Was that created at your school or do you know a good site that would allow us to download assignments like that one.
Thanks
Warren
Thanks Warren.
The Virtual Bakery is a learning object created by The Learning Federation (Australian & New Zealand initiative, see http://www.thelearningfederation.edu.au for details.
Happy moodling, best wishes & thanks for dropping by
Tomaz
August 11th, 2008 at 12:35 pm
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August 14th, 2008 at 7:30 pm
Tomaz,
Just want to than you for this resource. Please do keep sharing, Fellow Moodler!
Best regards,
Art
art@moodlerooms.com
August 18th, 2008 at 11:05 pm
Tomaz
As a non moodler and remaining hopeful our school may consider it, I really enjoyed your videos and post. Particularly liked the comment “But as wonderful and useful as Moodle has been, it is the people who are making the difference. It is not the technology itself - it is what we do with it.” This is the message I hope our staff hear. Thanks for sharing
August 21st, 2008 at 5:22 am
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August 23rd, 2008 at 2:27 pm
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August 30th, 2008 at 2:08 am
Very interesting clips. I traduced a part of your comments in french at http://skolanet.over-blog.fr/article-22350022.html
August 30th, 2008 at 7:33 am
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September 4th, 2008 at 7:49 pm
Moodle is doing well in My School, but mainly in my Dept. (Science), Been unable to get much interest in other departments… Learning curve is steep. I could use resources/course seeds/starters for other departments. I am willing to GIVE whole science courses fully resourced for year 7-11 (School given permission), or the resources used for anyone to use. (Developed by science department).
I could use Language resources, Geography, Maths, technology, ICT, English etc for age groups 11-18
September 12th, 2008 at 7:28 am
Oustanding videos. I just started using Moodle this year. The kids love it.
September 17th, 2008 at 9:09 am
We implemeted Moodle as a system wide initiative last school year. I have been the primary Moodler in our school system. Most of our courses allow guest access, see what we’re doing with our Moodle from Elementary to High School.
http://moodle.fcschools.net/
October 3rd, 2008 at 1:56 am
We have been running Moodle for three years and the results are brilliant. Our area like yours is quite deprived and the school struggles and fails to get near the national average results for school leavers. But in the moodle classes it is different, a 100% of mine passed with high grades and 10 - 15% of Moodle access is outside of school hours. I have tracked some of the schools bad boys online at 11 pm swotting for lessons the next day. They don’t want to appear to try in class so they put in the time when they are not watched.
For Christs sake, we had 1100 hits after school on Monday, there are only 900 kids in the school. In spite of all of this I have colleagues who are batting away with fountain pens and Charles Dickens determined to make the kids fit them and not them fit the kids.
November 16th, 2008 at 11:59 am
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November 24th, 2008 at 5:23 pm
[...] the blogosphere. Tomaz has been a great find for me this year and a very friendly supporter. His, ‘How MOODLE can Change a School’ videos were brilliant and much watched at my [...]
December 20th, 2008 at 7:35 am
I could not agree more wholeheartedly that the technology (Moodle, or any CMS, LMS, LCMS, among other acronyms to describe e-learning platforms) should be perceived for what it is: an “enabler”…and nothing more. I’ve worked for many years implementing all kinds of e-learning platforms for universities and corporations alike, and the one concern that seems to rear it’s ugly head again and again is the perception that the technology will solve all problems. Nothing could be further from the truth. Moodle is an excellent platform on which to build a structured, pedogical training schema, but it needs to be in the hands of an experienced educator in order to be correctly utilized. Poorly-implemented, Moodle (like any e-learning solution) will only cause discouragement among its participants and worse, it can result in their missing to see the opportunities and values that online learning–and social constructivism–can play as an educational delivery mechanism.
January 2nd, 2009 at 1:54 pm
Wow….Thanks for this awesome video it will be helpful to everyone. Moodle is an excellent platform on which to build a structured, pedogical training schema so thanks for it.
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January 6th, 2009 at 5:49 pm
Thanks for sharing the valuable information.
January 25th, 2009 at 10:31 am
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February 17th, 2009 at 11:27 pm
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April 3rd, 2009 at 5:08 am
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April 5th, 2009 at 8:35 pm
Hi, I really liked your films on Moodle. I’m thinking of start using Moodle in my school. Any chance that you are visiting Stockholm and Sweden in the near future and want to help me out?
April 14th, 2009 at 5:02 pm
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June 2nd, 2009 at 4:25 pm
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