Have you any ideas how Moodle navigation (including blocks, layout and themes) can be improved? [read more]

From Moodle.org, Helen Foster writes a post about the navigation in Moodle 2.0. Read more and see what Martin Dougiamas says about solutions.

From Moodle.org Announcements:

Have you any ideas for new features you’d like included in Moodle? If so, please see our documentation New feature ideas for information on the process of how ideas can be turned into reality.

Now is a particularly good time to come up with ideas for new features, as we’re hoping to take part in Google Summer of Code 2009, so we need lots of great ideas for student projects. Please see the discussion Wanted: New feature ideas for GSOC projects in the general developer forum for more details.

Source: http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=116731

Fresh out of the box Moodle sets each user’s default setting Forum Auto-subscribe: as Yes: when I post, subscribe me to that forum.

This can be changed by the user when they edit their profile. However, I have found out that many users do not know how to change this, that it can be changed or they forgot to change it. I’ve gotten several questions from teachers wondering why they are getting these strange e-mails from Moodle telling them that Sue Johnson has posted in a Forum in the Moodle Training course they were in months ago!

Now, we tell our staff in the training to change this setting in their profile but I think it would be much easier to make this feature an “opt-in” instead of an “opt-out”. There has been a lot of discussion about this issue and Martin Dougiamas explains that it basically encourages interaction. In my opinion, having this feature be an “opt-in” situation works best for our district. Teachers get enough e-mail and it will more than likely just annoy or frustrate them if they don’t know why they’re getting all of the e-mails or how to stop them from coming in. If a user wants to really follow a Forum they will take the time to click that option when they post.

Another problem with Subscribing to a Forum is that sometimes I want to follow just a post in a Forum, not the entire Forum! I think there should be a “Subscribe to Thread” option, like many of the Forums on the web.

Anyways, while searching the web and the Moodle.org Forums I found an answer to setting the Auto-subscribe setting default to be “No: don’t automatically me to forums” for new users and a way to change that setting for users already in the system:

If you have access to your database through phpmyadmin, then just do the following.

1. Select the mdl_user table
2. Click on the pencil (to edit) beside autosubscribe
3. Change the default value from 1 to 0

The above will change the default value for all new accounts.

1. Select the mdl_user table
2. At the top, click on SQL
3. Erase what is in the query field and enter the following:

UPDATE mdl_user SET autosubscribe = 0

4. Press “Go”

This will change all existing accounts to “No: don’t automatically subscribe me to forums”.

Note: It’s always a good idea to back up your database before doing anything like this. Use at you own risk

Source: http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=94386

I do not have the rights to phpmyadmin for our Moodle site but I was able tell our network person how to do this and it was done. It seemed to have worked but as we continue trainings some teachers are still getting the “Yes” option. I am currently waiting to try it again with our network person to check out the problem. Although, I am having problems with it working 100% all of my research has pointed to the above solution. Any information about this issue would be greatly appreciated! I may be missing another setting I need to cahnge. Any opinions or information on this?

Blog posts from The Global Classroom

• 10+ Ideas: What to do with a Moodle classroom
  
• Scales and the Moodle Gradebook

Other

• A reliable and straightforward guide to using Moodle 1.9 – A blog post and review of the book, Moodle 1.9 E-Learning Course Development. I have not read this book, I may have to take a look at it–but will a lot change once Moodle 2.0 comes out?
• Introducing Anomaly for Beta Release – A new theme from New School Learning.
• Moodle Journal – A blog about Moodle and E-Learning (added to my Moodle Blogs links).

Lately I have been trying to find blogs, web sites and social networking sites that revolve around Moodle. I found a few great blogs like The Moodleman Blog, Taming Moodle, Global Classroom and a Moodle Tutorials Blog. I am also a member of the Ning groups Moodle Meet and Moodlers.

However, considering how popular Moodle is I expect there to be more blogs, sites and communities revolving around Moodle. I would think that Moodle, being an open-source product, would have more communities and sites with resoures because the open-source community is known to be large and very collaborative. I wonder why this is–maybe I am just not looking in the right places or maybe it is because Moodle.org has such great documentation and a great community itself that any other community would just not be as good. Don’t get me wrong Moodle.org has the best, most complete documentation, help and awesome forums to get an answer but where are the communities or social networking sites that focus on things like “Moodle in Elementary Schools”, “Teachers using Moodle in the classroom”? A place where teachers can collaborate and get ideas from other teachers using Moodle.

The two Ning Moodle communities are pretty good but there is not a ton of user action. I guess I just expected there to be more out there about Moodle, whether it’s a web site, blog or community because Moodle is getting very popular.

I would greatly appreciate any suggested Moodle sites, blogs or resources!

SLOODLE (Simulation Linked Object Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment) is an Open Source project which integrates the multi-user virtual environment of Second Life® with the Moodle® learning-management system.

Sloodle provides a range of tools for supporting learning and teaching to the immersive virtual world; tools which are fully integrated with a tried and tested web-based learning management system used by hundreds of thousands of educators and students worldwide. – Read more

Sloodle has been around for awhile, however I have not yet dug deep into it as to how it really works. Our district has been working with Moodle for a good 7-8 months and now that we have the basic functionality down I have been looking at how to do more with Moodle–whether it’s looking at Moodle 2.0, the Moodle layout, plug-ins or integrating it with other software.

I am still a little fuzzy on the look and functionality of Sloodle but what I get from it is basically taking your Moodle site and making each block, activity and resource a 3D graphical thing and instead of a participant name they are an avatar. Check out a Sloodle Demo and see for yourself. I believe this is an an old video demo but it gets the point across.

I think our district is a long ways away from this program (if ever) but it’s very interesting to look at the possibilities of integrating other software with Moodle. I do wonder about the effectiveness of turning your Moodle classroom into a virtual world. I think it can definitely engage  students more but will this cause time wasting? Will the “cool graphics” and “fun” part of it outshine the curriculum and learning that a Moodle classroom provides? Like I said before, I am still fuzzy on the functionally of Sloodle so I can’t make a judgment. If anyone has any information or personal experiences with using Sloodle in the classroom I would greatly appreciate any comments.