About Moodle

Moodle is a software package for producing Internet-based courses and web sites. It is a global development project designed to support a social constructionist framework of education.

Moodle is provided freely as Open Source software (under the GNU General Public License). Basically this means Moodle is copyrighted, but that you have additional freedoms. You are allowed to copy, use and modify Moodle provided that you agree to: provide the source to others; not modify or remove the original license and copyrights, and apply this same license to any derivative work.

The word Moodle was originally an acronym for Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment, which is mostly useful to programmers and education theorists. The heart of Moodle is courses that contain activities and resources. There are about 20 different types of activities available (forums, glossaries, wikis, assignments, quizzes, choices (polls), scorm players, databases etc) and each can be customised quite a lot. The main power of this activity-based model comes in combining the activities into sequences and groups, which can help you guide participants through learning paths. Thus, each activity can build on the outcomes of previous ones. There are a number of other tools that make it easier to build communities of learners, including blogs, messaging, participant lists etc, as well as useful tools like grading, reports, integration with other systems and so on.

Moodle is used by a variety of institutions and individuals, including Universities, High schools, Primary schools, Governmentdepartments, Healthcare organisations, Military organistaions, Airlines, Oil companies, Homeschoolers, Independent educators Special educators

Moodle Key Features

Moodle is a free, online Learning Management system enabling educators to create their own private website filled with dynamiccourses that extend learning, any time, anywhere. Whether you’re a teacher, student or administrator, Moodle can meet your needs.

If you are an Administrator, you can...

  • Authenticate and enrol your users in over 50 ways.
  • Create an attractive, mobile-friendly learning environment with themes which can integrate with your website.
  • Bulk upload and delete courses and create course templates.
  • Enhance your Moodle with add-ons that you can update from inside your site.
  • Sign up to Community Hubs such as Moodle.net to share free courses.
  • More Advanced Features

If you are a Teacher, you can...

  • Drag your favourite teaching resources straight onto the page.
  • Search for and embed multimedia
  • Award badges
  • Direct your students’ learning path.
  • Get your students working and learning together in forums, wikis, glossaries and more.
  • Assess and feedback with self-grading quizzes.
  • Set them inididual, group or anonymously graded assignments with a marking workflow and rubrics.
  • Annotate students pdf submissions directly in the browser.
  • Provide opportunities for them to peer and self assess in workshops.

If you are a Student, you can...

  • Manage your files through file picker.
  • Track your progress in your course.
  • Create your own personal dashboard.

Moodle Site - basic structure

The Front page

The Front page of a Moodle site - the page you reach from your browser - usually includes information about the establishment itself and can be highly customised. (Note that it is also possible to lock the front page down so that all a user sees when they click on the Moodle URL is a log in screen.) How users join a Moodle site depends on the establishment: they might be given logins; they might be allowed to make accounts themselves, or they might be signed in automatically from another system.

Inside Moodle

Moodle’s basic structure is organised around courses. These are basically pages or areas within Moodle where teachers can present their learning resources and activities to students. They can have different layouts but they usually include a number of central sections where materials are displayed and side blocks offering extra features or information. Courses can contain content for a year’s studies, a single session or any other variants depending on the teacher or establishment. They can be used by one teacher or shared by a group of teachers. How students enrol on courses depends on the establishment; for example they can self -enrol, be enrolled manually by their teacher or automatically by the admin. Courses are organised into categories. Physics, Chemistry and Biology courses might come under the Science category for instance.

Teachers, students and other Moodle users

You don’t enter Moodle with the “teacher” or “student” role. Everyone who logs into Moodle has no special privileges until they are allocated roles by the administrator according to their needs in individual courses or contexts.

Finding your way around

A logged in user can access areas of Moodle such as their courses or profile from the Navigation block and Administration block. What a user sees in these blocks depends on their role and any privileges granted them by the administrator. Each user has their own customisable page, accessed from the My home link.