Chapter 5 Implementation using Learning Management Systemshodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/6443/11/11_chapter 5.pdf · Environment. [31] Moodle includes the following elements:

Implementation using Learning Management System

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Chapter 5


5.1 Moodle Moodle is a free open source virtual learning environment founded and managed by

Martin Dougiamas. Moodle acronym means Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning

Environment. [31] Moodle includes the following elements:

• Administrative tools

• Student registration and tracking facilities

• Internal mail, discussion and news forums

• Chats with or without moderator

• Basic teaching materials

• Additional resources, including reading material, and links to outside resources in

libraries and on the Internet

• Self-assessment quizzes which can be scored automatically

• Formal assessment procedures

• Differential access rights for instructors and students

• Easy authoring tools for creating the necessary documents including the insertion of

hyperlinks

• Capable of supporting numerous courses (Moodle.org)

Moodle was created to help educators to have a platform where they could create online

courses. Moodle is been developed all the time by several parties who create new

qualities and improve existing ones. The first version of Moodle was launched in 2002

and it has developed rapidly over the years. The latest, Version 1.9 was released in March

2008. (Moodle.fi)

5.1.1 Modules and blocks

The Moodle course page consists of three adjacent columns where the outermost columns

consist of the blocks and the space between them is the reserved for the course contents.


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The course section is where the modules are inserted by the teacher. There are several

modules and blocks in Moodle which can be added into course sites. They enable the use

of links, course material and are helpful in communication.

Table 5.1 shows some activity modules in Moodle. The assignment module is

very often used in RGI-Moodle's courses. The module allows students to submit

documents and files into the Moodle and then teacher can grade them. This module is

ideal for example for exercise submissions. Forum module gives a platform for the

students' and the teachers' discussions. Resource module allows teacher to insert content

into the course in the form of labels, files, directories, text and web pages. The Wiki

module is very handy in group working. The students can use a Wiki page at the same

time and create for example a presentation of learned subjects.

Activity module Description

Assignment Allows teacher to grade various types of student submissions.

Chat Module allows participants to have a real-time synchronous discussion

via the web.

Choice Teacher gives a question and specifies a choice of multiple responses.

Forum Module provides a permanent space for people to meet and discuss

matters both course-related and not. The postings can be viewed in a

variety of formats, and can include attachments.

Glossary Module allows a dictionary or list of definitions to be maintained. It is

possible to automatically create links to the entries from throughout the

course.

Lesson Module consists of a number of pages. Each page leads to another page.

Students are given content and choices which determine the next page

they see.

Questionnaire Module allows teacher to create surveys.

Quiz A quiz is an activity that presents students with questions and then

processes their responses to give feedback and grades.

Resource Resources are content: information the teacher wants to bring in the

course: label, file, directory or text/webpage.

Wiki Module enables participants to work together of web pages to add,

expand and change the content. Old versions are never deleted and can

be restored.

Table 5.1 Moodle’s Activity Modules

t


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Table 5.2 shows some of the blocks in Moodle. The administration block is shown

only to the teachers of the course. It includes tools for editing the course page and

also the users of the course. The file manager block is a file archive where students

and teachers can add files. The files can be chosen to be seen only by the user or by

the whole course.

Everyone can see their own attended courses from the 'my courses' block.

Surveys can be made by several tools in Moodle. Some of them are designed to create

surveys while others are designed for other purposes. In any case they all serve as survey

making tools. The tools are: Choice, Quiz, Questionnaire, Survey, Feedback and Form

Modules. The Choice module is a tool for making polls. The Survey module contains

three ready made surveys about studying, Critical Incident Survey, Constructivist On-line

Learning Environment Survey (COLLES) and Attitudes to Thinking and Learning

Survey (ATTLS). The Quiz module is a very good tool for making surveys and exams.

Pictures and text in HTML can be added to the quiz. The questions added into the quiz

can be reused and used also in other courses. There are the following style choices to

make the questions: Multiple Choice, Short Answer, Numerical, True/False, Matching,

Block The block shows

Activities Which activities are used in the course.

Administration Administrative tools for editing the page and users.

Calendar A mini-calendar which shows event days in different colors.

Course/site description A HTML block where you can write a description of the

course.

File Manager A folder where students can save their files.

HTML A HTML block where you can write text in HTML.

Latest news Latest news updated to courses News forum.

Messages Messages written through Moodle message system.

My courses user's courses

Online users Users who are online in the past 5 minutes.

People Participants of the course (students and teachers).

Quiz results Results of a quiz made in a course.

Recent Activity Recent user activity in the course (forum posts etc.)

Search forums A search engine for the forums.

Time A basic round clock.

Table 5.2 Block Modules


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Embedded Answers, Random Short-Answer Matching, Random, Description, Calculated,

and Essay. The Questionnaire module consists of already made questions but they can be

deleted or changed and new questions can also be added. The Feedback module is almost

the same as the Questionnaire module but teacher can invent the questions by himself.

The style choices for the questions are: Check, Dropdown menu, Label, Picture, Radio

button, Text area, and Text field. The Form module can also be used to create

questionnaires. Header, Text field, Text area, Radio button, Check box, Dropdown Menu,

Document, and Image are the choices of questions that can be used in the Form module.

All the answers from every survey making tool can be downloaded as an Excel-table.

Moodle (Modular object oriented Dynamic Learning Environment) is a license free

software platform commonly used by most of the reputed institutes of India and abroad

for implementation of e-learning also called as Learning management system(LMS).

Moodle helps the designers of education materials i.e. educators to create online

courseware by providing best opportunities for the instructors and learners for very

effective interaction. Effective Implementation and Deployment of Moodle in any

educational institute or university will certainly help in effective delivery of instruction

material and will always have positive impact on the teaching and learning process in a

traditional environment. The stated philosophy of Moodle (LMS) includes a social and

constructive approach to education with an emphasis that teachers as well as learners

contribute significantly for the educational experience.

After getting specialized training for 17 weeks at Indian Institute of Information

Technology, Bangalore, the prototype model of Moodle LMS was implemented at VIT

Campus on trial basis for both odd and even semester in phase – I and then at Institute of

Knowledge – College of Engineering for undergraduate students of engineering. The

traditional environment at VIT Campus before the implementation of LMS is the

classroom teaching using either blackboard or LCD projector with the students taking

down the notes delivered by the teachers in the classroom. Exams/ quiz /assignments

were given as printed hard copy and the students were asked to take multiple copies and

distribute among themselves as per the strength of the class. Generally, only 5% of the

students who are toppers in a class of strength of 60 students do the assignments strictly

by analyzing the assignments thoroughly and discussing the problems encountered while


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solving the problems with the teachers, while rest of the class just copies the assignments

from other students. Also, quizzes conducted using traditional pattern by providing the

students the traditional quiz sheets. Also, while conducting quizzes, we need to provide

supervisor in the room of 30 students each, so all it requires is large amount of

manpower, infrastructure for sitting arrangement and also to check the answers for the

assessments and providing the results for ensuring the integrity of the examinations. So

the traditional systems need to be changed due to following reasons.

