One problem with introducing a Virtual Learning Environment is quite often pupils have signed a School Acceptable Use Policy that doesn’t include this type of learning platform.
Moodle offers a solution that ensures every user agrees to the terms before they are granted access to courses.
I have been thinking over the last few weeks about school based pupil email provision. I have to confess we have been considering investing in an advanced Google Apps for education (paying so we can apply a policy) system for pupils after a very successful model with staff. When providing for pupils a school really can not provide any sort of ICT system without some sort of save guarding filtering or quarantine policy and this is what Google charge for.
Over the last few weeks we have been exploring some of the less obvious yet massively advantageous activities available in Moodle courses. One of my personal favourites is the brilliant Glossary feature. The glossary allows teachers (and students) to build up definitions of key terms used within the course.
By the very fact you are reading this article you have probably already embraced Web 2.0 and the idea of embarking on running a Virtual Learning Environment isn’t going to scare too much. Virtual Learning Environments don’t excite everyone in education and nor should we expect them to.
2nd life is certainly no stranger to educational projects. The innovative 3d platform is home to a number of 3rd level qualifications and many schools are looking at the online world for classroom teaching. Well the solution could well be here in the form of SLOODLE (Simulation Linked Object Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment).
If you use Moodle you probably do everything possible to lock down who as access to the courses on your server both to protect the content but also to protect your students from outside visitors. There are quite a few steps you can take to ensure your VLE is protected ranging from the total lock down of administrator account creation only right down to email authentication.
