Why Moodle?

Why Moodle?
One of the most frequently asked questions I get from blog readers is "Why did I choose to go with Moodle" over other Learning Management Systems. The answer is simple; Moodle gives you the most bang for your buck, especially if you don't have a lot of bucks. A huge factor in my case is that I had zero budget to implement eLearning in my organization so I didn't have many options. However, when it comes down to it, Moodle met most of the requirements I had listed out and met those requirements at the lowest cost by a long shot. I spent a lot of time researching LMS systems that added on a lot of expense for bells and whistles that my organization didn't need so why pay for it when with Moodle all you need is a little hard work.

However, Moodle is not all rainbows and unicorns. Although Moodle is turning out to be a good fit for my situation, it is not the ideal solution for all organizations. It is important to do your research and testing before making the leap to Moodle or any Learning Management System. Below are some factors I took into consideration and some tips that may help you in the LMS selection process.

Making the Decision
Thinking back on my LMS decision making process there were 3 key steps I took which helped me narrow down the huge amount of options and make a final decision. This is just a high level description of the steps I took to come to a decision that works for my organization. There are many more details to drill down into but I could go on all day with the small stuff.

1. Write an RFP - Writing a request for proposal (RFP) really helps you to analyze what exactly you need in an LMS. Starting out by describing everything you want to use the LMS for in an RFP helps to ensure that you take everything into consideration before making a final determination. If you go straight into the research without listing out your requirements it can be easy to get swept away in LMS features that you may never have use for and end up overpaying for a system that you don't need. You also want to make sure that you don't make the mistake of going with an LMS that doesn't meet your requirements and end up having to go with something else down the line. For more information on RFP's and samples to help you get started, check out this blog post about LMS RFP's by Tony Karrer.
   
2. Research - Plan on spending a lot of time with Google researching the wide array of LMS options. Don't get stuck in the research phase forever but make sure to talk to plenty of LMS vendors and take the time to view their Demo's. A great resource that got me off to a good start was eLearning Guilds 360 report on Learning Management Systems. This gave me a good starting point of LMS's to begin researching. Because there are so many options with subtle differences it is a good idea to put together some kind of tool to take notes while viewing demos so that later on you can easily compare the key differences and narrow down your options. I put together a simple excel spreadsheet that later turned into a great tool for narrowing down my choices. Once you have your list of contenders narrowed down you can send them your RFP and start testing out their trial versions.
   
3. Get your hands dirty - This is the most important step of the LMS selection process. Don't make any decisions until you dive in and test out the trial versions of your finalists. This can be a little time consuming but actually putting together a sample course and testing out administration features tells you a whole lot more about the LMS then any demo will ever tell you. Many LMS vendors provide trial versions and in Moodle's case it is a free download anyway so you can test out the full version at no risk. This is how I ended up deciding on Moodle. I was able to easily get it up and running on my own and it met most of the requirements I had described in my RFP.
   

Going through these steps helped me come to the conclusion that Moodle would fit the needs of my organization at the lowest cost. You may come to the conclusion that you would be sacrificing too much by going with Moodle. Either way it's important to do the work involved in selecting an LMS before you go too far down the wrong path and waste money. Do you have any suggestions that will help others decide whether Moodle is the right choice? If so, please leave a comment with your suggestions, tips, or questions.

In this post I brought up that there are a lot of pro's and cons to Moodle that are helpful to know about when trying to decide on whether Moodle fits your needs. In a future post I will be asking for contributions to a list of Moodle pro's and cons that will help others in the decision making process. I hope you'll contribute your opinions of Moodle for the sake of others struggling with the decision.

Go Kings!

I went to see the Sacramento Kings play the Pistons on Tuesday night and ended up getting a whole lot more than I bargained for. I was picked out of the crowd to come down to the court and compete in a "name that song" contest sponsored by Verizon wireless. I was so caught off guard to be picked out that I didn't even hear her mention what the prize was.

So here I am during a timeout in the 3rd quarter standing on center court ready to compete with one other guy. The announcer explained to the crowd that there would be 3 rounds and the prize get's better each round. The first song started playing and neither I or the other guy knew what it was so the first round went by without either one of us winning the $50 verizon wireless gift card. Then on comes the second song and I nail it! Scored myself a $75 gift card to Verizon which works out because I actually am a Verizon customer. All I needed to hear is the first couple of notes of the song for Round 3 before nailing the buzzer and screaming "Ozzy - Crazy Train!!" It's a song I know very well to say the least. We got shuffled off the court in a hurry having no idea what I won for the second round. As soon as they got me off the court they handed me a piece of paper to write my address down on. I suspiciously asked why and their response was "We need to know where to send your new Blackberry Storm!" This is where the heart skips a beat and the drool starts dripping down my chin.

I like my gadgets and the Blackberry Storm looks to be the hot gadget of the Christmas season. If you haven't heard it's Blackberry's answer to the iPhone. I am particularly excited about this phone because my work is Blackberry dependent so I will be able to replace my current clunker with this giant upgrade. That is unless I decide to put it up on eBay for a pretty penny. There has been a delay on the release of these phones so there is no availability retail which is driving up the price on eBay. The phone arrives in 7-10 days so I will have to see what they are selling for at that time. If they are available retail before then the ebay price will drop. It would be a no brainer to sell it if I didn't want to keep it so bad!

