Fachhochschule Nordwestschweiz

Dear Members of the Swiss e-Learning Community,   We are happy to invite you to th eduhub days 2019, which will take place on February 13 & 14, 2019, at the University of Zurich.   The eduhub days 2019 will focus on digital skills and digitalisation in higher education. Digitalisation is omnipresent in discourses about society, work and education. It is an expression that englobes many aspects: Being able to use new technologies and to apply them in a way, so that they are the most efficient for our intentions. It affects the way we teach and the way students learn. It also refers to a more fundamental change in the disciplines and the process of scientific knowledge creation.   During the eduhub days 2019 we will focus on how digitalisation affects teaching and learning practices in our daily activities. How can we best leverage public awareness and interest for digital technologies to transform our universities? We will look at methods and practical experiences in applying new technologies for higher education, such as augmented and virtual reality, artificial intelligence, robotics and learning analytics.   Digital excellence is built on the ability to understand and employ new  learning and teaching technologies in the most efficient way. The eduhub  days provide a platform for knowledge exchange on digital awareness,  digital skills and media literacy. At the eduhub days 2019 you will be  able to present the way you promote digital excellence and effective use  of new technologies for teaching and learning at your institution either  in a tutorial, in a BarCamp or in a digital exhibition.   You can register for the eduhub days 2019 and send a proposal until December 20, 2018. Please note that places for eduhub days 2019 are limited. Registration is therefore binding.   We are looking forward to welcome you in Zurich in February 2019 and to another inspiring conference of the Swiss e-Learning Community!   Best regards, Nathalie Roth

There is an error which seems to be causing a lot of problems for students and lecturers alike.

Information about this error may be found here:

https://help.fhnw.ch/fhnw/2018/aai-login-nicht-moeglich-empty-uid

Liebe Kolleginnen und Kollegen

Am Mittwoch, 7. November, 13:30-16:00 Uhr, findet der nächste Workshop für Dozierende zum Umgang mit Turnitin statt.

 

Bitte macht in euren Hochschulen über die entsprechenden Kanäle darauf aufmerksam:

https://welcome.inside.fhnw.ch/aktuelles/news/Seiten/Plagiatspr%C3%A4vention-18-10.aspx

https://web.fhnw.ch/plattformen/plagiat/beratungs-und-weiterbildungsangebote

 

Herzlichen Dank und viele Grüsse, Nadja

It is worth noting that when showing grades in Moodle, you should do so either to three decimal places or only one. My opinion is that one is best since this is what the students will finally see in Evento.

Recently a student noted that in Moodle they had been given a 4.75 for some work, but when the grade was sent over to Evento the grade was only a 4.7. On inspection the grade was actually a 4.74745 which rounded to 4.75 but not 4.8 and clearly the student’s question was why do I not get a 4.8.

Thus, in future please ensure all grade book, activity and quiz scores etc. are displayed to one decimal place only.

Corporate IT have said that they do NOT propose to upgrade Moodle this summer, but will instead do so during the winter holidays.

The HT Moodle is currently Moodle 3.5.1+ which is the latest version.

Five things you probably didn’t know about Moodle Plugins.

The M in Moodle stands for Modular, and one of the great benefits of Moodle is that if its many standard features aren’t enough for you, you can search over a thousand additional plugins to find what you need – for free!

Quick overview on Quiz
Happily, the Plugins directory is very well organised so if, for example, you are a fan of the powerful Quiz module, it’s easy for you to sift through the different question types, formats, reports and more. Did you know, for example, that you can require students to agree to a plagiarism statement before they begin a quiz, in a similar way to assignments? You can do this with the “honesty check” quiz access rule plugin.

Extending the power of the teacher with Availability conditions
Recent improvements in availability conditions have encouraged developers to contribute in this area too. Perhaps you have a course accessed by users with different native languages and you want an easy way to restrict activities in each language. Did you know about the Restriction by language plugin which lets you do just that? Read more about availability condition plugins here.

Update your course format
Most Moodlers are happy with Moodle’s standard weekly or topics course format, but if your users are particularly keen on Facebook or Twitter and you think having a more social media-like course might motivate their learning, you can have just that with the Socialwall course format. Explore the many useful contributed course formats here.

Gamification for engaging courses
Along with the social side of learning, gamification of courses is very popular these days. Did you know you can add a Level Up! block, allowing students to gain experience points and level up in their courses? Check out other handy blocks here.

What else is on offer?
A ‘local plugin’ is one that doesn’t fit into a particular area such as quiz or block. Did you know there is a local Moodle welcome plugin which sends a welcome message to a new user and alerts the admin at the same time when a user creates an account? Being made to feel welcome when you first join a course is good for your motivation, and it’s yet another example of how Moodle plugins support successful learning.

This article is taken from Moodle. 23.06.2018

Moodle 3.5 has arrived, and we are currently testing it for compatibility with existing plugins.

An interesting feature that existed back in Moodle 3.1, but which seemed to mysteriously have disappeared was stealth topics. Moodle never admitted that this was a feature, in fact the developers considered it a bug and removed it from the application version 3.3 onward.

After considerable lobbying Moodle have agreed to reinstate this feature, but as an official feature this time. It is hoped that it will appear in one of the regular upgrades in 3.5 over the forthcoming weeks.

In the HT Moodle we have added two new formats which you may like to experiment with:

1. Grid format
2. Buttons format

Grid format allows you to create a course based on a series of tiles to form your menu, whereas Buttons format allows you to create a course based on buttons, numerical, alpha or roman numerals. You can also create subsections etc.

For further information please send an inquiry to Paul Raper who will be glad to explain these features in more detail.

As of May 25th 2018, the new GDPR law will come into force across the whole of the European Union.

Moodle has in its latest upgrade to 3.5 taken some measures to address these new regulations and it maybe worthwhile just taking a few moments to read through them so that you are clear about what they mean to yourself here at the FHNW.

I have made a link to the relevant Moodle page here.

Also, there is a link to an interesting guide on the subject here.

For anyone who is interested in learning how to make the most of Moodle, Moodle are running a MOOC called Learn Moodle starting on the 18th June 2018.

To register, login here: learn.moodle.net.

A new guide for students starting at the FHNW Hochschule für Technik has been developed.

The intention is for the guide to work together with the new e-learning portal and to give the students a “heads up” on what they can expect to find, and how to get started.

It has been produced in both German and English, the latter aimed mainly at overseas students visiting us here.

A link to the guides can be found here:

• Student e-learning guide German
• Student e-learning guide English