Abstract
This work describes the impact of different teachers’ approaches in using Moodle, for supporting their courses, at the Polytechnic of Porto - School of Engineering. The study covers five different courses, from different degrees and different years, and includes a number of Moodle resources especially supporting laboratory classes. These and other active resources are particularly analyzed in order to evaluate students’ adherence to them. One particular course includes a number of remote experiments, made available through VISIR (Virtual Instrument Systems in Reality) and directly accessible through links included in the Moodle course page. The collected data have been correlated with students’ classifications in the lab component and in the exam, each one weighting 50% of their final marks. This analysis benefited from the existence of different teachers’ approaches, which resulted in a diversity of Moodle-supported environments. Conclusions point to the existence of a positive correlation factor between the number of Moodle accesses and the final exam grade, although the quality of the resources made available by the teachers seems to be preponderant over its quantity. In addition, different students perspectives were found regarding active resources: while some seem to encourage students to participate (for instance online quiz or online reports), others, more demanding, are unable to stimulate the majority of them.
Highlights
Almost all institutions have some sort of a Learning Management System (LMS)
Other issues are considered today as essential for the future of remote laboratories, namely: integration with LMS, flexible interfaces, and infrastructures to facilitate the sharing of experiences
In this paper we present an extension to the research: a fifth course has been included, and it used a new type of resource in Moodle: the remote laboratory VISIR (Virtual Instrument System In Reality)
Summary
Almost all institutions have some sort of a Learning Management System (LMS). We relate these two features with remote experimentation offered through a LMS platform. The experimental systems, and in particular remote laboratories, have been the subject of efforts to demonstrate their capabilities and advantages for teaching and learning processes in higher education [1]. Since the 90’s, several educational institutions have addressed the issue of remote laboratories. The educational work in the area tries to improve the efficiency and effectiveness in its use, by creating flexible infrastructures that offer features such as authentication, resource reservation, communication tools and access to support materials. Other issues are considered today as essential for the future of remote laboratories, namely: integration with LMS, flexible interfaces (taking into account usability and accessibility), and infrastructures to facilitate the sharing of experiences. The system integration with an LMS, like Moodle, is explored in this paper
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