VLE 2.0

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VLE 2.0

• Martin Weller

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Outline

• Current VLE situation
• Succession
• Examples
• VLE 2.0
• Some questions

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Whats wrong with VLEs

• They are content focused
• They have no strong pedagogy
• They are based around a teacher-classroom model
• They combine a number of average tools, but not
  the best ones
• They do not feature a particular tool
• They operate on a lowest common denominator
  approach
• They do not meet the needs of different subject
  areas
• It is difficult to exchange content between them,
  despite claims to interoperability

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Current state of play

• OECD/OBHE 2004 survey in 13 countries
• All had VLE
• 37 have institution-wide VLE
• 90 expect to have single VLE in next 5 years
• 52 use commercial system
• Rest use combination of in-house and open source
• No institution had just OS
• 31 had portal
• 6.6 had CMS

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What is changing

• Open standards a dilemma for commercial VLEs?
• Convergence of functionality little to choose
  between commercial and open source options.
• Reliability of open source solutions
• The battle over patents

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Why have VLEs been adopted?

• Because they do not require big changes in
  practice
• A content management system requires
• Most content is available digitally
• Content is in appropriately sized chunks
• Reuse of material is encouraged
• E-learning plays a significant role in the
  overall educational strategy

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Plant succession
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Technology succession
technological environments are not merely
passive containers of people but are active
processes that reshape people and other
technologies alike (McLuhan 1962)
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Some examples

• UKOU SOA, with Moodle
• SUNY SOA with LAMS Portal
• NZ Open source - Moodle

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Web 2.0

• Both an approach and a set of technologies
• Web as platform
• Harnessing collective intelligence
• Evolutionary development
• Lightweight programming models

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VLE 2.0

• How would a VLE 2.0 be constructed?
• Service oriented
• Tools tested and released
• Standards based
• Unique/local configurations
• Incorporate external tools
• Pedagogy aware
• Personalised

• What does web 2.0 education feel like?
• Students as co-creators
• Reuse
• Less rigid boundaries
• Social

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Some questions

• Is a VLE 2.0 a VLE at all?
• What are the implications for support?
• What are the implications for teaching?
• What are the technical issues?
• How does it fit with portals, CMSs, etc?

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Known unknowns