1. for effective and easy distribution of the instruction material to the students

2. for effective and easy distribution of the learning material to the students

3. for easy conduction and evaluation of the examinations/quizzes/assignments

4. providing individual feedback to the students

Hence, it was decided to implement Moodle LMS basically for the following reasons.

1. easy exchange of learning material from teachers to students without much of the

overhead

2. for conduction of online quizzes and submission of assignments

3. for online grading system for exams and assignments with proper individual feedback

The overall objective for implementing Moodle was to reduce the burden of the students

who spend more than 30% of the time of studies for copying the notes from the slides or

board or from the dictator of the notes. The valuable time the students can be effectively

used to solve the technical problems in the subject taught by the teacher with proper

individual attention. Following courses were taken for implementation

Course Name Semester No. of Students

Computer Network VI / Even 60

Design and Analysis of Algorithms VI / Even 60

Object Oriented Programming III / Odd 120

Software Engineering IV / Even 120

Operating Systems V / Odd 60

System Software Engineering V /Odd 60

Information Technology I / Odd 120


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The first and foremost challenge was to evoking students interest, as the major advantage

of implementation of Moodle was for students and students must understand the

advantage of implementation of Moodle and to meet out the challenge I motivated the

students to use the LMS by organizing special lectures concentrating on the following

points and giving a live demonstration.

Delivering the lecture materials

Interaction with the teachers

Implementing time management in assignment process

Implementing time management in online examination systems

Personal feedback to students

Day No. of students Accessing Moodle (LMS)

1 50

2 80

3 130

4 150

5 190

6 210

Table 5.3: Moodle Daily Uses Analysis

Moodle tries to achieve maximum benefit through new learning and teaching methods and

tools, and through its simplicity of usage for both the trainers as well as students. With its

integration of communication, collaboration and content management, its functionality has

been ahead of its time compared to other systems just evolving on the market.

Technological advances, rich streaming media, high-bandwidth access, and advanced Web

site design, are revolutionizing the training industry. Today, live instructor-led training via

the Web can be combined with real-time mentoring, improved learner services, and up-to-

date, engaging “born on the Web” content to create a highly-effective, multi-dimensional

learning environment. These sophisticated training solutions provide even greater cost

savings, higher quality learning experiences, and are setting the standard for the next

generation of e-learning.


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In enterprises, e-Learning will continue its integration into total knowledge management

and will adopt several new forms of learning not known or at least not practiced before.

e-Learning will not be restricted to cumbersome PCs and laptops anymore but will become

ubiquitous due to new wireless connected mobile devices. Through the use of such

“personal advisors” the difference between personal information management, just-in-time

learning and education will vanish.

There are several ways in which Moodle can be used as learning and training tool:

It can be used as a substitute for instructor-led training where traditional training is not

possible or too expensive.

It can be used as a tool for blended learning to support training seminars to improve quality

and enhance efficiency.

It can be used for new ways of learning such as for just-in-time learning and training:

o Just-in-time learning can be accomplished by gathering the required information by using

various tools and restructuring it according to one‟s needs to construct one‟s own

knowledge representation and interpretation.

o Just-in-time training can be achieved by gathering and reusing various existing information

pieces and by combining them into a new course with specific training and learning goals.

When the course has been created, it can be immediately assigned to other users (by

notifying them and putting the course announcement on the personal portal) to let them

verifiably complete the course within a specified amount of time.

Lecturers can also use Moodle to create, maintain, and offer courses and also to

administrate student affairs.

Rich communication facilities extend the advantages the system provides to its users.

Moodle only requires a JavaScript capable browser like Netscape 4.x or Internet Explorer

5.x (or higher) on the client side because the whole user interface is implemented using

HTML, DHTML and JavaScript and is open source software based on Linux platform.

The e-Learning system currently defines four different types of users (so-called roles)

and provides different features and functionality for them. These roles are participating

students and trainees, teaching staff, such as trainers and tutors, courseware authors and

system administrators. Users can also belong to several types at the same time (e.g. an

administrator could be a student in one course and a teacher and author in a different


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one). Within the learning environment various so-called rooms separate different

scenarios, and tools provide additional functionality to the users.

Typically, users enter the environment through the administrator page where they can

register for a personal account, read the introduction and overview of the system, or look

at the list of available courses. After the users have registered, they will get a unique

login name. Here students will get a list of suggested courses (depending on the users'

profiles), or then may enter enrolled or review already finished courses. Teachers and

authors may also create new courses by using a tool called the course create which, upon

activation, asks a few questions concerning the lecture (such as aim of the course,

prerequisites required to master it, time and place of live lectures if appropriate, tutors,

etc.) and then automatically creates a course skeleton and some introductory HTML

pages. The course content itself can easily be added either by using the Web browser or

via drag and drop, a Windows Explorer extension. Access to the administration rights is

only granted to teachers, authors and administrators and is used to maintain user

accounts, teams, courses and modify system settings. Of course, not all functions are

available to all three user types in the same manner, e.g. teachers can suggest or assign

their own courses to different students but may not remove other courses or delete user

accounts. Although students do not have access to the administration office, they can

directly change their own profile by altering the settings of their electronic business card.

Most parts of the business card such as photo of the student, the name and other personal

data may be made public and can be viewed by other members of the system whenever

they click on a visible user name. This has the positive and important effect that a

personalized virtual community can be created because users can see what other users

look like or what their hobbies are, which simplifies team working and collaborating. The

study room also contains a personal Web space where the students can develop their own

projects or work together in shared areas.

If students select one of the listed courses in their private study rooms, they will be

moved to the course room of the specific course. The course room provides access to the

course content, which is dynamically interlinked (including e.g. the creation of a table of

contents) and adaptively presented, which means that it can vary depending on the

student‟s preferences. Furthermore this room offers different tools for communication


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like a messaging system which can be synchronized with Internet mail, a discussion

forum with sophisticated functionality that surpasses e.g. Usenet News, and personalized

and typed annotations.

Annotations can be directly attached to a certain area of text within the HTML content

page (or to the whole page if it is non HTML) just by selecting the text area and adding

the note. Afterwards, an icon indicating the annotation and heading the selected area will

be visible only to the author of the note, or to a team or the public depending on the

assigned access rights. Annotations can also contain attachments and are of a certain type

like remark, question, answer or supporting argument. If a student poses a question note,

the tutors of the course will be notified automatically by the messaging system so that

they can answer the question as soon as possible. After doing that, the student that asked

the question will also get a notification that it has now been answered. To minimize

question/answer dialogs and thus supervising effort, the system supports various

sophisticated searching techniques such as full-text query within every part of the system

and a course specific section for storing background material called the background

library. This should improve the chance that students can find answers to their questions

on their own.

The system can also be seen as an integrated component of a knowledge management

system which will become a vital part of enterprises and will replace old style intranet

systems that

a) only store information but do not transfer the needed information to the right place

b) have few communication and collaboration facilities.

Using Intranet or Internet, the Moodle system supports the learning process within the

corporation, provides courses and necessary information to the employees and can become

a rich knowledge source of great value.

