Moodle
Encyclopedia
Moodle is a free source e-learning
software platform, also known as a Course Management System, Learning Management System
, or Virtual Learning Environment
(VLE). it had a user base of 49,952 registered and verified sites, serving 37 million users in 3.7 million courses.
Moodle was originally developed by Martin Dougiamas
to help educators create online courses with a focus on interaction and collaborative construction of content, and is in continual evolution.
The Moodle project comprises several distinct but related elements, namely
Some typical features of Moodle are
Developers can extend Moodle's modular construction by creating plugins for specific new functionality. Moodle's infrastructure supports many types of plug-ins:
Many freely-available third-party Moodle plugins make use of this infrastructure.
Moodle users can use PHP
to write and contribute new modules. Moodle's development has been assisted by the work of open source programmers. This has contributed towards its rapid development and rapid bug fixes.
By default Moodle includes the TCPDF
library that allows the generation of PDF documents from pages.
package, deploying a ready-to-use TurnKey Moodle appliance or using the Bitnami
installer.
Some free Moodle hosting providers allow educators to create Moodle-based online classes without installation or server knowledge. Some paid Moodle hosting providers provide value-added services like customization and content-development.
, Linux
, FreeBSD
, Windows
, Mac OS X
, NetWare and any other systems that support PHP
and a database, including most webhost providers.
Data goes in a single database. Moodle version 1.6 could use MySQL
or PostgreSQL
. Version 1.7, released November 2006, makes full use of database abstraction so that installers can choose one from many types of database servers such as Oracle
and Microsoft SQL Server
.
E-learning systems can have many dimensions of interoperability. Moodle's interoperability features include:
Moodle also has import features for use with other specific systems, such as importing quizzes or entire courses from Blackboard
or WebCT. These import tools are not, however perfect. At the time of writing (Feb 2010), Moodle will not import Blackboard courses due apparently to some change in php code-releases.
and education
, wrote the first version of Moodle. Dougiamas started a Ph.D.
to examine "The use of Open Source software to support a social constructionist epistemology of teaching and learning within Internet-based communities of reflective inquiry". Although how exactly social constructionism makes Moodle different from other eLearning platforms is difficult to show, it has been cited as an important factor by Moodle adopters. Other Moodle adopters, such as the Open University
in the UK, have pointed out that Learning Management Systems can equally be seen as "relatively pedagogy-neutral".
approach to education, emphasizing that learners (and not just teachers) can contribute to the educational experience. Moodle supports an outcomes-oriented learning environment.
"Moodle" is a trademark
in many countries around the World registered to Martin Dougiamas. Only Moodle Partners may legally use the trademark to advertise any Moodle-related services such as hosting, customization, training and so on.
Not having to pay license fees or to limit growth, an institution can add as many Moodle servers as needed. The Open University
of the UK is currently building a Moodle installation for their 200,000 users. It is often known for individual departments of institutions to use the unlimited feature, such as the maths department of the University of York
.
The development of Moodle continues as a free software project supported by a team of programmers and an international user community, drawing upon contributions posted to the online Moodle Community website that encourages debate and invites criticism.
Users can freely distribute and modify the software under the terms of the GNU General Public License
version 2 or any later version.
MCCC is available only through Moodle Partners, and through Central Certification Services. MCCC for Moodle version 2.0 will be available from early in 2011. Discussion is ongoing regarding an official Moodle Administrators Certificate.
or other institution
. They are typically supported by a Moodle Partner and some are preceded by a technical Unconference
.
Moodle Conference Center has announcements of Annual Meetings and open MoodeMoots.
E-learning
E-learning comprises all forms of electronically supported learning and teaching. The information and communication systems, whether networked learning or not, serve as specific media to implement the learning process...
software platform, also known as a Course Management System, Learning Management System
Learning management system
A learning management system is a software application for the administration, documentation, tracking, and reporting of training programs, classroom and online events, e-learning programs, and training content...
, or Virtual Learning Environment
Virtual learning environment
Defined largely by usage, the term virtual learning environment has most, if not all, of the following salient properties:* It is Web-based* It uses Web 2.0 tools for rich 2-way interaction* It includes a content management system...
(VLE). it had a user base of 49,952 registered and verified sites, serving 37 million users in 3.7 million courses.
Moodle was originally developed by Martin Dougiamas
Martin Dougiamas
Martin Dougiamas , lives in Perth, Australia and is an educator and computer scientist with postgraduate degrees in Computer Science and Education...
to help educators create online courses with a focus on interaction and collaborative construction of content, and is in continual evolution.
The Moodle project comprises several distinct but related elements, namely
- the software.
