Greetings Moodle Instructors!
With midterm past, and the end of the semester in sight, we want to remind you that our friendly and capable consultants in the Instructional Media Lab are available to assist you with importing exam scores, working with your Moodle gradebook, and other seasonal Moodle activities. We also have some important Moodle-related announcements:
Moodle Community of Practice Lunch, December 9th
Join us Tuesday, December 9th, from 12:30 – 1:30 p.m. for an end-of-semester lunch for Moodle instructors. Since Spring 2013, Moodle has been the learning management system for on-campus courses at UMass Amherst. Over the past two academic years, with your help, we have made a lot of improvements to Moodle, and have more planned in the coming months. As we consider changes, we want to hear what you value about Moodle, what’s working, and what could be better.
Please register for this lunch at https://etna.oit.umass.edu/public/workshops
Moodle Course Requests for Spring 2015 open November 12
Pre-registration and Moodle course request for Winter term and Spring 2015 courses open next Wednesday, November 12.
- For a reminder on how to request a Moodle Course in SPIRE, see: http://www.oit.umass.edu/support/moodle/request-your-moodle-course-overview
- For help importing a previous Moodle course into your new empty course , see: http://www.oit.umass.edu/support/moodle/reuse-a-moodle-course-using-import
Removal of “Old” Moodle Courses
It has been a long-time policy to remove courses from our Learning Management System 18 months after the end of the semester the course was taught. Since the transition from SPARK (our old LMS) we haven’t removed courses from Moodle. The server is getting full, and it is past due to resume this routine.
Courses that were taught during or before Spring 2013 will be removed next semester at the end of Add-Drop period (February 2nd, 2015). This gives you plenty of time to backup course content or student work from old courses that you may want to have on hand. For information about backing up Moodle courses, see http://www.oit.umass.edu/support/moodle/back-up-a-moodle-course
October Moodle Update
Modifications to Moodle in October included:
- If another instructor gives you permission to import their course, you’ll be able to see a guest view of the course before you copy it.
- Grade items changed to “No grade” display in the User report and Categories and items view with a possible point value of 0 (–) and will not calculate into the course total, but can still receive text feedback
- Minor bug fixes
- Upgrade to Moodle 2.5.8 (security patches)
As always, if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions regarding Moodle, please contact the Instructional Media Lab (413-545-2823 or instruct@oit.umass.edu).