Tools & Technologies

Delete and declutter

It’s coming up to the start of term and time to get Moodle courses ready for the new cohort of students. We have refreshed most courses and upgraded to the new theme so it’s the perfect time to clear out old material, delete and de-clutter!

The LTI Moodle audit identified many issues with layout and structure that could easily be rectified by following our suggestions below.

 

 

Common issues and how to solve them:

Poor structure

Many courses consist of one long messy list with content hard to find and often current material is hidden at the bottom of the page.

  • Consider a different course format. Perhaps the grid or collapsed topics if you have lots of content.
  • It may be worth hiding and revealing content as the course progresses so students see the most current information at the top of the page.  You can also highlight the most current section by clicking on the light bulb on the right hand side.
  • If you have lots of material on the same topic then it might be worth consolidating it into a Moodle page or Book.
  • Consider the order that you present material to students – you might want to move sections around so important information is at the top of the page and is quicker and easier to find.
  • You might want to add a table of contents block with links to each section highlighted.
  • When using the grid format Images can provide visual clues and signposts to students as to the type of material each section contains.

Inconsistent titles

Once you have chosen your course format make sure that you have consistent titles for each section or topic.

  • Try to use titles that are clear and descriptive rather than the default section 1, section 2.
  • Remember that you can add labels to clearly sign post material.
  • You can also use the text editor to add colour, or different text size if you want to emphasise certain text.
  • If you have a large course you may want to use the groups and groupings features on Moodle to ensure student can differentiate and access between the various resources and assignments.

Too much clutter

Many courses have old material hidden that dates back years and can clutter the page for editors – don’t be afraid to delete things!

  • Moodle now has a recycle bin so things can be restored within seven days if deleted in error.  LTI also keep back up copies of all courses every year and retain them in an archive so your current course does not have to contain a historical record of old course files.
  • If you have lots of sections that are not in use then delete them, you can always add more sections later.

Broken links
  • Check that the links on your course still work, if you are linking to LSE reading lists make sure you use the reading list activity and if you are linking to lecture recordings you will need to use the Echo360 activity and make sure that you have consented for your lectures to be recorded on LFY.

Deadlines and dates
  • Make sure that your course start date is correct in the Edit Course settings, this is especially important if you are using the weekly format.
  • Ensure that any dates and deadlines are up to date and check your settings if you are using the assignment activity.

Check enrolments

Automatic enrolments are now active on Moodle, so when students make course choices in LSE for You, they will automatically be enrolled in the corresponding Moodle course.  Choices for 2017/18 made by continuing students have already been processed.

Check your course is set up for automatic enrolment. This can be done by going into the settings: Administration block > Edit Settings. If the “Course ID number” field is empty. Please contact Lti.support@lse.ac.uk.

If using alternative methods of enrolment please check that they have been set up properly. This can be done by looking in the Administration block > Users > Enrolment methods.

Teaching staff may still be enrolled on the course from previous years.  Email LTI to remove any enrolments that are no longer accurate.

Lastly remember to make your course visible to students.  Even if students are enrolled on your course they will not see it in their list of courses or be able to access it if it is still hidden in the edit settings.

September 18th, 2017|Assessment, Moodle, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies|Comments Off on Delete and declutter|

New look Moodle for 2017/18!

We hope you like the new look of Moodle and can find you way around. When you first log in you will taken to your dashboard

On your first access you should see a tour which takes you through the new layout.  Also see our online guide on finding your way around.

If you are a Moodle editor we have devised some new guides to get you going and we have updated our FAQ’s for staff and students.

If you really don’t like the new look you can change it back, just follow our instructions on our website.

We are running Moodle basics training for Moodle editors on Tuesday 22 August and Wednesday 20 September. Book a place via the Training and Development System.

Remember that all courses are automatically hidden after the refresh so you need to make them visible to students before the start of term.

