Using Adobe Presenter 8 with Moodle

This semester I have had the opportunity to teach an online class for one student that needed the course to graduate. Fortunately for me, I have had access to Adobe Presenter 8 and Moodle to teach and thought that it would be a great way for me to deliver the course to my student. We are now half way through the semester and using these tools has made it easy for me to deliver learning modules to my student that he is able to work through. The beauty of using Adobe Presenter 8 is that I have plenty of PowerPoint presentations that I have done over the years which I have been able to convert to learning modules. Having access to the features found in Adobe Presenter 8 has allowed me to add video, audio as well as quizzes to my modules which really has enhanced the learning experience for my student. Adobe Presenter 8 is great at wrapping up your PowerPoint presentation and delivering them as a stand alone eLearning asset.

One of the features that has really worked well for me using Adobe Presenter 8 is the ability to create a SCORM (Sharable Content Object Reference Model)  compatible course from my PowerPoint presentations that I can then upload to Moodle. Using the Quiz feature found within Adobe Presenter 8, I am able to create a variety of different types of questions that allows me to assess what the student has learned during the session. It also provides a valuable way for my students to receive feedback after they have worked through the module. Creating the SCORM compatible file from your course is a cinch when using Adobe Presenter 8 which makes it really easy to upload to Moodle. From within the Quiz Manager select the Reporting tab and simply select the SCORM option. Now you simply have to Publish your course from within Presenter 8 and save the course using the Zip package format.

Now that you have saved the course in the zip package format it is time to upload it to your Moodle course. First select the week that you would like your students to have access to the learning module and from the drop down select SCORM activity. Upload your course that you saved in the zip format to Moodle and you are done. If you like you can customize and control how many times the students can attempt the course. That's all you need to do. Now when your students access the course and take the quiz Moodle will report the students score to you and whether they passed or not. Using Adobe Presenter 8 along with Moodle has been a really fantastic experience and has allowed me to quickly create courses and provide a way for my student to receive immediate feedback. As a professor, I am always looking for new ways to efficiently develop eLearning materials and using Adobe Presenter 8 really foots the bill!

How Has a Shift to Mobile Platforms Impacted on Your Use of MindMapping Applications?

Over the last couple of months I have been pondering and reflecting on the use of my mind mapping tools and how to best integrate them into my mobile lifestyle. More and more, I find that I am accessing my iPhone and iPad and need to have access to my mind maps for projects, to-do lists and brainstorming sessions. While I still rely on my desktop applications for doing the critical creation of my mind maps, I want to be able to access the information on my mobile devices wherever I am. Several years ago, I moved a lot of my mind maps to the web using Comapping, which I have used to teach my graduate courses. Comapping produces great embedding code and works wonderfully within Moodle. My students get the benefits of a prepared visual agenda-complete with links and file attachments which are easy to navigate. The only flaw in using Comapping at this time, is that it is Flash based and can't be accessed using an iOS device.

Looking at the options, I now needed to evaluate mind mapping tools that would give me the flexibility of being able to create them on my computer but have the capability to view them on my iPhone and iPad. Being a long time Mindjet MindManger user, I can use the desktop version for the mind mapping creation and upload it to my free Connect account which can be accessed from any iOS device with the Mindjet app. This is a new workflow for me but so far so good. My MindManager maps are stored on line and can be quickly accessed via my iPhone. Likewise, I can also choose to save my mind maps from my computer to my Dropbox account which is tightly integrated with the Mindjet app on my iPhone and iPad. One of the nice advantages of use the Mindjet Connect account with my iOS apps is that the maps are always synchronized and I don't have to be concerned if I am working on the latest version. In a pinch I can also access my Mindjet Connect account from any computer connected to the web and create mind maps which I can than access from my iPad or iPhone-which is really great!

I have also revisited MindMeister which I had used for a time several years ago and am very pleased with the features and the fact that it is web based and I can access my maps from my iOS devices. Unlike, MindManager, MindMesiter is all web based which gives me added flexibility of being able to create and access my mind maps with a browser and a connection to the web. With MindMeister, I can attach files and links which makes it a wonderful digital repository for my work. MindMeister creates a graphically rich mind map which can be embellished with icons and images to jazz it up. One of the really nice features of MindMeister is the ability to create embedding code which makes it easy to share out my maps-and works well in Moodle. Using the MindMeister app I can access my maps from any iOS device which has proven to be really helpful on several occasions.




