Moodle 2.1 - Changes, New Features and Enhancements

Moodle 2.1 offers a new set of features, plus changes to the behavior of some tools. If you are interested in learning how any particular tool will change, or have questions about the upgrade process, please write to mccm@lclark.edu.

Changes

Navigation & Settings

The Navigation and Settings blocks have been completely revised. They are now added to every single page in Moodle and they display links based on the content shown.

Blocks

Blocks can now be added to any page in a Moodle course. They can be placed on the side of the screen (if the theme supports it) via the Dock icons. The “docked” blocks appear as horizontal tabs along the left side of the web page.

File Management interface and functionality

Moodle 2.1 will offer a new “File picker” interface that offers the option to select files from outside repositories. The new way of file handling suggests that files should be associated contextually with the resource or activity, and not with the course as a whole. Because of that, users may need to revise their business practices and make a decision upfront of whether to link to the files from a repository, or copy them into the context of the activity or resource.

New Text Editor

The WYSIWYG editor has been replaced with a more robust version.

New Enrollment interface

The Enrollment interface (Assign roles in 1.9) has a new look, but functionality will remain the same.

New question engine

• Moodle question system has been rewritten to make it much more robust and to support lots of new possible functionality.
• See summary of changes at the New question engine page and more details in the tracker MDL-20636.
• Warning: This change requires a major database upgrade.
• Backward compatibility warning: Random short-answer matching question type was moved out of the main Moodle distribution

New features

Completion Tracking

“Completion Tracking” enables instructors and students to automatically or manually mark an activity or resource completed based on certain conditions, such as activity view, grade achieved, number of posts, etc.

Conditional Activities (“Restrict Access”)

Instructors and Moodle Course Admins can restrict the availability of any activity according to certain conditions such as dates, grade obtained, or activity completion status.

Course Completion

“Course Completion” allows for a course to be marked as finished, either manually or automatically according to specified criteria.

Comments block

The Comments block can be added to the individual pages, therefore, users can leave public comments/notes about page content.  This allows commenting on Moodle Blogs.

Portfolios

Students can export their own entries/submissions/posts to external systems or download them locally. Activities that support export of entries include assignments, chats, databases, forums, and glossaries.

Enhancements

User Blogs

Blogs now allow comments from other users. Users can automatically import entries from external blog systems into their Moodle user blog.

Course Blogs

Instructors can add course blogs by adding a forum activity and selecting “Standard forum displayed in a blog-like format” type.

Messaging

The messaging system has been revised and improved. Users can now choose preferred notification method (email, chat, pop-up) for a variety of events (private messages, forum posts, quiz submissions, etc).

Filters

Instructors can now decide whether or not to enable automatic text filters on the level of the individual resource or activity.

Wiki

The Wiki module has been re-written and offers better functionality and improved interface.

Quiz/Question bank

“Quiz” offers improved navigation for students with the option to flag questions being answered. Instructors can now provide different release dates, number of attempts, time limits for individual students or for a group. The Quiz editing interface has been redesigned, along with the reporting capabilities.

 

There are a number of YouTube videos introducing Moodle 2.0 features.  This playlist can be found at   http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=5F39867B1037BA89.