The MOODLE system can be implemented in different environments. With various

features, the system is designed to meet the users' needs and supports the requirements of

learning processes in the electronic world with its challenges such as virtual classrooms or

virtual universities. Furthermore, the proper use of technology facilitates entering into the

area of creativity, problem solving, analysis and evaluation.


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5.1.2 Moodle User Characteristics

The previously introduced future-oriented learning system provides a set of tools

supporting courseware authors, trainers and learners, and system administrators. The

foundation of the learning environment is based on the experiences of already existing

systems and the knowledge drawn from published research. The resulting environment is

characterized by its extreme user friendliness for both trainer and learner. Furthermore, it

supports the reuse of existing material and is focused on good communication and

teamwork.

Unrelated to its implementation, the system supports four different types of users:

Trainees enhance learning, communicating and collaborating with other members of the

system and help administrate their trainee affairs.

Trainers may enrich or replace traditionally held lectures, supervise and support trainees

and simplify everyday tasks like sending announcements, assigning exercises, grading, etc.

Courseware authors may use several of the editors and wizards the system provides to

simplify the creation of new modules.

Administrators can install, configure the system and change general policies.

The main modules (like navigation etc.) of the system follow common user interface

guidelines and standards, so the users feel familiar right from the beginning. Basic skills

and experiences with using a Web browser are required, but no special training for using

the system is necessary.

Student/Trainee

Students may use the system to support and enhance learning, communicate and

collaborate with other members of the system and help administrate their student affairs.

Basic skills and experiences in using a Web browser are required, but no special training

for using the system is necessary.

When the trainees log into the MOODLE system, they get access to their personal study

room, which is the main entry point. Here, the trainees will find a list of suggested courses

and their possible sequence, the courses in which they are currently enrolled and the

courses they have already taken. Further, trainees may access the private or shared

workspace and their personal characteristics (like name, department, grades, progress


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statistics etc.). If a trainee enters a currently enrolled course by clicking on it, the course

environment will become visible. In detail, the system provides

access to the courseware content (hierarchically structured),

general information (such as course objectives, table of contents, requirements, information

about the trainer, previous exams etc.) and announcements (such as when the next exam

takes place etc.),

previously recorded virtual office hours,

exercises and assessments,

a glossary and

a background library.

However, due to the high degree of adaptability, this list can be easily extended by other

resources.

The trainees may also access the asynchronous and synchronous communication and

collaboration features where several annotation types (remark, pro, contra, question,

answer, etc.), documents types (not only text), and access rights (private, public, group) are

supported. Annotation or notes may also be the starting point of a discussion in the

discussion forum. The synchronous chat facility can be used for virtual office hours to talk

with the trainer (such a talk will be recorded for later reuse to build a knowledge base) or to

meet in learning groups and (virtual) rooms.

The learning environment also serves as an administration utility for the students to help

them plan their study program.

Further enhancements are that the system automatically suggests certain courses depending

on the students‟ talents, which can be determined by examining their previous grades and

courses taken, and also predicts what study schedule could be completed within what time

(assuming continuing success and ambition). This will be summarized under the terms

skill management and skill gap analysis.

Teacher/Trainer

Teachers will use the system to enrich or replace traditionally held lectures, supervise and

support students, and simplify everyday tasks like sending announcements, assigning

exercises, grading, etc. The user interface for the teachers also has to be as simple as

possible because it cannot be guaranteed that teachers have more expertise in using


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computers than students. However a certain degree of experience with using Web browsers

has to be assumed.

One of the key aspects for the acceptance of the system by teachers is the Moodle approach

to Web based training by supporting a soft migration of courses from the traditional lecture

room style, over electronically assisted courses (blended learning) and working up to fully

featured pure virtual Web based lectures where no physical presence of students or teachers

is required anymore. Courseware creation and reuse is supported by various so-called

wizards, managers and tools that take over routine tasks and provide guidance for more

sophisticated undertakings, using helpful user interfaces. In addition, MOODLE can be

used as an administration system for managing students records (exercise assignments,

grades, learning progress etc.) classes (who may or has to participate in a course etc.) and

for keeping statistics on courses (quality, efficiency, acceptance, etc.) to ease cumbersome

everyday tasks.

Author

Courseware authors may use several of the editors and wizards the system provides to

simplify the creation of new modules. Because these tools are quite powerful, a special

training about their usage might be necessary for people that have less experience in

advanced usage of computers.

Authors may also use the full range of document management tools, like the easy to use

Virtual Folders, which simplify authoring and structuring of content using the drag and

drop process within the authors familiar environment (e.g. file explorer in Windows). Apart

from that, authors can also profit from the powerful data control features. Additionally, a

smart background library provides many valuable features. The courseware author can use

background libraries to search for specific information to create new or update existing

lessons. The Media Depot can be used to hierarchically organize reusable courseware

elements and add metadata to speed up finding the appropriate information when later

assembling new courses where the structured material can be useful. Furthermore, relevant

information evolving from discussion or question-answer processes can be used to extract

“recycled information”.

In addition to issues concerning the courseware, desired extensions are the support of

different students profiles, like learner type, knowledge and cultural background and skill


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levels (e.g. different granularity of detail); different network bandwidths (by offering

several qualities of the same material, like text, image, audio and video) and different

presentation types, depending on the way the lecture is held (e.g. slides with animations for

a life demo, or more detailed explanations including audio etc. for Web based training).

Each of these different materials has to be kept within the same course structure and it has

to be possible to switch between these types whenever suitable (e.g. switching between

materials optimized for the visual learner type and another one, to let the students find out

to which type they belong).

System Administrator

The System Administrator‟s job is to install and configure the system and to change

general policies or perform actions that require system privileges such as changing

sensitive access rights or configuring the mode for automatic account creation. Simple

tasks can be completed without deep knowledge of the underlying system due to the user-

friendly interface. With more detailed knowledge of the system, the administration can

change the complete look and feel of the system, activate/deactivate functions and features,

add new languages, etc. However, for most of the tasks, there are no true programming

skills necessary to accomplish them because the code of the system need not be changed.

The MOODLE environment gives manifold support to different user groups in their

interactions with course contents within the learning environment. For the teaching and

learning as well as for structuring the content, the MOODLE system offers many different

modules and features to users.

The administrator page is the main access point for a guest or a new user. Here the user

may read an overview about the system and register for full access.

Through lists of courses and forums, direct or indirect access to all other system features is

provided. User specific data is also stored in the study room.

The Course room enables the teaching/learning process. With the help of the navigation

provided, trainees can browse through the course content and make notes or annotations,

which can be personal or public. Discussion forums and chat possibilities make virtual

lecturing even more interesting and friendly.

The Administration office enables MOODLE system configuration and other actions such

as creation, configuration and removing of users, teams and courses. Also assigning


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courses to teams or learners and grouping learners into teams can be done in administration

office. It also serves as a platform for manifold statistical evaluations.

Other rooms (such as a public library) can be added or activated on a customization level

without much effort (depending on the type of room).

