Reading – Transition to Moodle (Florida International University)
I believe that asking questions is a good thing, and can often bring a greater sense of understanding in whatever subject area you currently inhabit. The question of whether your current VLE (or LMS or CMS or whatever you classify it as) is the right one for your Institution seems to be one of those questions that people would rather you didn’t ask. I’m not sure why considering the costs involved in maintaining a VLE infrastructure; surely we can ask if we are getting value for money?
Which is when I found this: Transition to Moodle, Florida International University
The article outlines the FIU’s position in the development of their VLE, from WebCT to BlackBoard via the BlackBoard purchase of WebCT, through to the evaluation of alternative systems.
“Our testing and evaluation of open-source alternatives showed that both Sakai and Moodle offer comparable tool/feature sets compared to Blackboard. However, the Moodle university, user, and developer communities are substantially larger than those of Sakai. In addition, Moodle is rated higher on ease of use by many in the LMS community.”
If the question is asked, and the answer (after proper consideration and evaluation) is that your existing VLE system (BlackBoard, Sakai, Moodle, etc) IS the right choice for you then so be it. I’d be happy with that kind of answer, so long as it has been properly addressed. If the answer is NO then that is the right time to ask the next logical question … what should you be using for your intended outcome?
Has your Institution asked this of itself? Are you migrating from one VLE or LMS system to another (if so from what to what)? Please share your thoughts and experiences by leaving a comment below.
Awesome entry. Your definitely into technology and all that it offers..I am a second degree seeking student at the University of South Alabama in Mobile, Al. Senior Status!! I wish you luck with all future endeavors and continue your techno venture.
I am a teacher and working with google tools for educating and teaching for a long time. I made by myself a personal workspace for me and for my student which working similar to moodle in a meaning of a course management tool.
Here’s a link to presentation which explain it:
http://tiny.cc/urhz2
thanks for the post.
After having used Blackboard for 10 year and having moved to another school where I have installed and set up Moodle I can clearly say that in areas of usability, and pedagogy Blackboard is a standout winner. The interface and structure of the platform are clearly superior as are the backend management tasks and tools. Although I am an advocate of open source, and it is rather unfair to compare a commercially developed product with a community developed one, price is the only area where I consider Moodle to be superior. The comparison between Blackboard 9 and Moodle 2.0 clearly illustrates the disparity between the two systems and the vision that Blackboard has for their product.
Kim – I think you are the first person I have ever heard say they prefer Blackboard to Moodle! Well done.
I too am a supporter of Open Source software (WordPress, ModX, osCommerce, PHPList, etc) and freely admit I have no hands-on experience with Moodle, so am not in a position to really extol the virtue of Moodle over other VLEs such as Blackboard.
I do, however, think that a system developed by the Community (eg Moodle) is often better than one developed by a commercial enterprise – the Community is often more likely to bend and be adaptable to the direction a system needs to take for the pedagogy to work for the stakeholders (academics, students, etc), whereas a commercial organisation will have other reasons for a development lifecycle.
I am open to a conversation on this point, so please feel free to jump in and comment.
All the best, David
It’s interesting to compare Florida University’s decision to Cornell University, which recently decided to stay with Blackboard and upgrade to 9.1 rather than move to Moodle after an initial pilot testing period.
Frankly, I’ve used Blackboard v7.3 enough to know I hate it, but I’ve looked at the features and layout of the new Blackboard release, and I can’t say I’m too upset. It looks very streamlined and much more intuitive than previous versions (I’ve also tried what I think is v8 and it wasn’t too bad). With commercial backing and support, I can understand why an institution would want to upgrade to an almost equivalent platform rather than have to transition to a new CMS and worry about community-based support (which can be very unreliable, depending on your problem, something very important to a large organization)
http://blogs.cornell.edu/blackboard/2010/08/12/upgrade-announcement/
Looking around, I can see that Moodle does indeed have commercial support, but not first-party.
Learning on the internet is made more easier with the Moodle system. That is why, it is one of the most in demand online learning systems worldwide.