Tell me and I forget. Show me and I remember. Let me do and I understand.

Here’s some points to consider:

• How many learners will participate in the learning network?
• What social tools will be used?
• Who will facilitate and moderate the social learning?
• What will be the basic requirements from the learners’ perspective?

With social learning, the dynamic among the online participants will be a different one to a traditional face-to-face setting: teachers can be learners, learners can be teachers, teachers and learners can work with their peers. In a truly collaborative environment, we can all be teachers and learners. Bear in mind, certain protocols for communication should be observed for the use of forums, blogs, wikis, chat, messaging and so forth. To help encourage appropriate use of online social tools, we recommend you consider the formulation of Acceptable User Guidelines.

Benefits of of social learning include:

1.  Learners are empowered to communicate with their peers;

2.  Ideas are more openly exchanged;

3.  Topics of interest are more readily discussed by the group;

4.  Content sharing is easier.

In terms of minimum technical requirements to be involved with social learning online, learners require at least basic computing skills and a computer or laptop connected to broadband Internet.

In conclusion, social learning can be an engaging, collaborative and rewarding experience. By contrast, learning in isolation can be very lonely and challenging for all concerned. Social learning is a practical approach to value-added 21st century education. After all, we are social creatures, so it follows that our learning should be natural, engaging and fun. If you haven’t already, we suggest you check out our Webinar recording: Getting Social with Moodle.

Traditionally, compliance training was delivered via code of conduct manuals or face-to-face workshops. However,  due to time and cost constraints, many organisations now consider online compliance training as a viable alternative. Furthermore, web-based content delivered via learning management system software is more interactive and learners can be effectively assessed, tracked and reported on.

Reasons to offer compliance training include:

• Teaching employees to detect and avoid violations that may lead to legal problems both for the employees and the organisation;
• Creating a workplace devoid of unprofessionalism, abuse, any kind of molestation, discrimination, sexual harassment and so forth. It helps create a harmonious and respectful workplace;
• It also serves as recourse for an organisation to use in their defence if an employee acts or behaves inappropriately while performing duties. The employer has evidence that compliance training related to the violation committed by the employee was provided.

There is a wide range of topics that may be considered for compliance training in your organisation. Popular topics include:

• Occupational Health and Safety
• Workplace Discrimination
• Equal Employment Opportunity
• Information Privacy
• Bullying and Harassment

To make the right decisions quickly, you need timely and targeted information at your fingertips

My Reports tab

• Pre-built reports for each system role.
• Allows personalisation by the user.
• Scheduled reports can be sent via email at specified times.

My Dashboard page

• Pre-built dashboards for each system role.
• Allows personalisation by the user.
• Provides timely and key information related to role such as alerts, tasks, statistics, news and events.

Report Builder

• Build your own reports from scratch -no technical knowledge required!
• Export reports to a variety of formats such as CSV.
• Add in customised search filters to allow users to drill down into data.
• Report on numerous data sources such as e-learning and assessments.
• Assign pre-built or custom reports to any system role.
• Filter reports by organisation, position or user information.

Contact us to discuss your requirement, view a demonstration or request a quote.

• Attribution (by); the general public can make copies to be distributed, displayed, acted on or make similar works mirroring the authors copyright work without making any payments all that is needed and enforced by this license is that the licensees must give recognition to the copyrighted work in the manner specified by the license.
• Noncommercial (nc); in this case, licensees are given the privilege to write, display, perform and make mirroring works in relation to the licensed work but these remakes and usage of the original work must not be used in any way for commercial reasons.
• No Derivative works (nd); as the name suggests, licensees can copy, display and perform works from the original article without paying the author of the licensed work but the copied or performed work must be done or repeated in verbatim no derived versions must be spun from the original.
• Share- alike; original works can be shared in different formats either as derived works or performed act as long as the derived work is copyrighted under a similar license like the one that governs the original.
• Sampling; this is usually used in the music industry the creative commons law of sampling states that part of an original work can be sampled for any purposes as far as advertising is excluded.
• DevNations; this is a special creative commons law designed to suit the needs of people from developing nations, it allows them to copy and produce license work for their own use in any format, examples are the use of original music to create similar sounds for artistic and monetary gain.

There are also different combinations of the above listed creative commons license types:

• Attribution+ NonDerivatives combination. (by-nd)
• Attribution + share- alike (by-sa)
• Attribution + non-commercial (by- nc)
• Attribution+ non-commercial + non derivative (by-nc-nd)
• Attribution + non-commercial share-alike (by-nc-sa)

Organisations solely built under the jurisdiction of all creative common licensing laws have been set up in different areas of the world such as Creative Commons (CC) that is located in California their main aim is to widen the reach of creative works, so that people from all over the world can download, use and re-create legally and also share to their friends. These organisations usually release copyright licenses of artists’ works free to for public viewing so other artist can learn and take a cue on the type of copyright licenses they set on their own respective works.