- Moodle Pty Ltd (also known as Moodle Headquarters or the Moodle Trust, based in Perth, Western AustraliaPerth, Western AustraliaPerth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia and the fourth most populous city in Australia. The Perth metropolitan area has an estimated population of almost 1,700,000....
), an Australian company which performs the majority of the development of the core Moodle platform. - the Moodle Community, an open network of over one million registered users who interact through the Moodle community website to share ideas, code, information and free support. This community also includes a large number of non-core developers, with Moodle's free source license and modular design allowing any developer to create additional modules and features that has allowed Moodle to become a truly global, collaborative project in scope.
- the Moodle Partner network, which forms the commercial arm of the Moodle environment and provides the bulk of the funding to Moodle Pty Ltd through the payment of royalties.
Features
Moodle has several features considered typical of an e-learning platform, plus some original innovations (like its filtering system). Moodle is very similar to a learning management system. Moodle can be used in many types of environments such as in education, training and development, and business settings.Some typical features of Moodle are
- Assignment submission
- Discussion forum
- Files download
- Grading
- Moodle instant messages
- Online calendar
- Online news and announcement (College and course level)
- Online quiz
- Wiki
Developers can extend Moodle's modular construction by creating plugins for specific new functionality. Moodle's infrastructure supports many types of plug-ins:
- activities (including word and math games)
- resource types
- question types (multiple choice, true and false, fill in the blank, etc)
- data field types (for the database activity)
- graphical themes
- authentication methods (can require username and password accessibility)
- enrollment methods
- content filters
Many freely-available third-party Moodle plugins make use of this infrastructure.
Moodle users can use PHP
PHP
PHP is a general-purpose server-side scripting language originally designed for web development to produce dynamic web pages. For this purpose, PHP code is embedded into the HTML source document and interpreted by a web server with a PHP processor module, which generates the web page document...
to write and contribute new modules. Moodle's development has been assisted by the work of open source programmers. This has contributed towards its rapid development and rapid bug fixes.
By default Moodle includes the TCPDF
TCPDF
TCPDF is a free and open source software PHP class for generating PDF documents. TCPDF is currently the only PHP-based library that includes complete support for UTF-8 Unicode and right-to-left languages, including the bidirectional algorithm....
library that allows the generation of PDF documents from pages.
Deployment
Users can install Moodle from source, but this requires more technical proficiency than other automated approaches such as installing from a DebianDebian
Debian is a computer operating system composed of software packages released as free and open source software primarily under the GNU General Public License along with other free software licenses. Debian GNU/Linux, which includes the GNU OS tools and Linux kernel, is a popular and influential...
package, deploying a ready-to-use TurnKey Moodle appliance or using the Bitnami
Bitnami
Bitnami is an open source project that produces open source installers or software packages for web applications and solution stacks as well as virtual appliances. Bitnami is sponsored by Bitrock a company founded in 2003 in Seville, Spain by Daniel Lopez Ridruejo...
installer.
Some free Moodle hosting providers allow educators to create Moodle-based online classes without installation or server knowledge. Some paid Moodle hosting providers provide value-added services like customization and content-development.
Interoperability
Moodle runs without modification on UnixUnix
Unix is a multitasking, multi-user computer operating system originally developed in 1969 by a group of AT&T employees at Bell Labs, including Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, Brian Kernighan, Douglas McIlroy, and Joe Ossanna...
, Linux
Linux
Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...
, FreeBSD
FreeBSD
FreeBSD is a free Unix-like operating system descended from AT&T UNIX via BSD UNIX. Although for legal reasons FreeBSD cannot be called “UNIX”, as the direct descendant of BSD UNIX , FreeBSD’s internals and system APIs are UNIX-compliant...
, Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
, Mac OS X
Mac OS X
Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...
, NetWare and any other systems that support PHP
PHP
PHP is a general-purpose server-side scripting language originally designed for web development to produce dynamic web pages. For this purpose, PHP code is embedded into the HTML source document and interpreted by a web server with a PHP processor module, which generates the web page document...
and a database, including most webhost providers.
Data goes in a single database. Moodle version 1.6 could use MySQL
MySQL
MySQL officially, but also commonly "My Sequel") is a relational database management system that runs as a server providing multi-user access to a number of databases. It is named after developer Michael Widenius' daughter, My...
or PostgreSQL
PostgreSQL
PostgreSQL, often simply Postgres, is an object-relational database management system available for many platforms including Linux, FreeBSD, Solaris, MS Windows and Mac OS X. It is released under the PostgreSQL License, which is an MIT-style license, and is thus free and open source software...
