Using Moodle in a Blended Learning Environment

Gulf Islands Secondary School (GISS) is actively pursuing the Ministry of Education’s personalizing learning plan (B.C. Ministry of Education, 2011), and one strategy being used is the development of a blended learning environment using Google Sites for Education to place content on-line for student access.

Proposal

Replace Google Sites as a content management system with the Moodle learning management system.

Background

1. Learning Management vs. Content Management

A content management system (CMS) allows publishing and editing of content on a web site without requiring technical knowledge of web site management and creation (Wikipedia, 2012a; Guenther, 2001). A major feature of a CMS is the ability to work through a web browser to create or edit content that can be viewed by others. Wikis, Blogs and Google Sites are examples of CMS.

A learning management system (LMS) has the same functionality as a CMS, but also allows tracking, assessing and reporting on student learning as well as progressive or timed availability of content (Wikipedia, 2012b, Rouse, 2005). Georgouli, Skalkidis & Guerreiro (2008) suggested LMS are causing fundamental changes in educational practices because of their functionality.

Black et al (2007) noted the main difference between a CMS and an LMS is in the way the LMS can store and reference educational content. An LMS offers more than a CMS, especially for an educational institute where tracking, assessing and reporting on student progress is required.

2. Blended Learning

Fleck (2012) describes blended learning as a mix of conventional face-to-face elements combined with on-line elements, but suggests the term is problematic since it implies a uniform mix whereas the practice usually is more “a chunky fruit salad than a blended smoothie” (Fleck, 2012, pp 339). In most cases at GISS course sequences and lesson instructions are on-line and students are frequently referred to off-line resources such as text books and DVD’s and teacher-led lectures.

3. SECTIONS: A Way To Evaluate Educational Technology

Bates & Poole’s (2003) SECTIONS outlines a framework to evaluate educational technologies. Little differences between Google Sites and Moodle in the areas of Students, Cost, Organization, Novelty and Speed exist. Differences are noted in the area of Ease of Use, Teaching and Learning, and Interactivity. Security of student personal information and student generated content as well as the security of the system as a whole, not addressed by Bates & Poole (2003), are considered.

 

Differences between Moodle and Google Sites with respect to SECTIONS
		Moodle	Google Sites
Ease of Use:	Navigation obvious and clear	Yes	No
	Off line course creation	Yes	No
	Straight forward uploading or downloading	Yes	No
	In the Cloud	No	Yes
Teaching and Learning:	Text, audio and video supported	Yes	No Audio
	Track student progress	Yes	No
	Contain assessment tools	Yes	No
	Timed or progressive release of content	Yes	No
Interactions:	Interactions through internal messaging and chat	Yes	No messaging
	Teacher set up discussion forums	Yes	No
	Student-content interactions within the system	Yes	No
Security	Student work stored on servers accessible only by educational institute	Yes	No (USA Patriot Act)
	Personal information protected	Yes	No (USA Patriot Act)

 

Discussion

Google Sites does not have many of the educationally important features which exist in an LMS. Interactions are not well supported in Google, the creation of course content is limited to on-line created web pages which are very restricted in their look and feel, and no provision for tracking student progress exists. Moodle has many built in resource types, such as discussion forums and Wikis, allows web page development off line, and is highly customizable by the creator of the learning resources. Little or no on-line discussions between students are currently evident at GISS, but the ease of set up and use of chats and discussion forums in Moodle would enable and encourage student interactions.

Of concern is security. Although both systems are protected by password access, content on Google Sites is, through the USA Patriot Act, viewable by American security agencies without end user notification (Thompson, 2011). Canada’s Privacy Act makes it a requirement to inform end users when their personal information and created content are viewable by third parties and to allow them to opt out (Thompson, 2011). Having to give a student the option of not using the standard system creates a great amount of work for a teacher, and indeed, may make it impossible for the student to complete the course when Google Site is being used as a content management system.

Costs

There are two costs associated with educational technology: the dollar cost to purchase and maintain the hardware and software and the time cost for the implementation, support and creation of learning resources using that technology. As it stands now, GISS’ hosted web server provides the capability to install and use Moodle without additional dollar costs, making it just as attractive from a budgetary standpoint as Google Sites. The cost in time to implement Moodle is estimated to about one day: installation is simply by a script run on the web host, the initial administrative and teacher users need to be created, and an initial course created and tested. The cost in time to support Moodle is estimate to be the same as currently given to supporting Google Sites. Once Moodle is mastered by the content creators, the cost in time to set up courses and learning resources in Moodle should be lower than the time required for these tasks in Google.

Conclusion

GISS should stop putting time and resources into Google Sites and install Moodle as soon as possible. New courses should be placed on Moodle and the existing Google Sites courses should be migrated to Moodle. Google Docs can still be used for storage of teacher created material like slideshow which may exceed system file size upload limits. In doing so GISS will have an LMS, giving a level of flexibility and functionality that currently is not the case, in support of a quality blended learning environment.

References

B.C. Ministry of Education. (2011). Personalized learning in B.C. Retrieved from http://www.bced.gov.bc.ca/personalizedlearning/

Bates, A.W. & Poole, G. (2003). A Framework for selecting and using technology. In Effective Teaching with Technology in Higher Education: Foundations for Success. (pp. 77-105). San Francisco: Jossey Bass.

Black, E., Beck, D., Dawson, K., Jinks S., & DiPiertro, M. (2007). The other side of the LMS: Considering implementation and use in the adoption of an LMS in online and blended learning environments. Tech Trends 51(2), 35-39,53. Retrieved from EBSCOhost

Georgouli, K., Skalkidis, I., & Guerreiro, P. (2008). A Framework for adopting LMS to introduce e-learning in a traditional course. Educational Technology & Society, 11(2), 227-240. Retrieved from EBSCOhost

Guenther, K. (2001). What is a web content management solution?. Online, 25(4), 81. Retrieved from EBSCOhost

Rouse, M. (2005). Leaning management system (LMS). Retrieved from http://searchcio.techtarget.com/definition/learning-management-system.

Thompson, G. (2011, January 10). Cloud computing, the patriot act and you. Ottawa Business Journal. p. 8. Retrieved from EBSCOhost

Wikipedia. (2012a) Content management system. Retrieved Octtober 4, 2012 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Content_management_system

Wikipedia. (2012b) Learning management system. Retrieved October 4, 2012 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning_management_system

Maurice Last
October 2012.