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Giving access to high-quality educational experiences with Moodle

There are many ways by which Moodle shows that it is committed to giving access to high-quality educational experiences. One of them is sharing the MoodleMoot Global 2022 video playlist. Indeed, for me as a High School teacher living in Israel, watching that playlist is the only way I could have access to the presentations. I have not watched all the different videos yet.

I am particularly interested in how educational institutions and teachers use Moodle. While there are instances such experiences have been shared, I have not found many. The one I have found so far in the MoodleMoot Global 2022 video playlist is “Transforming a Moodle course into a class-organization platform”. In his interesting presentation, Nicholas Bovee explained how to turn “a Moodle course into a university-wide class-organization platform for online and blended foreign language education”. I highly recommend watching this presentation.

Mr. Bovee’s approach caters to the needs of about 200 language teachers. These are adjunct teachers who are hired in part-time positions. They teach about 700 language courses. They are not particularly invested in one university because they teach at several different institutions. I understand that many of these teachers are not very technologically inclined. About 5,000 students are enrolled in the language courses.

Mr. Bovee decided to customize a Moodle course containing all 700 groups (700 classes). The general format of it is that the course revolves around Q & A Forums, and there is a single Announcement Forum to which teachers post their weekly class assignments. Each teacher has her/his own space on the course and each teacher’s students have easy access to their teacher’s forum. This approach fulfills one of its aims: many different teachers in different institutions can deliver their digital courses with a basic knowledge of how to use Moodle.

I think Mr. Bovee’s approach shows one very good way to use Moodle effectively and efficiently to give access to an educational experience. In previous posts, which I have shared in MoodleNet too, I have allowed a glimpse into the Moodle English Digital Courses for Pupils (“Dig into Digital”), and how The Israel Ministry of Education English Department has used Moodle to cater to the needs of thousands of teachers and hundreds of thousands of K-12 pupils.

The Israel Ministry of Education English Department has decided to give K-12 teachers access to Moodle courses with contents (Templates). Teachers can request copies of those courses with their pupils enrolled. Each teacher can then use the contents as they are, and/or customize their courses.

The Ministry invests effort, time, and money to train teachers to make the most out of Moodle. During the last few months, Teacher Professional Development Workshops have been opened, many of which focus on using the “DIg into Digital” Moodle courses. There have also been teacher conferences, webinars, and workshops around professional learning communities in which K-12 teachers have been encouraged and helped to use Moodle courses.

During the past few years, I have developed and facilitated several Ministry of Education’s “How to use Moodle – Hands-on Workshops”, and collaborated with Moodle enthusiasts like me on even more workshops. I am facilitating one more such workshop nowadays.

On January 19, 2023, Moodle News post by Sonya Trivedi (“Open education for a brighter future: Moodle’s commitment to learning”), we learn of Moodle’s adherence to the idea of investing in people and prioritizing education. This is done in K-12 in Israel.

The Ministry of Education’s approach in Israel seems (to me) unique. Unfortunately, I am not aware of how other Ministries of Education share their approach to using Moodle (if at all). Unless I am very wrong, Moodle Moots have centered on educational experiences mostly in Universities and Colleges, as well as in Business Organizations. I would like to see more about K-12.

Moodle empowers educators to improve the world with the most effective platform for learning. It is in K-12 where Moodle can have the biggest impact. I would like to see Moodle share more on this. Perhaps when Moodle shares more videos of presentations in upcoming Moodle Moots I will learn more about Moodle in K-12. I hope to read more Moodle posts about it. I am looking forward to that.

Regards from Israel.

Eduardo Lina
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Eduardo Lina

Born in Argentina, Eduardo has been living and working in Israel since 1979 - and he loves to use Moodle! Married to Susy, with two daughters: Gabriela and Maia, and three granddaughters (Sol, Dor, and Eliana), Eduardo is teaching English at school. Having completed with HRDNZ both MoodleBites for Teachers and the six MEC courses, Eduardo is a Moodle Certified Educator. He is a Certified Israel Ministry of Education Teachers’ teacher. He has developed and facilitated several Israel Ministry of Education's Spanish and English as a Foreign Language online workshops.

2 thoughts on “Giving access to high-quality educational experiences with Moodle

  • blank ElearningWorld Admin

    As always, a very interesting post 🙂
    Yes, I think capturing presentations from Moodle conferences and making these available worldwide is a really valuable resource for helping any teacher see how others are using Moodle !

    Reply

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