What is Moodle?

Moodle is a learning environment specifically designed to enable instructional designers, students, teachers and trainers to create and manage flexible and rich online experiences. The name “Moodle” is an acronym for Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment. It is also a verb that describes enjoyable tinkering that leads to insight and creativity.

Unlike commercially licensed software with expensive recurring costs for licensing and user support, Moodle is based on open source architecture. This means that Moodle’s license and source code are freely available, making it possible for users to create customized features and functions. In fact, a large international developer community collaborates on the creation and sharing of applications, plug-ins, themes and modules.

Moodle runs without modification on multiple systems including Unix, Linux, Mac and Windows. It incorporates IMS, SCORM and other standards, thereby providing a high degree of interoperability. And it conforms to accessibility standards to accommodate students with special needs.

Since its original development in 1991, Moodle has grown to over 41,500 registered Moodle sites with over 18 million users worldwide, with its user and developer base increasing daily. Moodle has been adopted worldwide and is used for online course work and testing in all levels of the education community, including primary and high schools, colleges and universities, independent teachers, but also for workforce development and training for private companies and other corporate entities of all sizes, non-profit organizations, and both state and federal government agencies.

The Moodle Philosophy

Moodle was specifically developed around two approaches to learning: Constructivist Pedagogy and Social Constructionism. Its flexibility enables users to allow teaching and learning practices to drive the technology, rather than having to be conformed to it.

Constructivist pedagogy maintains that we create knowledge by interacting with our environment, associating new information with prior knowledge and experiences (remember the idea of “enjoyable tinkering” that leads to insight and creativity?).

The second approach is known as Social Constructionism. It supports the idea that learning is more powerful when we create something for others to experience.

The Moodle Community

Moodle’s international community of developers is large and diverse with over 400,000 registered users on the Moodle.org site alone. Moodle is now available in over 70 languages in 196 countries. The community draws upon contributions posted online, encourages debate and invites criticism.

The Moodle Experience

Moodle encourages interaction and exploration. Because of this, most learning experiences created in Moodle are non-linear as opposed to the typical commercial LMS with preset functionality and navigation. While Moodle does provide linear approaches for more simplistic teaching, their use diminishes the true attributes of the Moodle learning philosophy.

Moodle offers three distinct advantages, open source, educational philosophy, and a large active community. You may utilize them as little or as much as you wish. As the learning community continues to support Moodle, newer features and functions will continue to grow the learning application to new heights and usage growth.

Moving forward you will be hard pressed to find any commercial product with these key attributes. Take a test drive and register for a free online demo by clicking here and see for yourself why Moodle is the best option for your new learning management systems.