The Road to Moodle 4.0 – Toward a seamless learning environment

June 30, 2021 By Abby Fry

Moodle 4.0, the user experience centrepiece that will transform Moodle LMS, will incorporate new integrations, features and tools specifically designed to create a smooth and seamless learning environment for learners, educators, administrators and managers.

As the global online or e-learning market continues to rapidly grow, the mainstream adoption of learning management platforms has highlighted the importance of creating learning systems that are not only rich and configurable but also interactive, engaging and intuitive. 

 

Foster engagement with integrated virtual classrooms

The global pandemic has highlighted the importance of fostering learner engagement through integrated virtual classrooms. We are proud to announce that BigBlueButton, the open source web conferencing solution providing real-time sharing of audio, video, slides, whiteboard, chat and screen, will be incorporated into Moodle 4.0 as a standard feature. Currently available as a Moodle plugin, BigBlueButton, allows educators or managers to use breakout rooms, polls, multi-user whiteboard, and shared notes to engage learners.  

Like Moodle, BigBlueButton is open source. This means any school can set up their own BigBlueButton server (or pool of BigBlueButton servers) to host their virtual classrooms. Blindside Networks, the company that started the BigBlueButton project and developer of the plugin, will offer a built-in free tier hosting of BigBlueButton to enable any school running Moodle 4.0 to try out BigBlueButton right away. The free tier hosting will include 60 minutes and 25 users per session, moderator webcam and seven day non-downloadable recordings.

Image: bigbluebutton.org

 

Evaluate the impact of learning

There is an increasing global trend to use data to measure student progress and analyse the impact of learning programs. We are excited to reveal that Custom Reports, a feature of Moodle Workplace, is being incorporated into Moodle 4.0 so that educators and managers can generate system level and custom reports to generate additional insights. Over time, all reporting in Moodle LMS will be consolidated in the report builder to provide a single and consistent interface for reports. This will allow reports to be filtered by particular elements of the data, exported to a range of formats, scheduled to be sent automatically or on a timely basis and restricted to specific audiences based on their roles. 

 

Remove seams within and between systems

To facilitate easy integration of external tools into Moodle, and to make sure learners experience this in a seamless and secure way, Moodle embraces LTI – learning tools interoperability – and is a certified LTI Advantage Complete platform. LTI removes seams (or gaps) within and between systems. It allows Moodle LMS to be securely connected with external learning tools and users to access external content from a Moodle LMS site. By using LTI tools, the need for learners to navigate to different websites to access their learning materials is removed, therefore creating a smooth, consistent and enhanced learning experience. Moodle 4.0 will take interoperability one step further by moving from LTI 1.1 to 1.3 Advantage standard. This enhances Moodle’s capacity to act as an LTI provider and securely host content for other LTI platforms to consume. We have adopted the new standard because we want to remove as many technical barriers as possible to creating integrated digital ecosystems while ensuring privacy and security of data.

Moodle’s commitment to delivering a learning management system that protects the privacy and security of learners’ data is underpinned by our security by design practice and as signatories to the Standards First Pledge

For more information on the Moodle 4.0, please join the Moodle UX community, sign up to our usability testing and review our Moodle 4.0 documentation.