Waffle Bytes

Here are the steps to import material from one Moodle Course into another.  Note: if you are moving an entire course’s content, make sure you have changed the course settings to include the same (or more) number of topical a reas as the course you are copying.  In the course you want the material in: -Go to the Admin Pane -> Import In the next window, select the course that contains the material you want to move from the “Courses I have taught” or the “Courses in the same category” Click on the “Use this course” button. In the next window, select the material you want to move by checking/unchecking boxes (if you are using most of the material, hit “All” to start with everything checked; if you are only moving a few items, hit “None” to start with nothing checked.)  You can take as much or as little as you want. At the bottom, select if you want the course files to be copied over. Then click on “Continue”.  Another screen will come up, hit “Continue” on that one as well. 

Often, finding good web resources are the hardest part of the job for an educator.  With all the demands on a teacher's time, who has time to spend searching?  If this is you, here are some resources you may found useful.  Please feel free to share with others! General- Crayola Interactive Coloring: http://www.crayola.com/coloring_application/ Free website from Crayola for coloring and printing pictures. ELA- Technology Tips for Poetry: http://www.thewritingsite.org/resources/technology/poetrysites.asp For all students: examples, links to some great resources, ideas for publication Math- nrich, Specialists in rich mathematics: http://nrich.maths.org/public/ “NRICH is a team of qualified teachers who are also practitioners in RICH mathematical thinking. This unique blend means that NRICH is ideally placed to offer advice and support to both teachers and learners of mathematics.” Science- Kinetic City:   http://www.kineticcity.

Often, finding good web resources are the hardest part of the job for an educator.  With all the demands on a teacher's time, who has time to spend searching?  If this is you, here are some resources you may found useful.  Please feel free to share with others! General- Google PDF Handouts with Screenshots: https://sites.google.com/site/mcccdtech/pdf-handouts-with-screenshots Many How-to Handouts on using Google developed for Maricopa Community College.  There is a link to editable versions of the handouts. ELA- 250+ Places for Free Books Online: 250+ http://www.techsupportalert.com/content/50-places-free-books-online 250+ .htm “This is a listing of 260 sites that legally offer free books (eBooks) for download or for online viewing.” Math- Johnnie’s Math Page:  http://jmathpage.com/ “Interactive math tools, math activities and math fun for kids and their teachers.” Science- Cells Alive: http://www.cellsalive.com/ View video,

When you are adding activities or resources on your Moodle site, you often have access to an HTML Editor toolbar such as the one pictured here: (If you do not see this toolbar, you are probably using a browser that does not support it. If you are able to, try using another browser such as Mozilla’s Firefox to see if you have access.) Let’s break the toolbar down a little and describe what you can do with it! The first couple are font formatting settings, allowing you to set the font type and size: The third one is a little less obvious, unless you have experience in working with HTML code. It uses some preset font formats that are set by the Moodle theme you are using. These presets might change any of the following, depending on which theme you use: -color of the font or the background behind the font -add a border around the font -bold or italicize font -text alignment -spacing after a return -font type & size Next are a few font formatting selections:

This week I've started cleaning up, organizing and deleting old documents as I have moved to a new laptop.  I ran across this sheet I created for teachers using Mac OSX; it turned out to be useful to a few colleagues so I thought I would share it here. Here are a couple screen shots of it: Link to file: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/13600278/MacShortcuts.pdf Feel free to use and to pass on to fellow Mac users :-)

This month we are going to look at some Moodle blocks you might find useful.  Today is about the Activities Block. Once you begin adding more items to your Moodle, it begins to grow in length, and students (and you) might be getting frustrated at the amount of scrolling they are doing.  Or you might reference Moodle activities in a handout.  Or you might have students who think about the material in a different way.  The Activities Block might be useful for dealing with these type of situations.  To add the Activities Block, Turn editing on and select Activities from the Add Block area: A new side block will appear with the types of activities found on your Moodle Course: Clicking on one of the activities will result in a list of all the activities of that type on the course. (Here is a partial list of links on my sample site): You will notice that the Topic in which the item resides is displayed with the name; the summary will also be displayed if you write summarie

Often, finding good web resources are the hardest part of the job for an educator.  With all the demands on a teacher's time, who has time to spend searching?  If this is you, here are some resources you may found useful.  Please feel free to share with others! General- Information Literacy : http://novemberlearning.com/resources/information-literacy-resources Great resource for testing and improving your own information literacy, and provides resources to help you teach it to your students.  Many of the tips can easily be shared with students within a research project you are already doing without requiring additional teaching time. ELA- Technology Tips for Poetry : http://www.thewritingsite.org/resources/technology/poetrysites.asp Useful sites and tips for incorporating technology into learning poetry. Math - nrich, Specialists in rich mathematics: http://nrich.maths.org/public/index.php Site has activities, puzzles and questions to help promo

My latest project has been creating a Moodle Help 101 course on our Moodle server.  With so many of our local school districts converting to Moodle, I find that it is nice to have one site to store documents, links and videos.  I'm sure it will quickly become overwhelming, but at least here at the start it is manageable! Site: http://onlinelearning.calhounisd.org/cisd/course/view.php?id=69 For the sake of clarity: the topics are organized by how particular features are (or will be) leveled at county-wide training.  As you can see, the Introduction topic is for Moodle orientation and helping users to add resources to a course; a majority of the Introduction material is already loaded onto the site.  We are using Basic, Expanded and Advanced to classify all remaining Moodle modules, add-ons, tricks and anything else you can think of.  These will be added in as the trainings happen in the next couple months. Please note the creative-commons licensing points out that it is void o