With the help of different tools, user‟s interactions with course contents within several

rooms are enabled. Tools are displayed in an add-on window. The same tools can occur in

multiple rooms. Tools exist for the following categories:

Communication & Collaboration: supports manifold formal and informal communication

within MOODLE

o Annotations: Notes and Question/Answer Dialogs

o Discussion Forum

o Messaging

o Shared Workspace

o Task list

o Calendar

o Address Book

o Chat

o Audio Chat

o Video Chat

o Shared Whiteboard

o Application Sharing

Information Retrieval: simplifies learning and work

o Search Dialog

o Background Library/Knowledge Base

o Glossary

o Self Assessments & Exercises Library

Authoring and Structuring of Content: supports easier authoring of course structure

o CourseWizard

o Module Repository/Media Depot

o Shared authoring & structuring tool

o Scene Viewer and Editor


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o Info board

o Offline version & Offline-Publisher (MOODLE CD-Publisher)

Administration

o User Wizard & Administration

o Team Wizard & Administration

o Course Enrolment & Administration

o Resource Management

o System Usage Statistics

Human Capital and Competency Management

o User Progress Reports

o Course Usage & Progress Statistics Reports

o Grading & Assessment Tool

o Competency & Skill Gap Analysis

Note: The following tools may be based on the same tool as they share the same feature set,

but with a different entry point into the data structures:

Shared Workspace

Library/Knowledge Base

Media Depot

Shared authoring & structuring tool

System Architecture

Operational Environment:

The system requires a Java and JavaScript capable Web browser on the client (both for

trainers and trainees). Netscape 4.x or Internet Explorer 5.x (or higher) are recommended,

however, if the need arises this can be customized to other Java and JavaScript capable

browsers.

User Interface:

The User Interface has to be kept completely separate from the functionality and the rest of

the system because it is very likely to be customized in various applications. Usage of

resource files is therefore required. The UI has to follow common HCI guidelines and has

to take support for disabled users into consideration.

Main entry point for the users to Moodle is to


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1. Inform new users about the system, thus giving them an introduction and overview to the

system and explaining features.

It can be used as an advertisement (show highlights and advantages of e-Learning) and as a

user guide (for very interested users or students & teachers; a more detailed description).

The user guide can be implemented as a demo course with guest account access rights, but

with restricted functionality for unregistered users (registered users doing this introduction

course may access all functions of the system)

2. show an overview of all available courses. A table listing the most important information

like title, type, time and duration (e.g. at a university it could be winter and/or summer term

and hours per week) about each course. Each entry includes a link which leads to the public

part of the course (overview and logistic information).

Note: In later implementations, the table listing has been extended to a tree view, in which

each open branch shows the listing of all courses offered within a course profile. Course

profiles are collections of courses belonging to the same category (such as same course of

study, or courses which employees belonging to the same department have to take).

3. provide access to the user registration & account creation (if automated), if the users decide

to actively use the system. For the registration, users must fill out a questionnaire. The

account creation can be automatic or semi-automatic:

4. identify themselves to the system (for already registered users) and to guide them.

Apart from that, the welcome page provides an Identification button, a language select

button, a help button, and an exit button to leave the e-learning system:

Exit e-Learning environment: jumps back to specified general home page of the server. The

destination has to be configured during the installation process (may be changed later on

within the system administration).

Students’ & Teachers’ interaction

It provides access to all other features of the system in a direct or indirect way and stores

user specific data.

It consists of the following sections:

List of courses, in which users have enrolled, once they have finished or created or which

are suggested to them

List of discussion forums, to which the user is subscribed


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More detailed information about the user‟s statistical data, such as progress information

and assessments results (“My Statistics”)

Personal settings (“My Settings”)

Personal files (“My Files”) - it is planned that this component will be extended to a private

workspace.

Shared workspace (“My Projects”)

Personal Courses Section:

Courses Enrolled: The course listing provides quick access to the enrolled courses by

clicking on a list element.

Courses Suggested – A list of suggested courses in which the user may enrol. Enrolment

can be done by clicking on the “enroll”-button either automatically or semi-automatically.

The course listing is also clickable, which provides the user with a preview of the course. A

course will be suggested to a certain user if he/she meets the course requirements (if there

are any set for the course). Current definable requirements are the finishing of other

courses, or a certain user profile like being member of a certain department etc. For later

versions, it was also planned that enrolment may also depend on certain conditions, like a

skill gap analysis, max. number of students or, if billing applied whether there is enough e-

cash available etc.

By enrolling in a course, the following actions are carried out:

Automatic mode:

A message will be sent to the course administrator, informing him that a new student has

enrolled for the course.

The user will become a member of the user group that is allowed to access the course.

The suggested course will be moved to the “courses enrolled” section.

Course-specific user objects will be created, which store the progress information and the

grading.

Semi-Automatic mode:

A message will be sent to the course administrator, informing him that a new student

wishes to be enrolled in the course.

The course administrator may afterwards complete the enrolment procedure manually. The

user will then become a member of the user group that is allowed to access the course.


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The suggested course will be moved to the courses enrolled section.

Course specific user objects will be created, which store the progress information and the

grading (after finishing the course).

Courses Finished – This section lists the courses already finished.

Discussion Forums Sections: - This section lists the following categories of forums:

General Forums: Forums about general topics. They can only be created by administrators

Course Forums: Here are listed the forums of all courses in which the user is currently

enrolled

Team Forums: Here are listed the team specific forums

in which the user has currently enrolled, or

are suggested to the user

My Settings - The personal settings section is used to maintain

a public homepage, which will be automatically generated during the account generation

process and may be changed by the student later.

electronic business card (dynamically created by template based on user preferences, can

be viewed by other users). It can be used

by the current user to view and change the personal preferences and other data by using a

form based interface.

by other users to retrieve publicly available information about a user (especially about

teachers, their offices, ...).

My Files: The personal files section can be seen as an e-Learning diary because it lists and

provides quick access to all

questions, answers, annotations/notes and discussion articles a user has created. These

articles will be displayed hierarchically grouped depending on their belonging to a course

or team. When clicking on an annotation or discussion article, the corresponding tool (e.g.

forum) will be opened displaying the article.

The private workspace tool can be seen as an enhanced My Files section. In addition to the

own notes and discussion articles created a private background library can be configured

by creating a knowledge base structure, uploading and modifying own documents, linking

a user-specific set of books linked from the global background library, linking relevant

pages from subscribed courses and adding resources from other Web sites (bookmark list).


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This tool follows the constructivist approach of supporting the construction of the student‟s

own mental structures.

Courses Created (for editing) – This section lists all courses a teacher has created or has

write access to. By clicking on a course, the teacher enters the course. The courses‟

preferences can be modified by clicking on the icon of the course. The preferences of a

course are:

Policy for course suggestion (can also be applied within administration module):

manual suggestion (students don‟t see availability of course; default during course

development)

(semi-)automatic suggestion: specify conditions for automatic suggestion (e.g.

prerequisites)

Policy for course enrolment (can also be applied within administration module):

(semi-) automatic enrolment: specify conditions for automatic enrolment (e.g. max. number

of participants etc.) or actions for semi-automatic enrolment (trainer notification if trainee

enrolled in course etc.)

