When teaching with technology, teachers have to act as subject matter experts, instructional designers and course developers all rolled into one person. Specifically, we not only have to know our subject, but we have to be able to effectively impart that subject to our students by creating a series of engaging and interesting course activities. While there are a variety of tools available out there to do this, the main tools for creating successful courses are the Internet and your school’s online learning management system or LMS.
At my current school, my online courses are developed in the Moodle LMS. Over the years, I’ve worked in many LMS environments and have found the need to create what I call an “instructor toolbox” in my courses.
The other day, I was talking to another faculty member about my instructor toolbox. Below is a loose description of how our conversation went.
Q: What is an instructor toolbox?
A: As the name implies, an instructor toolbox is a space in the LMS that contains sample “tools” for creating the ingredients for a successful course. In my toolbox, there are three types of tools. There are those tools for organizing the course (called "resources" in Moodle), those tools used for providing interaction and collecting feedback (called "activities" in Moodle) and then those tools for using external resources on the Internet such as websites and instructional videos.
Q: Where is my instructor toolbox located in Moodle?
A: My instructor toolbox is located at the bottom of my course screen in a module that is “hidden” from students. To hide a module in Moodle, you click on the eye icon on the upper right side of the module. It acts as a toggle key in that if you click it a second time, it will show the module.
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| Example of the Show/Hide eye icon in a Moodle module. |
Q: How did I create my instructor toolbox?
A: Since the toolbox is just like any other module in the course, you could simply utilize an existing module for it. When I took over my course from the previous instructor, it had a few modules that I did not use but kept hidden from the students. So, I took one of the modules; renamed it “Instructor Toolbox”; deleted the activities from it and inserted my own sample activities.
Q: What is in my current instructor toolbox?
A: My current toolbox has samples of interactive activities in Moodle that I am planning to use in my upcoming courses. Since the toolbox is a “module” in my course, it is automatically copied over with each new course that is created when a new semester starts.
Below is a snapshot of the current instructor toolbox in my course. Notice the samples of different types of course activities.
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| Tools for my current instructor toolbox in Moodle |
Q: How do I start using the activities in my toolbox for a given course?
A: When I am ready to use an activity in the toolbox, I just copy it inside of the toolbox and then move the copy of the activity to the appropriate module in my course. This way the original activity stays in my toolbox to be duplicated the next time I need it.
Q: Why do I use an instructor toolbox?
A: Using an instructor toolbox encourages me to be more creative and confident when trying new activities in my courses. I know that I can “play around” with newer technologies in the toolbox before moving them into the course. I can also work in the toolbox module instead of current course modules while my students are actually online. Since, many of my students work on their assignments late into the night (the same time that I work), this setup works very well. They are not disturbed by new activities "appearing" in a module while they are working.
Image Credit: http://www.pixabay.com/en/toolbox-metallic-maintenance-306888/
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