Progress on Management Training Program

Months and Months ago I mentioned how I am starting my first larger scale eLearning project in a posting titled Manager Training Program. I am now knee deep in the project and learning a lot along the way.

I designed and developed a prototype for the first course and it is under review now. I am expecting that there may be some barriers I have to overcome due to the fact that this is a big change in how we facilitate training programs, and nobody likes change.

Due to budgetary restrictions I am limited to Power Point in combination with a PPT to Flash Converter as my authoring tool. This has actually gone surprisingly well and I am having a hard time figuring out what the major authoring tools out there have over power point when it is used with a Flash Converter. This has proved to me that the instructional design truly is the most important part. With good design, a power point can become a high end eLearning module.

So far the only hiccups I came across along the way was finding a good ppt to flash converter. I went through several trial versions finding something that worked well with MS Office 07. In "Better than Bullet Points" by Jane Bozarth, she recommends a product called PowerConverter that works with MS Office 07 but I was not happy with the results. PowerConverter did not like anything that used "Motion Path" animation. After testing with the trial versions of several different products, I ended purchasing the PPT 2 Flash Converter by Wondershare and so far it has worked well. I was not able to get it to work with PPT 07, but after saving the file as a PPT 03 it worked like a charm. I also had a little trouble removing the control bar from the flash player but the support staff quickly responded with a solution. The quick response from the support staff is what prompted me to make the purchase. Good job Wondershare.

IT Comes up Huge!

Last week my chances of getting a Wiki installed behind the firewall were looking terrible. I actually refocused on hosted solutions because the notion of installing MediaWiki behind the firewall was shot out of the water at first. Luckily we have a fired up tech support guy who is dying to get a Wiki up and going so that he can update it with the latest tech support issues that come up. He was persistent enough to find a solution that all parties are happy with and MediaWiki is now installed behind the firewall. The ball is now in my court to make it useful. Where do I begin?

I was so focused on just getting buy in for a Wiki that I didn’t put much thought into the actual development and implementation of the Wiki. So, what are the keys to success in a Wiki implementation? Based on experience I would say the most important factor is creating a great base of content to show the organization what the possibilities are and then come up with a way for them to be excited about it so that they will jump in and use it. It would be a good idea to come up with some kind of contest or release event that brings a lot of attention to the Wiki.

One idea I have had so far that should generate a little interest in the Wiki is to create an online scavenger hunt that will require the participants to find certain information in the Wiki. This would help them realize the great information that is available and how easy it is to access. Quia makes it really easy to make an online scavenger hunt that would be perfect for this exercise.
In addition to a scavenger hunt I will need something that requires them to post or edit information in the Wiki.

Once they see how easy it is to find answers to the Wiki they need to see how they can contribute to making the Wiki better. This is where some kind of contest could come in to play. The organization has a large sales force and a good contest idea would be to enter their most effective sales technique. The techniques entered into the Wiki could be judged by the VP of sales and the winner could win some kind of cool prize like an iPod.

But before I worry about getting people to use the Wiki I need to start writing out the content. I am going to start out by cruising through Wiki’s and developing opinions of what works and what doesn’t. I need to see how the information is presented so that it is made useful. I have plenty of material to work with but I am not exactly sure of the best way to present it. My goal for now is to research what makes a good and bad Wiki and develop a content layout plan from there.

Just in the nick of time!

Just as I was looking into purchasing Camtasia Studio by Tech Smith I came across a blog posting on Tony Karrer's eLearning Technology blog just in the nick of time. Tony posted links to free downloads of Snag It and Camtasia. I have been a long time user of Snag It and love it for screen shots. It is very handy for creating software training materials. I recently used the demo version of Camtasia to complete a software simulation project and it worked out great. I just installed Camtasia and can't wait to put it to use on a larger scale project.

Post about free Snag It and Camtasia downloads

One small step for eLearning, a giant leap for the company

Now that I am on a shoestring budget I have been making more of an effort to find low cost solutions to implementing eLearning. In my research I came across a website called Quia that I think will be a perfect fit for helping us get our feet wet in eLearning. It’s no high powered LMS, but it will let us create all kinds of assessments and track the scores. In addition to assessments, it also has an interface for creating fun games and activities. I think that by using Quia assessments and games along with power point shows, reading assignments, and conference calls we can construct a low cost distance education course. This may seem like a small step for eLearning, but it is a giant leap for my company : )

Here comes the tricky part. I need to find a subject to cover and preferably it is a subject that is currently being covered in an instructor led course. Ideally, I would like to take a portion of the content of an instructor led course and convert that to eLearning so that I can reduce the amount of days/hours required to complete the class. If I can point to a dollar amount that I saved by converting this material to eLearning I am more likely to turn some heads and get more leeway in the budget. By doing something simple that has a positive ROI I can begin to win the VP’s over and make eLearning a priority in next year’s budget.

So that’s the plan! Create an eLearning course that will replace a portion of an instructor led course and make the ROI blaringly obvious.