Create New Course – This function opens the Course Wizard tool

Open Media Depot– This function opens the Media Depot tool

Switch to Administration – This function switches to the administration room for

creating/modifying/deleting accounts, granting/disabling enrolments, manually finishing

courses, assigning grades, etc.

Course Room (for students & teachers; previously called Course Environment)

The course room is the main location for working through a selected course. The main task

of the course room is to provide access to the course content and navigation and to offer

access to appropriate tools to support several learning concepts.

Functions available for students:

Course Navigation: previous, next, (display) table of contents and a click-able status

information showing the topmost hierarchy level (main chapters)

Exit Course: jumps back to the Study Room. This function will not be available for the

anonymous user.


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Progress Tracking: percentage of pages/modules seen/mastered. Progress may be

determined by passing post-tests. This function has to be disabled for users that have not

enrolled in this course (e.g. guest/anonymous users, users which preview the course).

Create Annotation/Note. This function has to be disabled/handled especially for users that

have no full access to the course (e.g. no annotations for anonymous users, only private

annotations for identified users that have not enrolled in this course (preview mode)).

Open Discussion Forum: For details, look at the description of the discussion forum. This

function has to be disabled/handled especially (e.g., go to special discussion forum with

demo content) for users that may not access the forum, e.g. because they have not enrolled

in this course.

Open Chat: Synchronous Communication with List of Current Users (in same course,

chapter, vicinity and separate rooms for collaboration if member)

Search - Note: A nice feature would be to capture a selected area of the text in the browser

as a preset query string. This could be combined with special search buttons for searching

in a user (course independent) configurable library (e.g. in dictionaries). This would

simplify and speed up the looking up process tremendously. This also requires a UI for

creating a user configurable library.

Functions available for teachers/authors that may modify the course:

Trainers and authors will have access to all functions for students plus:

Administration Office

The Administration Office is used to administrate

users,

teams,

courses,

resources and

the system configuration.

Possible actions are creating/configuring/removing of user accounts, teams/membership

and courses, assigning courses and teams to users.

Groups

To provide a deeper understanding of the different user roles the system supports, the

relation between system specific groups and users will be explained briefly:


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Depending on the memberships to different groups (admins, teachers, authors), users have

access to the functionality (e.g. CourseWizard, Administration Office) of different roles

(administrators, teachers, authors). In addition, a finer grained security model can be

created by using different access rights.

Vitian

global MOODLE group

each group or user of MOODLE must be a direct or indirect member of this group

this group must be created during the installation of the whole system

Administrator

system administration group

all members of this group are system users and allowed to configure the whole system

this group and a user of this group must be created during the installation of the whole

system

Teachers

teacher/trainer group

all members of this group are teachers/trainer/tutor-groups for different courses. Depending

on their rights, they configure their courses and assign users, teams, related to it


Authors

authors group

members of this group may create and maintain content for courses and background

libraries. The respective access right depend on the membership of course specific

authoring groups

this group must be created during the installation of the WBT system

Teams

group containing all teams

members of this group are typically other sub groups representing teams (collection of

users working together on a specific topic)



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Course dependent groups

For each new course the following course groups will be created automatically by the

course wizard or the publish course function.

Filters

The task of the filtering system is to list users or courses in a specially sorted way. For

example, a teacher can ask for a list of students who belong to group A and have passed the

examination with a mark better than a 3.

This has the advantage that a user is not overwhelmed by a long list of users or courses,

which takes too long to process and to download, but is shown a one on which certain

operations can be performed (e.g. exporting of the list to a text file, deleting etc.).

In previous versions, a list of intelligent filters has been defined, which can be used by

teachers and administrators. In future versions, there will be a so-called Filter Wizard, with

which users have the possibility to create their own filters.

After leaving the administration tool, the currently selected filter will be stored in the users'

preferences. When they re-enter their tool, their last filter will be used.

User section

The User section allows handling of all user specific administration tasks. These are e.g.:

Creation of new user accounts

Modification of existing user accounts, including changing properties, course assignments

and status, team memberships and roles

Deletion of user accounts which are not needed any more

Grading and statistical reports of users

Exporting of user lists to various file formats for external post processing


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Notes: Create user: all selected users will be ignored

Delete user: all selected users will be deleted (by administrator)

Modify user: properties can only be modified if exactly one user has been selected If

multiple users have been selected only assigned courses and roles can be changed

Export user list: export the list of selected users

When a user‟s name is clicked on the electronic business card is automatically opened.

Create new user

As the name of this dialog indicates, it is used to create a new user account including all

necessary data structures. This dialog is the same one this is accessed from the Foyer for

registering a new user. Depending on the role and access rights of the user who calls this

dialog, the options vary.

Actions performed after submitting this dialog box:

a) create new user account

b) create new study room structure

c) define type of user (admin, teacher, author, student): only available for administrators

d) add courses suggested:

e) add all courses which should be added automatically to a new user (depends on the

preferences of the course and profile of the user)

f) teachers can manually add their own courses, if they are not added automatically (depends

on the preferences set in the course itself)

New User

Current user

Admin Trainer Author Trainee

Admin Yes yes yes Yes

Trainer No no no Yes

Author no no no Yes

Trainee No no no Yes

Table 5.4: Moodle Automatic mode – Create Users

Delete user

This function is used the remove the selected user accounts from the system. This action is

irreversible. Depending on the role (admin), either all types of user accounts may be


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removed or only their own account. Actions performed after submitting the warning dialog

box are:

a) delete account

b) remove user from groups

c) remove user from teams

Delete User

Current user


Admin yes yes yes yes

Trainer no self no no

Author no no self no

Trainee No no no self

Table 5.5: Moodle Automatic mode – Delete Users

users can modify their own properties (examples, because customizable):

First Name

Last Name

Position

Phone number

Fax Number

Address

Room

E-mail-address

Change password

Student ID

a) modify user type

change users' role from e.g. student to a tutor for the course and vice versa (by a teacher)

change users' role to a different one (only by administrator)

b) add user to and remove user from teams

add user to team group / remove user from team group


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c) add/remove courses suggested (courses for all users, courses for users who have special

prerequisites)

d) add/remove courses enrolled

e) add/remove courses finished

Modify User

Current user


Admin yes yes yes Yes

Trainer no self no Yes

Author no no self No

Trainee no no no Self

Table 5.6: Moodle Automatic mode – Modify Users

Modify User

Current user


Admin yes yes yes Yes

Trainer no no no Yes

Author no no no No

Trainee no no no Self

Table 5.7: Moodle: Courses Modifications for Users

Export user list

As the name indicates, this function can be used to export a list of selected users with

specified properties (to be checked within the dialog) in various formats for further

processing. A select all button makes it easy to select all listed users according to the

currently adjusted filter.