. Version 1.7, released November 2006, makes full use of database abstraction so that installers can choose one from many types of database servers such as Oracle
Oracle database
The Oracle Database is an object-relational database management system produced and marketed by Oracle Corporation....
and Microsoft SQL Server
Microsoft SQL Server
Microsoft SQL Server is a relational database server, developed by Microsoft: It is a software product whose primary function is to store and retrieve data as requested by other software applications, be it those on the same computer or those running on another computer across a network...
.
E-learning systems can have many dimensions of interoperability. Moodle's interoperability features include:
- authentication, using LDAPLightweight Directory Access ProtocolThe Lightweight Directory Access Protocol is an application protocol for accessing and maintaining distributed directory information services over an Internet Protocol network...
, ShibbolethShibboleth (Internet2)Shibboleth is an Internet2 project that has created an architecture and open-source implementation for federated identity-based authentication and authorization infrastructure based on Security Assertion Markup Language . Federated identity allows for information about users in one security domain...
, or various other standard methods (e.g. IMAPInternet Message Access ProtocolInternet message access protocol is one of the two most prevalent Internet standard protocols for e-mail retrieval, the other being the Post Office Protocol...
) - enrollment, using IMS EnterpriseIMS GlobalIMS Global Learning Consortium is a global, nonprofit, member organization that strives to enable the growth and impact of learning technology in the education and corporate learning sectors worldwide...
among other standard methods, or by direct interaction with an external database - quizzes and quiz questions, allowing import/export in a number of formats: GIFT (moodle's own format), IMS QTIQTIThe IMS Question and Test Interoperability specification defines a standard format for the representation of assessment content and results, supporting the exchange of this material between authoring and delivery systems, repositories and other learning management systems. It allows assessment...
, XMLXMLExtensible Markup Language is a set of rules for encoding documents in machine-readable form. It is defined in the XML 1.0 Specification produced by the W3C, and several other related specifications, all gratis open standards....
and XHTMLXHTMLXHTML is a family of XML markup languages that mirror or extend versions of the widely-used Hypertext Markup Language , the language in which web pages are written....
(NB although export works very well, import is currently not complete). Moodle provides various types of questions - Calculated, Description, Essay, Matching, Embedded Answers, Multiple Choice, Short Answer, Numerical, Random Short-Answer Matching, True/False. - resources, using IMS Content PackagingIMS GlobalIMS Global Learning Consortium is a global, nonprofit, member organization that strives to enable the growth and impact of learning technology in the education and corporate learning sectors worldwide...
, SCORMSCORMSharable Content Object Reference Model is a collection of standards and specifications for web-based e-learning. It defines communications between client side content and a host system called the run-time environment, which is commonly supported by a learning management system...
, AICC (CBT), LAMSLAMSLAMS, the Learning Activity Management System, is an open source Learning Design system for designing, managing and delivering online collaborative learning activities. It provides teachers with an intuitive visual authoring environment for creating sequences of learning activities... - integration with other Content Management SystemContent management systemA content management system is a system providing a collection of procedures used to manage work flow in a collaborative environment. These procedures can be manual or computer-based...
s such as DrupalDrupalDrupal is a free and open-source content management system and content management framework written in PHP and distributed under the GNU General Public License. It is used as a back-end system for at least 1.5% of all websites worldwide ranging from personal blogs to corporate, political, and...
or Postnuke (via third-party extensions) - syndication, using RSS or Atom newsfeeds - external newsfeeds can be displayed in a course, and forums, blogs, and other features can be made available to others as newsfeeds.
Moodle also has import features for use with other specific systems, such as importing quizzes or entire courses from Blackboard
Blackboard Learning System
The Blackboard Learning System is a virtual learning environment and course management system developed by Blackboard Inc. Features include course management, a customizable open architecture, and a scalable design that allows for integration with student information systems and authentication...
or WebCT. These import tools are not, however perfect. At the time of writing (Feb 2010), Moodle will not import Blackboard courses due apparently to some change in php code-releases.
Origins
Martin Dougiamas, who has graduate degrees in computer scienceComputer science
Computer science or computing science is the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation and of practical techniques for their implementation and application in computer systems...
and education
Education
Education in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next. Generally, it occurs through any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts...
, wrote the first version of Moodle. Dougiamas started a Ph.D.
Doctor of Philosophy
Doctor of Philosophy, abbreviated as Ph.D., PhD, D.Phil., or DPhil , in English-speaking countries, is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities...
to examine "The use of Open Source software to support a social constructionist epistemology of teaching and learning within Internet-based communities of reflective inquiry". Although how exactly social constructionism makes Moodle different from other eLearning platforms is difficult to show, it has been cited as an important factor by Moodle adopters. Other Moodle adopters, such as the Open University
Open University
The Open University is a distance learning and research university founded by Royal Charter in the United Kingdom...
in the UK, have pointed out that Learning Management Systems can equally be seen as "relatively pedagogy-neutral".