Totara allows you to map learning to job positions and organisational levels

Competency development

• Define hierarchies for job positions, organisational structure and competencies
• Hierarchy frameworks can use as many levels as you need
• Multiple frameworks can be created for different parts of the organisation

Bringing it all together

1. Assign learners to organisations and positions
2. Assign competencies to organisations and positions
3. Assign courses to any competencies
4. Courses and competencies then automatically appear in learning plans

Reporting capabilities

• Organisation hierarchies allow for reporting ‘down the management tree’
• Detailed reports can be compiled for any level within the organisation

Contact us to discuss your requirement, view a demonstration or request a quote.

Online learning content and experiences can be easily accessed using mobile devices, enabling everyone to learn everywhere at anytime.

Mobile learning is supported by mobile devices and technologies. These include:

• E Books
• Tablet computers eg. iPad
• Smart Phones eg. iPhone
• Personal media players eg. iPod
• Gaming devices eg. xBox 360

Technical support is necessary to facilitate effective mobile learning. For instance, 3G and 4G mobile data services are needed for seamless transfer of web-based content. Moreover, mobile devices do require high speed wi-fi internet to access courseware situated in a learning management system.

Here are some key features of mobile learning:

• Interactivity: There is high level of interactivity between learners and teachers and between peers. Knowledge is readily available and connecting with other course participants is matter of touching the mobile device’s screen to follow links;
• Accessibility: The data is available right on the learner’s mobile device. In this way, it can be accessed at any time and at any place that is convenient to the learner. Learning is self directed and self paced and there is little pressure on mind for completing the training, which is characteristic of face-to-face learning;
• Portability: The learning content can be transported anywhere the learner goes with their device. If the content is not stored locally on the mobile device, it will be available via the web-based system storing the data.

In conclusion, mobile learning offers portable and accessible learning for everyone. Smart phones and tablet devices have gained enormous popularity and should be embraced by 21st century educators. Mobile learning is indeed the future of education. On the same token, it must be recognised that learning management system software builds the foundation for harnessing the benefits of mobile learning. We recommend you view our articles and demonstration related to Moodle iPhone App and Moodle for iPad.

Once configured, your moodle site will auto-detect the end-user’s device type and display the default, mobile or tablet theme.

Your Moodle site must be running version 2.2 or later and your administrator must select the ‘MyMobile’ theme for ‘mobile’ and ‘tablet’ via Settings block > Site administration > Appearance > Themes > Theme selector. If you are running an earlier 2.x version and cannot foreseeably upgrade your Moodle, you may wish to consider installing the MyMobile theme available from the Themes database on moodle.org. Alternatively, if a Moodle upgrade or theme plugin are not options, simply access your site using any  standard (or custom) theme via tablet or mobile, bearing in mind, the theme is unlikely optimised for mobile devices.

Moodle iPad Theme Selector

The end user is presented with a neat two-column layout. It is a white and blue theme with predominantly monochrome icon set.

Moodle iPad Front Page

Situated on the Front page, in the left column, the ‘Student’ block consists of button links to ‘My home’, ‘My profile’ and ‘Logout’.

Moodle iPad User Block

‘My home’ is essentially the ‘My Moodle’ dashboard which displays personalised information including enrolled courses, assignments due, upcoming chat sessions, SCORM packages etc.

Moodle iPad My Moodle

‘My profile’ displays the said user’s profile information. We can follow the ‘Settings’ link to choose our preferred language, edit profile, change password and configure other settings related to portfolios, messaging and blogs.

Moodle iPad User Profile

Moodle iPad Profile Settings

The right column consists of a Site news forum and combo list of course categories and courses. Naturally, the front page layout can be edited via Settings block > Site administration > Front page > Front page settings.

Moodle iPad Single Column Layout

We can follow a link from the course catalogue to navigate to any given course. The course name displays in the page header and there are button links to ‘Settings’, ‘Jump’ and ‘Navigation’.

Moodle iPad Course Layout

‘Settings’ is a shortcut to our user profile settings page. ‘Jump’ is an anchor link to the bottom of the current page and ‘Navigation’ displays a drop-menu to navigate the course and site.

Moodle iPad Navigation Toggle

Situated in a course, the left column displays the course name, description and visible blocks that can be expanded and collapsed. The user can toggle the second column on/off as preferred. Also, the theme displays nicely in both landscape and portrait view.

Moodle iPad Portrait View

Most importantly, the mobile-friendly theme enables users to participate in a course via smart phone or tablet in a manner that is familiar and consistent with the desktop experience. Participants can use assignment, blog, chat, forum, messaging, quiz, wiki etc. Moreover, as expected, administrators and teachers can perform additional functions for their respective roles.

The new MyMobile theme is a welcome addition to the core Moodle software and underlines the value of learning by anyone, anywhere at anytime.