Who Moved My Sloodle?
09/10/2015
You have probably heard about Moodle, a very popular Learning Management System (LMS). But have you heard about Sloodle, the “virtual Moodle”?
The Sloodle Story
Sloodle is a combination of Moodle (Learning Management System) and Second Life (virtual world) to create a virtual classroom. Surprisingly, this brilliant tool didn't make it.
What is Moodle?Moodle
If you are in the eLearning business, you must have heard about Moodle. But just in case you haven't, here is a brief description:
Martin Dougiamas originally developed Moodle to help educators to create online courses with a focus on interaction and collaborative construction of content, and it is in continual evolution. The first version of Moodle was released in 2002. Nowadays the Moodle Project is led and coordinated by Moodle HQ, an Australian company which is financially supported by a network of Moodle Partner service companies worldwide. Moodle has been translated in over 100 languages.
Moodle (acronym for Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment) is a free and open-source software Learning Management System (LMS). Moodle is used for blended learning, distance education, flipped classroom, and other eLearning projects in schools, Universities, workplaces and other sectors. Moodle is highly customized and it is used to create private websites with online courses for educators and trainers to achieve learning goals. The open community shares plugins and themes to make Moodle fit your preferences and needs.
Moodle 3.0 is expected to be released in November 2015.
Plugins: A flexible tool set, allowing Moodle users to extend the features of the site. There are thousands of plugins for Moodle, extending the features of Moodle's core functionality.
Themes: Graphical themes for Moodle can be installed to change the look and functionality of a Moodle site or of an individual course.
See https://moodle.org/ for more details.
What Is Second Life? Second life
In 2003, Linden Lab launched Second Life, an online virtual world. The virtual world can be accessed freely via Linden Lab's own client programs where its users (also called Residents) create virtual representations of themselves, called avatars, and are able to interact with other avatars, places, or objects. They can explore the world (known as the grid), meet other residents, socialize, participate in individual and group activities, build, create, shop, and trade virtual property and services with one another. It is a platform that principally features 3D-based user-generated content. Second Life also has its own virtual currency, the Linden Dollar, which is exchangeable with real world currency.
See http://secondlife.com for more details.
What Is Sloodle?
Sloodle is a free and open source project which integrates the multi-user virtual environments of Second Life® with the Moodle™ Learning Management System to create a virtual classroom.
Sloodle’ Tools And Features
Sloodle's users can attend a virtual classroom where they can meet “face-to-face” with their virtual classmates in their avatar form. The trainer can create a learning environment to fit the training on hand. With unlimited possibilities, the students can participate in chats (audio and text) using the accessible Moodle chat room. Discussions can be archived securely in the Moodle database. Slides and documents can be viewed in-world as part of a live presentation on virtual boards and can be quickly uploaded to Moodle in a variety of formats to be viewed asynchronously.
Other features include:
- Assignment Drop-Box.
- Review grades quickly and easily in the standard Moodle gradebook.
- Link identities of Moodle users and avatars.
- Take quizzes in-world with the in-world Quiz Chair, integrated with the Moodle gradebook.
- Track points in in-world quizzes and games with the Scoreboard.
- Manage scenes of different objects with the Rezzer.
And, oh yes, you can also fly between worlds.
By Rambo Levin