Pedagogical approach
The stated philosophy of Moodle includes a constructivist and social constructionistSocial constructionism
Social constructionism and social constructivism are sociological theories of knowledge that consider how social phenomena or objects of consciousness develop in social contexts. A social construction is a concept or practice that is the construct of a particular group...
approach to education, emphasizing that learners (and not just teachers) can contribute to the educational experience. Moodle supports an outcomes-oriented learning environment.
Origin of the name
The acronym Moodle stands for Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment (in the early years the "M" stood for "Martin's", named after Martin Dougiamas, the original developer). As well as being an acronym, the name was chosen because of the dictionary definition of Moodle and to correspond to an available domain name."Moodle" is a trademark
Trademark
A trademark, trade mark, or trade-mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual, business organization, or other legal entity to identify that the products or services to consumers with which the trademark appears originate from a unique source, and to distinguish its products or...
in many countries around the World registered to Martin Dougiamas. Only Moodle Partners may legally use the trademark to advertise any Moodle-related services such as hosting, customization, training and so on.
Moodle statistics and market share
By 31 August 2011:- Moodle had a user-base of 55,110 registered sites with 44,966,541 users in 4,763,446 courses in 214 countries and in more than 75 languages.
- The site with the most users, moodle.org, has 66 courses and 1,090,234 users. Following a £5 million investment in 2005, The Open UniversityOpen UniversityThe Open University is a distance learning and research university founded by Royal Charter in the United Kingdom...
, UK is the second-largest Moodle deployment by user-base, with 714,310 users and 6,093 courses. A comprehensive list of the top ten Moodle sites (by courses and by users) is maintained at moodle.org.
Development
Moodle has continued to evolve since 1999 (since 2001 with the current architecture). Major improvements in accessibility and display flexibility were developed in 1.5. The version is 2.0, which was released in November, 2010. It has been translated into 82 different languages.Not having to pay license fees or to limit growth, an institution can add as many Moodle servers as needed. The Open University
Open University
The Open University is a distance learning and research university founded by Royal Charter in the United Kingdom...
of the UK is currently building a Moodle installation for their 200,000 users. It is often known for individual departments of institutions to use the unlimited feature, such as the maths department of the University of York
University of York
The University of York , is an academic institution located in the city of York, England. Established in 1963, the campus university has expanded to more than thirty departments and centres, covering a wide range of subjects...
.
The development of Moodle continues as a free software project supported by a team of programmers and an international user community, drawing upon contributions posted to the online Moodle Community website that encourages debate and invites criticism.
Users can freely distribute and modify the software under the terms of the GNU General Public License
GNU General Public License
The GNU General Public License is the most widely used free software license, originally written by Richard Stallman for the GNU Project....
version 2 or any later version.
Certification
Since 2006 there has been an official certification available for teachers using Moodle. Initially called the Moodle Teacher Certificate (MTC) this was renamed in 2008 to the Moodle Course Creator Certificate (MCCC).MCCC is available only through Moodle Partners, and through Central Certification Services. MCCC for Moodle version 2.0 will be available from early in 2011. Discussion is ongoing regarding an official Moodle Administrators Certificate.
Moodle conferences
MoodleMoot is the name given to the meetings held by the Moodle community. Such conferences take place regularly all over the world and are normally hosted by a universityUniversity
A university is an institution of higher education and research, which grants academic degrees in a variety of subjects. A university is an organisation that provides both undergraduate education and postgraduate education...
or other institution
Institution
An institution is any structure or mechanism of social order and cooperation governing the behavior of a set of individuals within a given human community...
. They are typically supported by a Moodle Partner and some are preceded by a technical Unconference
Unconference
An unconference is a participant-driven meeting. The term "unconference" has been applied, or self-applied, to a wide range of gatherings that try to avoid one or more aspects of a conventional conference, such as high fees, sponsored presentations, and top-down organization...
.
Moodle Conference Center has announcements of Annual Meetings and open MoodeMoots.
See also
- Learning management systemLearning management systemA learning management system is a software application for the administration, documentation, tracking, and reporting of training programs, classroom and online events, e-learning programs, and training content...
- List of applications with iCalendar support
- Online learning communityOnline learning communityAn online learning community is a public or private destination on the Internet that addresses the learning needs of its members by facilitating peer-to-peer learning. Through social networking and computer-mediated communication, people work as a community to achieve a shared learning objective...
Moodle
- Moodle
- Moodle plugin list
- Moodle Course Creator Certificate (MCCC) area on Moodle.org
- Example of Moodle