while I agree with some of the points Roger makes particularly regarding SMT buy in and whole school initiatived there are a couple of issues that I would wish to debate. In particular I feel strongly this list shoud not be used to suppliers or consultants to push their own products or services, I'll come to this later.
As an unashamed Moodle enthusiast I would very much disagree with the point regarding Moodle evangelists only having experience of Moodle. The reason most Moodle enthusiasts are so enthusiastic are that they have used other VLEs first had limited success and have moved to Moodle and had much greater success. For example the institution I work at at the moment had used WebCT for 4 years and had 30 active courses. after two years with Moodle that had risen to over 600. The main reason for this I would argue is how simple Moodle is for even IT terified teachers to use. Roger is right that Moodle needs supporting but there are plenty of organisations offering Moodle support at a fraction of the cost of a normal VLE license (1-4K per annum I believe is typical).
I'd also like to point out that I think its very questionable for Roger to use this list to promote a VLE that he has a commercial interest in. I appreciate that he has acknowledged his interest in Frog but my understanding of the rules of this list (and this kind of thing has occurred before) is that this is not on. The list is for users of VLEs to discuss issues not suppliers or consultants to push there own product or services.
BTW who is moderating this list at the moment?
all best
Peter Kilcoyne
Director of ILT
Worcester College of Technology
www.wortech.ac.uk
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-----Original Message-----
From: Virtual Learning Environments on behalf of Roger Broadie
Sent: Sun 12/10/2008 13:06
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [VLES] Struggling with Learnwise VLE
Tom,
I agree strongly with Liz Summerfield's points, you have to think this
through deeply and you need to do this with someone on the senior
leadership team.
I note you got several responses from people keen on Moodle and this
indicates one of the problems; most people only have real experience
of the system they use, and tend to become somewhat evangelical about
it because of the effort they put into getting it going, as well as
because they chose the system that most appealed to them (and this
list has a higher percentage of Moodle users than schools generally).
Which brings us to the second problem; schools use learning platforms
in very diverse ways, and you need the system which will best suit the
ways your school needs to use it, which means thinking deeply about
the school culture and educational philosophy, school community,
nature of your catchment area and desire of the senior leadership team
to embrace the change that can be catalysed by a really effective
digital environment.
I have been fortunate to have been in contact with a pretty wide range
of learning platforms, because of work I have done with the E.E.P.,
Naace, through work as an independent consultant, and in my current
role with Frog - but I am sure you can judge what 'health warnings'
you need to apply to my comments below. The things that have
influenced my thinking I recently pulled together the references to -
this list won't take attachments so I will send it separately, if
anyone else wants it drop me an email.
My advice is:
1) The world has moved on rapidly from Learnwise and it is not being
developed, so it is a dead end. Getting an effective digital
environment to complement the social and physical environments of the
schools is THE critical catalyst for transforming education for the
21st century. So plan to replace Learnwise before next academic year.
A good schedule would be initial explorations of what is available
between now and BETT, conversations at BETT with the suppliers you
have thinned the list down to, with purchase of the new system early
Spring, implementation and initial training for the core group in the
Summer term, and launch to the whole school Sep 09.
2) The only way for a secondary school to properly implement a
learning platform is as a whole school initiative. Unless all teachers
and all staff are using the system, most of the initial pay-back will
not materialise and the system will be used only the few and will be
marginal in terms of impact. But if you do implement for the whole
school properly, impact can be massive and the system can help the
school to get onto a much steeper improvement path - look at the
schools that have achieved this. The critical implication of a whole
school approach, is that the Headteacher has to be 100% behind the
development, because some staff will resist changing work processes
and need to be pushed over the initial (small) pain barrier. Watch the
video of Domenic Volpe talking to Naace Conference about this. (You
also need to ensure all staff have laptops and that the school network
is solid.)
3) There are basically two kinds of 'learning platform' around at the
moment, which you could categorise as 'just VLE' and 'VLE plus lots of
other online functionality'. The 'Becta List' was all about hosted
platforms to provide 'virtual learning spaces' for all pupils in all
schools, and as a result the process selected only large companies,
with hosted systems, with the scale to implement platforms for
hundreds of schools in a short time scale. The Becta list also
focussed only on 'VLE functionality' and not the wider needs of
schools for things like a public website, community portal, online
admin systems for teachers, pupils and parents, student voice areas
and so on (not to mention the parent reporting requirements now coming
in). Some of the systems from companies on the Becta list have
developed a fair bit since the list was put together, but the key
issue is that VLE functionality is now being subsumed into bigger
systems, that provide for these wider needs. So companies providing
'just VLE' don't give you what you need to be future-proof.
4) The long term trend (driven by BSF amongst other forces) is to move
to 'managed learning environments' well integrated with MIS and
organisational IT systems. The sooner you move down this route the
better, because working practices and teaching/learning approaches are
now changing fast in a significant number of schools, and your staff
are going to get left behind professionally unless they start to gain
experience of this. There are essentially three systems that you can
look at for this:
- Sharepoint based Windows systems, with a VLE such as Kaleidos or
Assimilate or Fronter incorporated within it.
- Frog, which is an alternative to Sharepoint (LAMP-based), not as
'corporate' but considerably easier for staff to create in, develop
and control, which again gives you the VLE functionality and all the
wider functionality you need.
- Moodle plus other open-source systems integrated with it. Moodle is
a course-based VLE and does not itself give you effective content
management, admin systems etc.
If you go the Moodle route, be clear that it is not 'free' - you need
sufficient technically competent staff in school to set it up and to
support it; sufficient to ensure that if one or even two key staff
leave you still have people who can run and develop it - which is why
FE colleges quite often use Moodle, they have technical teams able to
do this, whereas few schools can afford such a team). Frog is provided
as a managed service, as is Sharepoint usually.
When you look at all the costs including staff, there is little
difference between cost of Moodle and cost of Frog or Sharepoint based
systems. But in any event it is not the initial purchase or annual
system costs which really matter; it is the changes the digital
environment will make possible in the school, to make the work of
everyone more efficient and effective, and to save costs in other
ways. When you look at this properly, particularly how staff can use
time differently, the positive benefits and cost savings hugely
outweigh differences in system costs.
If you want to pick up any of these points and discuss them further,
do contact me off-list.
Regards
Roger.
On 9 Oct 2008, at 12:04, tshaw wrote:
> Dear All,
>
> Any advice greatfully recieved:
>
> I have taken on the role of E-Learning Co-ordinator at our secondary
> school, and we are currentley using 'Learnwise' for the VLE. This is
> proving quite unfriendly. Myself and the school technicians are
> struggling to upload a relatively straightforward 'VLE ready' piece
> of software, published by longman. We think we can solve the
> problems (mainly due, we think, to the number of files that need to
> be uploaded), but I'm worried that this will become a trial
> everytime we want to upload/use all but the simplest of courses.
>
> so.....
>
> Do we ditch learnwise at this early stage, and if so, can anyone
> recommend a VLE system currently in use in a secondary school?
>
>
> Anyone with any prior experience of Learnwise please feel free to
> add any general comments about the system!
>
> Thankyou in advance
>
> Tom
>
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Roger Broadie,
Director,
Broadie Associates Ltd.
http://www.BroadieAssociates.co.uk
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