Export selected user accounts to text plain separated by a „ ; “ (could be used to import

them into Excel)

Export selected user accounts to HTML


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Team/Project section

The purpose of teams is to form a community of users that want to work on the same task

e.g. to learn or discuss together. Teams can be seen as an alternative training aid that

supports the constructivism (as opposed to the Course Room which supports

behaviorism/instructivism). Currently, a team specific forum will also be created together

with every new team to provide a working and discussion area. For later versions it is

planned that each team gets assigned a specific project on which they will work, including

a project room as the working environment.

During the creation process (and afterwards when modifying it), the author of the team has

the possibility to invite other users to participate in the team. If other users have been

invited, the corresponding forum will appear in their study room under the "suggested team

specific discussions" section. Users may then take part in the team discussions and will

have access to all documents the team has access to. Furthermore, the team group can also

be used for specifying more sophisticated access rights e.g. as notes, discussion articles in

other forums, libraries etc.

The author of a team automatically becomes the owner and moderator of the corresponding

forum. Team owners may withdraw the team membership of another user or recursively

delete discussion articles within a team specific forum. An owner may also assign the

moderator role to some other user.

Administrators and teachers may also directly assign teams to users (instead of just inviting

them to their teams).

Course section

Courses are virtual lessons that can be hold completely online or used in addition to support

an instructor led training course. A Course is always a didactical entity and thus has

assigned one or more trainers to it.

Only trainers (and administrators) are allowed to create new courses and maintain them

afterwards. Trainers may define authors, who have the task to create content for their

courses and the corresponding background library. Authors have full control over the

modules they created such as, modifying, deleting and reusing/granting of reuse. However,

they should take care about physically deleting their own modules because someone else

might be using it.


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This section provides access to the administration of courses and the involved roles and

users and, by default lists all courses which correspond to the currently chosen filter. When

one of the listed courses is clicked on, the system switches to the course room of the

clicked course.

Create new course

This function opens the course wizard, which is the main tool for a trainer to create a new

course skeleton. A newly created course has the status “under construction” and is only

viewable by its authors and trainers until it is published to the public or a certain profile.

Delete course

This function removes the selected courses from the system. This includes:

Withdrawing the course from all course members (trainees, authors and trainers), including

course groups and links into study rooms

Remove the course structure, but take caution with the course libraries: Do not delete

modules which belong to the background or media depot/content library

Delete user groups belonging to the course

Authors may not delete any course (except when they are trainers at the same time),

trainers may only delete their own courses (which they administrate), and administrators

may delete any course.

Modify course

This dialog allows the changing of preferences and properties of the selected course. Only

the trainers of the respective course and the administrators may modify course settings.

The following properties of a course can be changed. These modifications should be done

by reusing the course wizard:

Course title

Trainers/Tutors for the course,

o With enrolment notification – yes/no

o With question/answer notification – yes/no

Authors for the course

Policy for course enrolment:

o Automatic mode: course collection is copied from courses suggested to courses enrolled;

user is added to the course group


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o Semiautomatic mode: the responsible trainers are notified that a user wants to enroll in the

course; if all conditions such as course fee has been paid, the course is not full are met, the

trainer grants the course enrolment.

Duration, type, and time of the course

Keywords for the course

Learning objectives

Target audience

How to use this course

Place and time for course

Expected time to master this course

Overview – content of the course

Place and time for course exercises

Expected time to master the course exercises

Overview – content of the exercises

Publish course

After a course has been finalized, it may be published to the public or to a certain profile.

After that, the course will be visible to users other than the responsible trainers and authors

(and administers). If the course is published to the public and set to automatic suggestion,

then it will be suggested as a recommended course to all trainees. If the course has been

published to one or more certain profiles, then it will only be suggested to those trainees

who fulfil the selected profiles and their policies.

Course Statistics

The Course Statistics button provides statistical information to trainers about the courses

they created. It includes information about the number of users enrolled, the amount of the

course material covered, and which chapters have been read the most.

The statistics information window consists of three parts, which can be viewed individually

or all together on one page:

General Course Information

Most Visited Pages

Trainee‟s Progress


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The General Course Information section gives a quick overview about the current status

and use of the course. It includes:

The number of trainees enrolled in the course

The percentage of the course covered

The percentage of trainees that have finished the course

The number of users enrolled but who have not yet started the course

The number of chapters in the course

The percentage of each chapter finished

The average number of days a course has been in use by all enrolled trainees

The title of the page

The percentage of users who have viewed the page

The number of users who have viewed the page

Name: This will list user statistics alphabetically.

The system can also be configured (by system administrators) so that no names are

displayed, due to data protection issues. In this case the displayed information is only of

general value for the trainers to see how the progress is distributed over individual class

members.

Filter course list

If larger numbers of courses are hosted within a system, the listing of existing courses

needs to be filtered to keep an overview, find the relevant courses fast, and reduce server

load and network bandwidth demand. Appropriate filters that can be combined (logical

“AND”), are:

Filter after course titles:

o Show all courses (needs to be deactivated if larger number of courses are hosted to prevent

too long response times)

o Show all courses whose titles start with a certain letter or string (e.g. “a*”, “b*”, “mm*”

…)

Filter after trainer:

o Show all courses of all trainers (only available for administrators)

o Show all courses of a specific trainer (a trainer may only list his/her own courses)


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Export course list

As the name indicates, this function can be used to export a list of selected courses with

defined properties (to be selected within the dialog) in various formats for further

processing. A select all button make it easy to select all listed courses according to the

currently adjusted filter.

Export selected user accounts to plain text separated by a „ ; “ (could be used to import

them into Excel)

Export selected user accounts to HTML

Resource management

This dialog lists all time slots for assigning resources of the selected course. It allows the

adding, removing or modifying of time slots, which can be labelled to identify a special

lecture. Each time slot can be assigned one or more available resources of different

categories.

Resource section

Resource Administration is used to assign and manage resources such as class- or meeting

rooms, video beamers, books, maps, computers and other electronic equipment, or even

human resources. Resources can be reserved for a specific time (can be a labelled time slot)

and assigned to persons such as trainers, administrators or to events such as courses. This

supports mixing online lectures with instructor led trainings (blended learning). Resources

can be added to or removed from the system, and modified or assigned to persons/courses.

In addition, a report of their utilization can be created: on which day/at which time it is

used by whom/what.

System section

System Administration is used to configure the system for proper use, set general settings,

do basic customizations and provide system statistics.

System administration is divided into three sub-sections:

General settings: The following entries can be made here:

o Mail server name: The mail server that should be used to send SMTP mails. If this has not

been specified, then SMTP emails will not be sent, just system internal messages.

o Exit address: The URL that should be called when clicking on the system exit button


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o Sort order: Specifies the default sort order of the chapter and title listing within the table of

contents of a course:

o Semi-automatic registration: Specifies whether all (self)-registered users can use the

account they just created immediately or whether the account has to be confirmed by an

administrator

o Admin to notify: This specifies which administrators are to be notified if the system is

switched into semi-automatic registration mode and when a user asks for a new account.

