Any parents, teachers or teaching asst's who can help with VLE's?

[HoldTouchEngage]

possibly help me with VLE's - specifically Moodles??

(Visual Learning Environments)

I am grateful for any opnions on how they benefit secondary schools, pupils, parents. Especially anyone who has children who need a little extra support with their learning - or how it helps either you as parents or teachers support pupils. And just most importantly if and how they are most useful!

Many thanks in advance!

(i have a secondary interview tomorrow, and have now been asked to provide a 15 minute presentation on the above - unfortunatley my industry is nothing to do with the above and i've only come across this slightly in the last fortnight since it was mentioned at dd's primary pta meeting!)

B xx

It's 'virtual learning environments'. Moodle is a type of VLE that's used by loads of universities (not mine though, we've got the world's crappiest VLE instead).

DS1's school uses their VLE (they use Frog) to set homework. The kids download the instructions, complete the homework and then upload the files for marking. It saves them 'losing' it on the way to school. DS1 likes it because it means he can do his homework on the computer.

They use it in a very limited way. The teachers just upload word documents or PDFs and get the children to upload their own word documents. It's perfectly possible in Moodle to have kids type into boxes on the screen, complete multiple choice quizzes, etc but it takes a long time to put it all together and teachers really don't have the time for that kind of thing. I think parents would prefer that they spent their time preparing imaginative and inspiring lessons, rather than producing homework for the VLE.

at my school it is not used really (RM) but, I have recently started to make more use of it (as a teacher) and so far my experiences are -

as soon as students log in they can see if there is work set (same with parents) and they can then do it and upload it. From my perspective, I can set work and see immediately if it has been completed, mark it and post the comments/grade on line and therefore students/parents have feedback which they can refer back to.

The worse thing about it is the initial set up! Whilst my timetable is there I have to manually allocate classes to a markbook etc and this takes time I need to be aware that not all students will have internet access which allows them to open all file types or even internet at all!

I suppose that once I do the intial time consuming work regarding setting up classes, adding students etc then it would work well as it saves me having to bring home reams of paper to mark; but it also means that rather than just picking up a worksheet/exercise book (whilst on the sofa!) I have to download their work, make comments etc which sometimes takes longer

DS1 uses a VLE (I think it is moodle but he is not at home so I cant check.)

He has homework that is set, the answers are typed in and the homework is automatically marked (mostly seems to be maths and some geography).
He has been revising for a maths exam for the last few days and the site was auto generating sample KS3 maths papers for him to do and then marked them. He could apparently do this as many times as he wanted as the questions would change so it was very useful for revision purposes.

My school uses Edmodo as a communication tool. It is like FB for schools. Each of my students joins their class group. Then I put homework instructions up and can set deadlines. You can insert links or load files.

When you log in all the latest posts come up of all the groups you are in, just like on FB.

We also have a VLE but now we have Edmodo the VLE is not used very much. We do have on-line versions of our textbooks on it though so students don't have to take books home. Using the files on it is pretty un-userfriendly though.

You can't upload work to Edmodo. For sixth form work where I need to see it as they work on it I use Googledocs. For younger students I get them to e-mail work to me or print and stick in books. Usually I give out hard copies of homework and then upload a soft copy to Edmodo for those who forget to take their books home.

Regarding weaker students- using a VLE is good as they can access their work easily, plus the instructions can be read by parents. This will benefit those who have good IT facilities at home and parents willing and able to help them.

PS good luck!