teaching, groupware, CMS

[edwurster]

I'm going thru all of the great stuff that can be installed thru Fantastico.

In a month or so I'm teaching an intro to PC's course (12 weeks) based on a very good text book/workbook.

I want to put up something to help foster communication between all the students (including me.)

Has anyone tackled a situation like this?

I don't need any testing or grade management. I'm focusing on group communication, insofar as posting, and discussing.

I know that Moodle is an application for teaching, and wanted to hear anything else you have to say about it or other CMS/Blog things.

[TechWeasel]

I did some on-line collaborative coursework in University on some enterprise-grade collaboration client/server stuff... the name escapes me. Not that it matters because it was completely garbage.

It was so hard to figure out how the "intuitive" software wanted you to work, no one bothered.

What about a course Wiki? Slightly off the beaten track from what I was originally thinking but it'd be a great tool for on-line feedback or discussion mechanisim that would also teach some of the fundamentals of how collaboration over the Internet can be a cool thing. There's two Wiki's under Fantastico and they're a great way to introduce people to being able to change things on remote servers without being confusing and daunting. Kind of a "first taste of web publishing" along with being able to provide feedback on the course.

Easy for students to use. Super easy for you to administer... gives a taste of on-line applications with an easy interface - just a thought.

[edwurster]

I installed Siteframe after trying a few things (including PHPWIKI.)

This works best, I think, because the layout is very simple. There are other themes, and a long list of administrative options to twiddle with, although not necessary.

ewurster.us/iteach

[TechWeasel]

Looks good - best of luck!

[stratplan]

It DOES look good! I'll see if it will do some learning tips for me for clients, but have to work on my setup architecture first.

Thanks for the exposure.

Dick

[edwurster]

Originally posted by stratplan
It DOES look good! I'll see if it will do some learning tips for me for clients, but have to work on my setup architecture first.

After using this for a few days, the two pluses are: it will broadcast an email to those who register, and it is basic in how it handles articles.

Trying to hit more than one need with this, and I think it will work for a while, as a sandbox.

As for learning tips, not sure about that. Read what the author is contemplating for the next release: next release .

With the present release, you can use folders, and perhaps that will get you to the starting gate.