Statistics: Systems statistics may be opened here and various filter settings may be

specified. The statistics show information about the following aspects for a specified

period:

o Total number of requests

o Requests per hour: hourly distribution of requests. This indicates server-load peaks over a

day.

o Requests per weekday: daily distribution of requests: This indicates server-load peaks over

the whole week.

o Requests per course: distribution of requests over all used courses. This indicates which

courses are used more often than others.

o Requests per host name: number of requests depending on browsers‟ domain name. This

should give some information on which domains (e.g. Internet provider, company,

university, etc.) users are typically coming from.

o Requests per IP Address: number of requests depending on browsers‟ ip-addresses. This

should give some information on which ip-addresses users are typically coming from (if the

domain is not available).

o Requests per platform: number of requests depending on browsers‟ operating systems. This

should give feedback on which operating systems should be supported.

o Requests by browser: number of requests depending on user browser version. This should

give feedback on which browser versions should be supported.

o Requests by client screen size: number of requests depending on browsers‟ available screen

size. This should give feedback on which screen size the whole system should be optimized

for.


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Discussion forum, structured discussions

Discussion forums are platforms where users can exchange ideas and documents on various

themes. Users can post articles on particular topics in the forum, or directly to the forum

itself. They can also reply to articles that are already posted, or post a question about an

article.

There are three types of discussions available within MOODLE:

General discussions: Any e-Learning System user can take part in these discussions. Only

administrators may create these forums.

Course-specific discussions: These discussions are specific to a course, and can only be

accessed by users who are enrolled in the course. Trainees and trainers can access a course-

specific discussion by clicking on the Forum button in the Course Room. A course-specific

discussion forum is automatically created during the course skeleton creation by the Course

Wizard.

Team-specific discussions: These discussions can only be accessed by members of a

specific team. A team is a group of users that wish to communicate based on a common

work group, project, outside interest, etc. Any user can create a team for a team-specific

discussion.

There are two possible viewing modes for the discussion forum structure; the hierarchical

tree-view and the linear flat-view. In both modes, the rooms are symbolized by special

icons. All discussion entries have to be characterized by a symbol, to show what type of

article it is.

Messaging

As an alternative to sending traditional mails by using an external e-mail application, users

can send messages to individual MOODLE users, whole teams of which they are members,

all trainees or trainers of a specific course, etc. The system itself can also post messages,

which will appear in the incoming messages folders of the targeted users.

The internal handling of messages has the advantage that

The System knows the actual state of users and its memberships

The users and groups can be addressed by selecting their name; there is no need to keep an

additional address book


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Every message that is sent to all members of a whole course is also linked to a separate

archive collection (one for each course, system messages are copied to all course specific

archives). The reason for an archive is that students who enrol in courses at a later time can

also view older announcements which might be relevant to them.

Users get a notification within the system when a new message arrives

The system supports an e-mail gateway for better compatibility with existing systems:

o Users can also specify whether they prefer to get a copy of the messages sent to them via

ordinary e-mail

o It is also possible to send or respond with an e-mail from an ordinary e-mail system to the

MOODLE messaging system by specifying the MOODLE user-id together with a

configured e-mail server.

It is simple and thus intuitive to use

The current version of MOODLE includes a very simple implementation of a text based

chat to reduce complexity and make it work in all environments (e.g. through firewalls).

The chat allows users to communicate in real time with other users that are online. There

are three different types of chat available

Permanent chat

Virtual Office Hours

Temporary personal chat

To complete the required tool set for synchronous communication third, the following party

tools need to be integrated:

More advanced group based moderated chat

Audio/Video Conferencing

Synchronous File Sharing

Shared Whiteboard

Application Sharing

Permanent chat

A permanent chat can only be created by administrators. As the name indicates, permanent

chats are open all the time. Users can take snapshots of an ongoing talk and store them

within their study room area. Permanent chats are usually accessed through a virtual café,

where all chats are listed.


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Virtual office hours

This is a chat that has been created by a trainer and corresponds to a certain course. It has a

specific start and end time. During this period of time all talks are logged and automatically

stored within the course for later reading.

Personal temporary chat

This chat can be created by any user, and is done by inviting one or more users on the list

of active users. The active users will be listed within the chat creation or invitation dialog.

The active user list can be restricted to the users who are currently in the same room,

course, chapter or page vicinity.

The chat automatically closes if users do not talk within a certain period of time (e.g., 5

minutes). If a personal talk is not set to hidden, it will be listed within the chat tool as an

active chat, so that the other users can also join it. Users can also switch to a non-disturb

mode. In this case, they will not be listed as active users and can not be invited to a chat.

Users can also take a snapshot of an active chat and store it within their study room.

Course wizard

The course wizard, which can be accessed from the trainer‟s study room as well as from

course administration, is the main tool for a trainer to create a new course. The course is

created according to clearly predefined pedagogical guidelines by suggesting a consistent

structure. Upon launching, it will ask the trainers to fill in information about the course

content and style (e.g. title of course, course objectives, requirements, table of contents,

short abstract, information about the trainer and tutors etc.). This is done to ensure a

minimum set of information and courseware quality. After the trainer answers the

questions, the wizard creates a course skeleton including a basic structure and the complete

courseware environment. If the trainers decide to not invest more work into the generation

of the course, they may finish at this point and use electronically created course

information as a support for traditionally held lectures. This course would then appear in

the list of available courses after it is published and assigned to certain learning profiles,

after which time it may be subscribed to by trainees. Even if no courseware content apart

from the general information about the course is available for the trainees, they may still

profit from a course environment that provides communication, collaboration and

information features.


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The Course Wizard is activated by pressing the „create new course‟ button. Afterwards, the

course trainer is guided through a dialog (containing various HTML input form elements)

supported with the following navigation and help facilities:

Next page Button

Previous page Button

Go to first page of wizard dialog button

Go to last page of wizard dialog button

Finish button to start the course creation process

Cancel button

Help button to provide online help for the corresponding wizard page

The CourseWizard creates a skeleton consisting of the following elements by asking

questions using an author/system dialog:

New course environment (includes generation of new user groups: student group, teacher

group and authoring group, entry points, templates etc., and also specifies which layout will

be used to visualize course environment). The course will be located within the main

courses collection and within the trainer‟s study room in the course collection. The new

course will be visible in the course table after publishing.

Content of overview page (publicly accessible)

o Course Content : overview / abstract / introduction to the course content

o Exercises Content: overview of course exercises (if any)

o Learning Objectives and Aims

o Target audience

o Prerequisites (recommended and necessary)

o References

Content of logistics page (publicly accessible)

o How to use this course

o Time and place of lectures

o Time and place of exercises

o Teacher and supporting staff

o Time required to master the course

o Time required to master the exercises


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Empty chapter structure if a table of contents has been provided

Preparation for discussion forum(s)

Preparation for course background library. Books from the online library can be selected

and linked into the course background library with the Course Wizard.

Authoring

The current version as implemented in MOODLE

collecting metadata (following several standards),

uploading documents (add & upload, copy, move, modify, delete; manage billing etc.),

adding metadata relations (describing internal & external documents),

search agents,

qualifying documents, metadata and relations by using collaborative voting

Reuse of information is essential when offering several context-specific libraries. It has to

be possible to reuse content stored in a global library/knowledge space and link it into e.g. a

course-specific library. In MOODLE and eLS, this is done by the simple module

“Repository Editor”, which is accessible from within the library.