Based on my workflow-I still tend to do more creation of my mind maps using a laptop computer which is just fine- but having access to the information and my files on the road from my iPhone or iPad is really indispensable. As developers of mind mapping application begin to think through their strategies for future product development  they need to enter into the formula ways for users to access their information from mobile devices. I trust that some of the leaders in the mind mapping space will announce apps shortly that will give end users more choices so that they don't have to leave their maps trapped on the island of their desktop or laptop.  As always, I'm interested in learning how the mobile platforms have impacted on your mind mapping workflow.

PS: I have just begun to utilize MindGenius and the MindGenius app on my iPad and will share my experiences in the next week or so.

Integrating Livescribe Pencasts with Moodle

Tonight, I was teaching my graduate course and we covered different strategies that can be employed for students note taking. We spoke about outlining, mind mapping, and giving students partially filled in materials to help them with note taking skills. This lead me into a demonstration of marrying the Cornell Note Taking Method with the Livescribe Smartpen. I divided the page in my Livescribe notebook into the necessary columns and explained to my students how this could be used in the classroom to help students record the main ideas of the lecture. With the Livescribe Pulse pen I was able to demonstrate how a student could easily review the material that was recorded and how teachers could use the pen to embed the notes in a Learning Management System. At the college we are presently using Moodle as our Learning Management System and wanted to show my students how we could deliver the notes on the web using the Livescribe technology.

To get started I had my student take some short notes on the page and I sent the page to My Livescribe account. Once the page was successfully uploaded to my Livescribe account I made it public and clicked on the option to copy the Embed Code. Once I copied the Embed Code I went back to Moodle and using the Create A Web Page option - pasted the embed code and voila the page could now be played within my Moodle course for all of my students to see and listen to. Using this technique it is possible to embed Livescribe notes to wiki's as well as blogs. Livescribe makes sharing your notes a cinch and if you choose to you can view your notes on an iPhone or iPad using the Pencast app. So give these techniques a try and let me know how they work for you. Your students will be glad you did.

AT Class p. 1
brought to you by Livescribe

PersonalBrain 6 and Moodle Perfect Together

Over the years I have been a big fan of the PersonalBrain and having used the PersonalBrain 6 Beta Release, I am really impressed with the feature set and the direction of the product. I  have used the PersonalBrain as a way to store and easily find information that is important in the work that I do in the field of assistive and educational technology. The PersonalBrain is a great way to visually store information and see the relationships of the data and thoughts that are embedded in your brain. I particularly like the fact that the PersonalBrain is a flexible tool and one that never locks you into a corner. If you want to keep your PersonalBrain structured by all means do so, but if you want less structure just feel free to drop information into your brain and everything is automatically indexed. Using the Search feature or the Advanced Reporting feature allows you to have the information you need at the tip of your fingers.

The PersonalBrain 6 is very tightly integrated with the WebBrain making it very easy to synchronize your brains to the web and back them up. I was particularly interested in the embedding function since my college is in the process of moving our Learning Management System over to Moodle. The question I had, would it be possible to embed one of my brains into Moodle so that students could visually search the database and use it as part of one of me courses? One of the things that I really like about Moodle is how it handles embedding code. I have successfully pasted embedding code from other sources and was able to render videos and flash objects without a hitch. I decided to see how well the embedding code worked and if I could integrate a Webbrain into one of my Moodle courses. This was a lot easier to do than you would think and within minutes I had my Webbrain working with my Moodle course.

I'm sure you want to know how I did it so here are the steps.

1. Log into your account at WeBbrain.com and open the brain you would like to embed.
2. Click on the Share icon on the top right of the Webbrain screen.
3. Copy the Embedding Code from the dialog box
4. Open your course in Moodle and Click on Compose a Webpage
5. Name the Resource and then Click on the icon <> Toogle HTML Source in the Compose a Web page section and past the embedding code
6. Save the page and watch how your WeBbrain is automatically rendered

Once you get the steps down there is no telling what you can do and how you can use PersonalBrain 6 to enliven your courses using Moodle.This is a wonderful way for me to share information and I for one know that I will take advantage of this synergy when using Moodle in the courses that I teach.Here is a sample brain for you to look at.