August 17th, 2017|Announcements, Moodle, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies|Comments Off on New look Moodle for 2017/18!|

Moodle refresh for 2017

Moodle will be unavailable all day on Tuesday 15 August and Wednesday 16 August for all users, and on 12th September for courses used to submit dissertations.

Don’t forget: you must download any information and documents you will need from Moodle before the refresh date that applies to your course. Course content will not be available to you after these dates.

See the LTI website for further details: http://lti.lse.ac.uk/moodle-end-of-year-arrangements/

 

July 31st, 2017|Announcements, Moodle, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies|Comments Off on Moodle refresh for 2017|

Changes to Moodle for 2016/17

The Moodle recharge event took place on Tuesday 27 June for those that couldn’t attend a brief summary of what went on can be found below.


This summer lots of changes are taking place so we split attendees up into four rooms and got them to rotate round to each room.  We asked everyone to give us feedback on the changes and the padlet is still open if you would like to comment.

 



 

New Features

Adding links to Echo recordings will change with a plugin making it easier for students and teachers to view recordings – see our online guide.

Reading lists will now be added using the External Tool or reading list blocks – see our online guide.

There are lots of new features for Moodle 3.1 – see our website for more details and new guides will be created over the summer.  In addition to our usual Moodle training before the start of term we are also offering bespoke training sessions for departments.  If you would be interested in this please get in contact (Lti.support@lse.ac.uk).


New themes

The look of Moodle is changing to be more modern and in line with the new LSE website.

LTI are working on getting the Moodle mobile app ready for 2017/18.  The app can be downloaded from itunes or Google play and more information will be made available on our website over the summer.

 

Turnitin have also made changes to their theme and on 1 August will introduce the Turnitin Feedback Studio which featuers a user-friendly interface, with a responsive design that is compatible with a wide range of devices.  More information about the changes can be found on our website.


My Feedback & Moodle archive

My Feedback is a feature that has been developed by UCL to improve access to assessment and feedback for students and staff.  One single view for all Moodle activities with marks and feedback.  The report will be combined with a live archive of Moodle so that users can view marks and feedback from previous years.  There will be a variety of options for staff with different roles gaining an overview of students marks and feedback.

Coursework  has been created by the Royal Veterinary College to enable more online and assessment and feedback options in Moodle.  LTI will be working on making it compatible with LSE Moodle for individual pilot projects in 2017/18.  Features include: double blind marking, sample marking, sampling workflows, personal deadline and no deadline assignments.  If you are interested in piloting this please contact LTI.Support@lse.ac.uk


Moodle labs & Moodle Audit

Moodle labs is a live instance of the most current version of Moodle which is available for LTI Spark or Ignite funded projects.

 

 

The Moodle Audit took place in March 2017.  LTI went through the methods and overall findings of the independent review.  Individual results will go out to each department in July for review with recommendations for improving your courses.

 

 



Next steps

Each department will be sent the results of the Moodle audit.  We are currently working on new guides and case studies to go on our website ready for the start of term.  We will be running bespoke Moodle training for departments – if you are interested in setting something up then please get in contact (LTI.Support@lse.ac.uk).

The Moodle refresh will take place on Tuesday 15 August for the majority of courses and Tuesday 12 September for courses used to collect dissertation submissions.  On these dates Moodle will be unavailable all day and students must ensure that they have downloaded any materials they would like to keep before these dates.  If you would like your course not to be included in the annual refresh then please let us know as soon as possible (email LTI.Support@lse.ac.uk).  More information about the Moodle refresh is on our website.

 

June 28th, 2017|Announcements, Events & Workshops (LTI), Moodle, Projects, Roundup, Show and tell, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies|Comments Off on Changes to Moodle for 2016/17|

Moodle recharge

Following on from our post back in February on our plans for Moodle we will be holding an event for all Moodle editors on Tuesday 27 June from 3-4pm to give everyone a sneak peak of the changes that will taking place this August in time for the new academic year.

Image from @XarxanetTecnMoodle is getting a recharge for 2017/18.  In addition to the usual refresh of all courses we will be upgrading to version 3.1.  On the 27 June we will be going through some of the new features that we think editors will be most interested in and unveil our new theme for the platform.  We will also share the results of our Moodle audit and invite Moodle editors to try out our new features ‘my feedback’ and Moodle labs.

 

New features
Moodle 3.1 features improvements to the layout, course editing, course administration, grading, and activities.  We will go through some of the more significant changes plus give attendees a chance to try out our new interactive guides.

 

Moodle theme

LTI will be changing the look of Moodle to be more in line with the LSE website. We will give LSE Moodle editors a sneak preview of the new theme.

 

 

Moodle Audit

In March 2017 LTI carried out/commissioned an independent review of a sample of LSE Moodle courses from across all the departments.  Approximately 22% of all courses were reviewed using three different metrics – the 3E framework (Enhance, Extend, Empower), an overall classification and a traffic light Red, Amber, Green system.  We will be sharing the findings of this audit and promoting some of the good practice that was discovered as a result.  Individual reports will also be made available for departments which highlight areas or issues that were cause for concern or need attention.

 


Moodle labs

A separate instance of Moodle that features the latest release for teachers to test out new approaches to teaching and is available for LTI grant projects.

 

 

 

 

My feedback

Developed by and rolled out successfully at UCL.  My feedback allows students and staff a single view of all Moodle grades and feedback.

 

 

 

To reserve a place at the Moodle recharge event please book via the LSE Training and Development system.

More information about the Moodle refresh for 2017/18 can be found on the LTI website.

If you have any questions about the Moodle refresh or recharge email LTI.Support@lse.ac.uk

Blogging as a Method of Assessment

The past couple of years an increasing number of LSE academics started integrating blogging in their courses. This took various forms, from using the blog feature on Moodle as an added activity to creating individual blogs for students as part of a course summative assessment. One thing that all these projects shared is the rationale for using blogs in an educational context: encouraging student engagement, making learning more student-centred and diversifying assessment with the view to making it more relevant to the course and developing students’ transferable skills.

A good example of such initiative is Anthropology’s Dr Walker AN300 student blogs project. Dr Walker applied for a SPARK Grant last year in order to support his project to “develop the use of student blogs as one component of the summative assessment for AN300 Advanced Theory of Social Anthropology”.

Below is a summary of the project and its outcomes, with quotes form Dr Walker’s application and project report, whose full version can be found on his project page.

What was done

AN300 is an intensive reading course focusing on full-length books rather than journal articles. There are three ‘cycles’ per term, each devoted to a different book […] Each student was required to produce his/her own blog. […]Students were expected to make one post each week for the first two weeks of each book cycle (12 posts for the course overall). Every third week was dedicated to commenting on the posts of others. The final mark consisted of the average of each student’s best eight posts.[…]The posts were assessed weekly by a GTA who was also in charge of providing feedback.

Students also attended a session on writing for blog run by LTI at the beginning of their course.

Rationale

Developing students’ academic and life skills

The aim of this project was to encourage students to develop their own original ideas and critical responses to key texts in social anthropology, as well as to cultivate their capacity to respond thoughtfully and diplomatically to the ideas of others. Making regular blog entries was also meant to encourage students to keep abreast of the required readings for each week, partly in order to positively impact the overall quality of class discussions. The project was also intended to cultivate students’ digital literacy, providing them with training in an increasingly widespread form of disseminating information.

Diversifying assessment

[The course format] is sometimes described as an advanced reading group. This makes it ill suited to exams as a mode of assessment. The blogs, by contrast, allowed students to develop their own ideas about the books they were reading as they went along.

Students appreciated the opportunity the blogs provided […] to work in a medium other than an essay or exam.

Evaluation

In general, the trial can be considered a success. […] The posts that resulted were often highly original and creative. Students appreciated the opportunity the blogs provided to be more experimental with their ideas and arguments, and less formal in their writing. […] Having to write a post prior to class gave students an opportunity to critically reflect on the readings, and to bring to the class ideas they had developed in their blogs

Lessons learnt

Clarity was identified as a key area for improvement in the project, as its absence seems to have caused some frustration among students. The main aspects that were identified as critical were clear guidance and expectations, grading criteria and feedback on the blog posts.

It is also worth noting that it was the first year blogs were tried in the department. The fact that students were not (yet) familiar with this type of activity made it even more important to provide them with extra guidance.

Outcomes

You can find a detailed evaluation report on the project’s dedicated web pages. The report includes guidance given to students at the start of term along with marking criteria, and examples of student posts and comments.

If you are interested in using blogging as a teaching tool, check out our and TLC’s resources or get in touch to discuss your ideas.

This project was funded by LTI’s SPARK Grant. More info on similar teaching innovation projects and how to apply on our website.

 

SPARK Grants: results and last call!

The results are in! 

In March the SPARK! Committee reviewed applications from our  first call and approved three projects aimed at improving the student learning experience through the use of technology and innovative pedagogical approaches.

The projects include an extension of a very successful students-as-producers project to further develop students filmmaking skills, the use of specialist software to create interactive assessment in Maths and a student-owned digital platform to produce and disseminate student research.

Find out more about these and previously-funded projects on our webpages.

It’s not too late to apply!

Our second call will be closing on Friday 5th May at 12 noon. This means you still have time to talk to us about your ideas and submit your application!

Detailed guidance on the application process can be find on our website. Get in touch now!

Using Powerpoint to create engaging simulations

Last academic year, two PhD students  teaching in the Department of International Relations  embarked on a journey to make their course more engaging to students. They applied for an LTI SPARK! Grant to support the development of Powerpoint-based simulation games.

Here are the highlights of the project following its completion and evaluation. Quotes are from the two recipients of the grant, Gustav Meibauer and Andreas Aagaard Nohr.

Related outcomes and resources on our website

The rationale

                Issues addressed

Currently available IR simulations for teaching purposes are often high-cost/high-tech and especially time-intensive: even if they do not require custom-made software packages with difficult interfaces and expensive licensing fees, they are almost without exception targeted at course-long or at least day-long activities that demand extensive preparation of both teachers and students, with book-length manuals, intricate rules, integrated assessment tools, and specific secondary literature. This is irrelevant for most of the undergraduate teaching practice, especially in introductory courses that often treat specific concepts only once in a 50-minutes class. But this should not mean that undergraduate students simply never get the chance to profit from interactive gaming and simulations.

                Why simulations? The pedagogy behind the technology

The project is based in the pedagogy of experiential learning, student ownership and self-directed learning, and the use of gaming activities and simulations in the classroom.

Simulations and interactive gaming solutions have long been known to enhance understanding both of specific empirical examples as well as, more importantly, theoretical linkages because they make students experience, rather than only hear about, factors and variables involved in such different topics as foreign policy decision-making, diplomacy, great power dynamics or identity formation.

Students do not simply passively receive the PowerPoint (as in a standard presentation), but play it, change its outcome (within given options), determine what the next slide will show, and are thus actively involved in what they learn. This is thought to encourage deeper learning.

It is not the outcome of the simulation that matters, but the process of its coming-about. Just as in real-world foreign policy or diplomacy, there is not necessarily a correct path to take or a right decision to find – instead, by playing the simulation, students engage in discussion and compromise, take into account a multitude of different factors, realize own mistakes, and get a feeling for the complexity of decision-making in multiple settings.

                Why Powerpoint?

There is no need to change the course design, overhaul the entire teaching approach, or experiment wildly outside what is currently known and available. Instead, our project aims at diversifying teaching where possible to integrate student-centered, activity-based teaching and learning. It does so by bringing out the true potential of already available teacher skills and learning technologies.

We do this by employing PowerPoint, specifically in-built features such as hyperlinks, interactive pathways, or audio or video integration that can be used interactively rather than passively.

Implementation

                Integration into the course

By necessity, simulations do not stand alone: they are accompanied by a set of theoretical structures and debates in which students talk and theorize about their experiences during the gaming activity

Each of our simulation classes consisted of an introductory stage of about 5 minutes, a simulation stage with multiple discussion periods interspersed (moderated variously by the class teacher or by the students themselves, depending on class dynamics) of about 20-30 minutes, and a discussion stage to tease out theoretical insights of about 20-30 minutes.

Take Aways

“Andreas and Gustav came up with a formula that gave students ownership of their own decisions and helped them to apply their knowledge to difficult real world dilemmas. Students were able to experience the consequences of both the cautious and risk taking approach and the many nuances and customs that apply to foreign policy decisions.”

Sarah Leach, Senior Learning Technologist on the project

                Students experience

Overall, results indicate a positive impact on student learning: students on average perceived simulations were enjoyable, allowed for stimulating discussion in the classroom and an experience of expertise and immersion into the topic of the class.

Not only did the simulations add an important additional method to diversify the learning experience and complement more “traditional” instruction styles, they also led to greater overall  participation rates in class (compared to more conventional class types, as assessed by teachers,  observers, and the students themselves), allowed students to bring in own previous experience and  learn from their peers, and try out learned theoretical concepts in class.

They gave students a language to talk about new and often highly abstract concepts, and allowed for smooth and often in-depth reflection and discussion. The simulations also proved entertaining and supported positive group dynamics in class, such as self-moderated discussion and quick exchanges between students without teacher interference.

                The teacher’s views

They allowed us as teachers to transition more easily towards roles of moderator and facilitator, as students interact with the simulation and with each other without input or instruction from the teacher.

Students worry that the simulations somehow divert from the “actual” material they are supposed to learn from the course, which means additional effort has to be put into developing desired learning outcomes and appropriate theoretical teaching materials.

“Andreas and Gustav have demonstrated that engaging students with technology doesn’t have to be daunting or cutting edge, a simple tweak can dramatically change the learning experience for students. To make this step even easier, they have written a ‘how to’ guide for any teachers who want to create simulations for small class teaching. The guide covers every aspect from defining the learning objectives and creating the slides through to teaching plans and evaluation. It’s a great resource.”

Sarah Leach

If you are interested in using technology to support teaching, learning and assessment like Andreas and Gustav, then please get in touch with LTI to discuss your ideas. Take a look at LTI’s SPARK! Grants for more information.

Live stream from NetworkED event Wednesday 1 March

As part of the LTI NetworkED seminar series, Professor Robert Allison Vice-Chancellor & President Loughborough University, will discuss ‘What is the place of technology in delivering an outstanding student experience?’.

 

More information about NetworkED and the upcoming seminar details can be found on the LTI website.

March 1st, 2017|Announcements, Events & Workshops (LTI), NetworkED, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies|Comments Off on Live stream from NetworkED event Wednesday 1 March|

Our plans for Moodle

This summer we’ll be using Moodle 3.1. It includes support for Competency Based Education, improvements to assignment grading, a Recycle Bin to help you retrieve deleted files, and enhancements to the Forum.

Other institutions have been using it for more than a year and we’re confident it’s stable. It’s a Long Term Support release, meaning security problems will be addressed regularly until May 2019.

The next Long Term Support release will be Moodle 3.5, and we plan to upgrade LSE Moodle to that version in summer 2018.

Why so serious?

Why don’t we upgrade at the same rate that new versions are released?

LSE Moodle is a mission-critical system, and we want it to be available 24/7. Upgrades are disruptive; taking Moodle offline for a day in reading week or during the exam period isn’t an option. New features can also be risky because they’re not tested to the standards we require.

But we’re keen to learn how you want to use Moodle to teach and to learn. This is why we’ve launched MoodleLabs, an instance of Moodle that will always run the current major release of the software.

So if you’re in receipt of an LTI grant and want to make use of a feature that isn’t yet available on LSE Moodle, you can use MoodleLabs instead.

February 10th, 2017|Announcements, Moodle, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies|Comments Off on Our plans for Moodle|