Edunology

This topic is not typical for my postings but it is a topic that is of great interest to me. Jamie Oliver discusses how the food we eat is the number one killer in our nation. He explains how we need to start teaching kids about food to help solve this growing problem. He won the 2010 TED prize for his work in the area. I can think of a number of technology infused lessons that will cover this topic. Take a few minutes to listen to his speech.

I have started to research the benefits of Moodle vs. Sharepoint. I have a couple of needs that I would like to address. I first want to provide an opportunity for teachers in my middle and high school to be able to extend their classroom beyond the 4 walls of their room. I would like to introduce tools such as blogs, wiki’s, multimedia etc.. Moodle seems to be my best option for setting up these virtual courses. It is a perfect solution to have all of these tools centralized in one place. It seems easy to use and simple to setup. The best part is that it is free.  I have worked with moodle briefly on my own professional development site.

My second goal is to provide an intranet portal for our high school. Currently faculty members receive numerous emails throughout the day. These emails include: daily attendance lists, lists of students attending field trips, lunch menus etc.. Many times we receive two or three revisions of each memo. What I would like to do is to create an intranet webpage to host all of this information. Through windows group policy we could make this page the Internet explorer home page for all staff members.

Based on my research to date it appears that Sharepoint will work best for this problem. Our district currently has a license for sharepoint server 2003. This is the full version of sharepoint. There is a free version of sharepoint called sharepoint services that is available on any windows 2003 server. Although it does not have all of the features on the full version. The free version would most likely be a good enough solution for the project.

Sharepoint appears to manage announcements and document distribution/revisions very well. It is also LDAP compatible. This should allow all authenticated users in the school to not have to log in. It is fully integrated with active directory. 

Moodle does not appear to organize an intranet start page as well as Sharepoint. I have found that everything is based on courses. Once you create a course you have the ability to do everything that I require. I am concerned about staff having to click too deep to get what they need. I want to make it simple to retrieve the information they require. 

Sharepoint does not appear to organize the class materials as well as Moodle. I have not found an option for gradebooks or quizzes. Moodle also appears to organizes the class sites in a much more user friendly manner.

There was a discussion on this same topic on Classroom 2.0.

I welcome input from everyone regarding this comparison. My current decision is to use both. I will use Moodle for courses and sharepoint to manage information and documents sent to faculty members.

We are all aware of the argument of which is better, PC or Mac. This argument is present in our personal and professional lives. Well, I am not posting this to argue which in my perception is better. I am writing this post to say, as educators we need to stop focussing our energy on this topic. Who cares which is better! I have been involved in this argument frequently because of the  mixed environment our regional school district operates in.

We are not in the business of teaching operating systems or platforms. We don’t even know what platforms will be available for the students we teach when they enter the working world. Never mind knowing what types of new jobs will be available or the requirements for these jobs.

What we do know is that computers and technology are a fantastic tool. We use them as a tool to not only teach curriculum. We also use them to assist in the development of 21st Century Skills. These are the skills that we predict will allow our students to be successful in the jobs that don’t yet exist. We hope that these skills will allow them to also make a seemless entry into the workforce by being able to adapt to the changing environment.

So, let’s stop worrying about which platform we invest in and start worrying about how we are using the tools that are available to us. It is not a brand that matters. It is the power of the tool. We are teaching our students to adapt to new technologies. Moving from PC to Apple to Linux is an example of this. There is not an edge for students in platforms. For the most part, students can learn a new interface as fast as they learn to maneuver the newest version of Grand Theft Auto.