About Ikigai Talent School
Originating as a learning blog in 2015 in Alicante, Spain, Ikigai Talent School transformed into a Talent School in 2019. The school demonstrates expertise in areas such as personalised learning, critical and creative thinking skills, feedback techniques, effective grouping strategies, and talent development. It also hosts workshops and seminars to equip educators, schools, and teacher training centres with innovative methodologies to elevate their educational practices.
Their online modules are meticulously designed to arm parents with the insights and tools to understand high abilities, helping them guide their children towards holistic emotional and social growth. Beyond formal learning, the school provides extracurricular workshops aimed at participants to improve their critical and creative thinking. Engaging challenges and customised feedback ensure participants hone their strengths and kindle their curiosity in unconventional learning domains.
The challenges
Ikigai Talent School faced a series of challenges as it sought to evolve in a rapidly changing educational landscape.
First and foremost, there was the pressing concern of adapting business operations during the lockdown, which coincided with the need to ensure quality education for the ever-growing number of students. This expansion demanded a captivating online learning environment, especially when teaching had to be executed remotely.
The diverse needs of students made customisation and differentiation essential, requiring a shift in teaching methodologies as they adapted to a new learning management platform with the goal of maximising its potential. With these challenges in mind, Ikigai needed to find a quick yet cost-effective online learning solution that upheld best teaching practices while minimising the time and resources spent on administrative tasks.
Additionally, it was crucial that this solution offer the highest levels of security and data privacy, as well as a hosted platform that is always up-to-date and capable of delivering diverse learning content. Moreover, as the school expanded its reach, it had to adeptly navigate time zones, cultural nuances, and linguistic variations to cater effectively to a global student community.
Implementing a MoodleCloud Standard Plan
MoodleCloud Standard Plans are fast, affordable and ready-to-go with Moodle’s most popular features built in and self-service support. Moodle goes beyond the basic content features of most learning platforms and is rich with activities that support good pedagogical practice and require students to actively engage with the learning content and each other in a range of modalities.
Ikigai Talent School chose the MoodleCloud Standard Plan as a reliable and resilient solution to tackle its key challenges, enhance student engagement, and improve teaching, training and learner outcomes.
Some of the key benefits for the school included:
- Managed hosting and security
MoodleCloud Standard Plans provide an accessible avenue for educators and small businesses to take advantage of Moodle’s features, without the need for specialised technical expertise or the responsibility of managing their own hosting infrastructure. This has been particularly advantageous for Ikigai Talent School, as it has allowed for quick and efficient course creation and content management, without the hassle of hosting and maintaining a Moodle instance on their own servers.
Furthermore, since Moodle handles all the hosting and security, Ikigai has been able to concentrate on delivering quality online courses, free from the concerns of additional technical maintenance or security measures.
- Always up-to-date solution
MoodleCloud Standard Plans keeps Ikigai Talent School on the latest version of Moodle. This updating process grants access to the newest features, performance improvements, and security enhancements, eliminating the need for manual interventions or updates.
- Supporting best practice online learning
- Delivering content and tasks in a range of formats for different learning preferences – Moodle allowed Ikigai Talent School to deliver course content in various formats such as videos, quizzes, and interactive lessons. This feature appealed to different learning styles and preferences, enhancing the overall student experience.
- Enabling social learning and learner collaboration – The platform’s community-building tools empowered Ikigai Talent School to foster an environment of social learning and peer collaboration. Students engaged in discussion forums and group projects, enhancing their educational journey through shared experiences and insights.
- Creating tests and assessments – Robust testing and assessment functionalities provided by Moodle allowed Ikigai Talent School to gauge student comprehension and performance effectively. Tailored exams and quizzes enabled a more nuanced understanding of each student’s strengths and areas for improvement.
- Tracking, analysing and reporting on learner progress – Moodle’s analytics tools offered Ikigai Talent School the capability to track and analyse learner progress comprehensively. Customisable reports helped educators identify learning patterns and make data-driven decisions to support their students.
By leveraging these diverse functionalities, Ikigai Talent School has optimised the learning experience for its students, ensuring engagement, progress, and a community-focused educational environment.
The results
Using a MoodleCloud Standard Plan has been a game-changer for Ikigai Talent School, helping the institution expand its reach to over 400 students in just three years. The rich array of interactive and customisable features on Moodle has led to it becoming the cornerstone of the school’s training activities.
“My students and I absolutely love using Moodle. The platform receives consistent praise for its user-friendliness and the options to interact and feel part of a learning community. And of course, it helps me to grow my business, as it allows me to reach students anywhere in the world,” shared Paulina Bánfalvi, CEO of Ikigai Talent School.
Bánfalvi also appreciates the regular updates and the addition of new resources each year. “The platform is constantly evolving, making it even more versatile for course creation. The updates are always logical, and functional, and often exceed our expectations,” she added.
Among the features most valuable to Ikigai Talent School are the discussion forums. These allow both educators and peers to provide targeted feedback on student drafts, aiding in refinement before final submission. MoodleCloud Standard Plans also offer traceability options to monitor a student’s learning journey closely. The flexibility to include various resources—like videos, links, documents, and other interactive activities—gives Bánfalvi the freedom to construct dynamic and varied courses.