Progress tracking

The idea of progress tracking is to find out how many of the course pages a student has

understood (by passing test or self assessments) or at least read. This information can be

used for various tasks:

As a feedback for the student, especially for e.g. finding out what parts (or percentage) of

the course have not been completed yet.

To provide statistics for the teachers to show how far their students have gone.

To restrict the visibility of further course pages depending on the knowledge level worked

out by e.g. passing pre-tests or completing other courses.

In MOODLE, every page, chapter or learning unit within a course can have a special user-

specific status that is dependent on the user‟s behaviour. In the simplest case the status can

be:

Unseen

Seen

Finished


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Whenever a page has no additional special property it has the status unseen, if the user has

not visited the page yet, and the status finished if the user has opened the page. If all pages

within a certain chapter are finished, then the chapter is also marked as finished. If all

chapters are finished then the course will be finished.

To provide an overview for the teachers about the success of their students and the

quality of their courses. Teachers can only see statistical information about the courses

(and enrolled students) they are administrating:

Course Usage & Progress Statistics Reports:

o Show a general overview about the course usage. This should also indicate the course

quality:

Success rate (finished pages and pre/post test..)

Average time to understand/finish a page or learning unit.

o List all passive students. Passive students are those who have not visited a course page

within the last x days.

Learner Statistics/User Progress Reports:

o List all classes a student has enrolled, finished or has been suggested to.

o For each course enrolled, list the percentage of the course that has been completed and

which pages a student has already finished, and the status and score of each assessment.

o For each course finished, certain skills will be gained which will be listed within a skill

matrix. This can be used to monitor the student‟s career for human capital management.

In addition to the reports for the trainers, the learner statistics reports can also be seen by

the learners themselves. Additionally, a special human resources manager role could have

full access to all information of all students belonging to a certain department that the HR

manager is responsible for.

Implementation of the model

Implementation for software engineering course using MOODLE

Course Title: Software Engineering

Program Educational Objectives (PEO)

Graduating Students of BE program of Information Technology will be able to

1. Select appropriate information technologies that would help an individual or organization

achieve its goals.


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2. Apply appropriate information technologies and methodologies to help an individual or

organization achieve its goals.

3. Operate, support and maintain the information technology resources and services of an

individual or organization

4. Evaluate and communicate the likely utility of new technologies to an individual or

organization

5. Design IT systems that would perform tasks related to E-governance and/or Health Care

Management

5.2 Implementation of courses using MOODLE

5.2.1 Implementation for software engineering course using MOODLE

Course Overview: The software engineering curriculum offers emphasis areas in software

engineering principles, process, and practice. Students may also take elective courses in

computer engineering and computer science. The objective of the Software Engineering

program is that its graduates should demonstrate expertise, engagement, learning,

leadership, and teamwork within five years after graduation.

Expertise: Graduates should establish peer-recognized expertise together with the ability

to articulate that expertise and use it for problem solving in the planning, design,

development, validation, and evolution of software using contemporary practices.

Engagement: Graduates should be engaged in the professional practice, locally and

globally, contributing through the ethical, competent, and creative practice of software

engineering in industry, academia, or the public sector, or graduates may use the program

as a foundation for interdisciplinary careers in business, law, medicine, or public service.

Learning: Graduates should demonstrate sustained learning through graduate work or

professional improvement opportunities and through self study, and they should

demonstrate the ability to adapt to rapid technological changes.

Leadership: Graduates should exhibit leadership and initiative to advance professional

and organizational goals, facilitate the achievements of others, and obtain results.

Teamwork: Graduates should demonstrate effective teaming and commitment to working

with others of diverse cultural and interdisciplinary background by applying software

engineering abilities, communication skills, and knowledge of contemporary and global

issues.


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Competencies

C1. Select an appropriate software development process for managing the complete lifecycle

of a given enterprise application.

C2. Select an appropriate software system model for a given application.

C3. Develop a prototype as per requirements

C4. Design the architecture of a software system as per requirements based on the domain of

application.

C5. Test and debug a given software system & C6.Verify and validate given software system

C6. Apply metrics to determine the quality and reliability of a given software system

C7. Support and maintain a given software system.

C8. Create a project management plan for development, testing, support and maintenance of a

software system

Figure 5.1: Competency map of Course_1 (System Software Engineering)

C1. Select an appropriate software development process for managing the complete

lifecycle of a given enterprise application.

C2. Select an appropriate software system model for a given application.

C3. Develop prototype as per requirements

C4. Design the architecture of a software system as per requirements based on the domain

of application

C5. Test and debug a given software system

C6. Verify and validate a given software system

C7. Apply metrics to determine the quality and reliability of a given software system

C8. Support and maintain a given software system.

C9. Create a project management plan for further development, testing, support and

maintenance of a software system.


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Module Descriptions: Life Cycles

A software life cycle model depicts the significant phases or activities of a software

project from conception until the product is retired. It specifies the relationships between

project phases, including transition criteria, feedback mechanisms, milestones, baselines,

reviews, and deliverables. Typically, a life cycle model addresses the phases of a

software project: requirements phase, design phase, implementation, integration, testing,

operations and maintenance.

Module 1: Competencies:

C1: Select an appropriate software development process for managing the complete

lifecycle of a given enterprise application.

C2. Understand different Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) and how they relate

to each other with merits / demerits of different process models.

C3: Select an appropriate software system model for a given application.

Module 2: Analysis: Requirements analysis in systems engineering and software

engineering, encompasses those tasks that go into determining the needs or conditions to

meet for a new or altered product, taking account of the possibly conflicting requirements

of the various stakeholders, such as beneficiaries or users. Requirements analysis is

critical to the success of a development project. Requirements must be documented,

actionable, measurable, testable, related to identified business needs or opportunities, and

defined to a level of detail sufficient for system design


C1: Develop prototype as per requirements.

C2. Understand and identify business model.

Module 3: Design: This module outlines the design concepts to provide the software

designer with a foundation from which more sophisticated methods can be applied.

Software design is a process of problem-solving and planning for a software solution.

After the purpose and specifications of software are determined, software developers will

design or employ designers to develop a plan for a solution. It includes low-level

component and algorithm implementation issues as well as the architectural view.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_engineeringhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_engineeringhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_engineeringhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_engineeringhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Requirementshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stakeholder_(corporate)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Requirementhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softwarehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_developerhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Designhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Designerhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algorithmhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_architecture


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C1: Design the architecture of a software system as per requirements based on the

domain of application.

C2: Design the UML diagrams for various Management Information Systems.

Module 4: Testing

Overview: Software testing is an investigation conducted to provide stakeholders with

information about the quality of the product or service under test. Software testing also

provides an objective, independent view of the software to allow the business to

appreciate and understand the risks of software implementation. Test techniques include,

but are not limited to, the process of executing a program or application with the intent of

finding sof

Documents

Chapter 5 Implementation using Learning Management Systemshodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/6443/11/11_chapter 5.pdf · Environment. [31] Moodle includes the following elements: