Thursday, July 06, 2006

Open Source Portal: Sharon Betts

Uniting Student data, Assessment and eLearning
NECC06, Wednesday afternoon, moblogged
Sharon Betts
Director of Technology in a rural area of Maine (and loving it!)

Looking at open source solutions: Moodle, web product
Note: If you sign up for Edublogs you get a free Wiki

"Open Source is a way of living and thinking"

Presentation done in open source office suite Star Office: Impress

Why use Open Source??
  • cost effective
  • open standards
Applications:
  • Metadot Portal Server (Content Management System)
  • Moodle Course management System MSAD52
  • Corroboratively designed Online Policy Book
  • Implementation (06-07) of Myeport
  • Launch of listserv / trouble reporting - phpGroupware
Note: Moodle used for blogging with younger students as external access is restricted
Advice re blogging: start with a student contract before blogging
New version of Moodle vs 1.6 has a blogging module
[My link: See also Tim Wilson's recent blog post on Moodle 1.6]

I am impressed with the online policy book software: searchable, printable, straightforward and community accessible, written in PHP, runs on MYSQL server

Myeport will be a new implementation for 0607, developed at Chandler-Gilbert Community College, Chandler, AZ.
See Sharon's own eportfolio example
Images can be scanned in, WP docs put in...any type od doc can be uloaded and archived. Also includes a place for student reflection. Sharon has asked for customisation for teacher's to add learning results, RSS appears automatically on the site!

"It does not hurt to have multiple ways and choices for teachers and students to do things" Sharon is referring to using more than one blogging method (Moodle and Myeport as examples) for different reasons. "You do not have to be prescriptive".

Great ideas and inspiration from Sharon.


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