Why ChatGPT has Educators Concerned
(I didn’t ask ChatGPT to write this for me.) Generative AI has educators worried. I am assuming you have heard enough to know what AI-based tools like ChatGPT can offer…
more…Real Analytics in a K-12 School
Previously I described a number of myths about analytics I saw circulating when I started working in the school sector after years in the tertiary education sector and the education-related…
more…Phishing Training for School Staff
Phishing attacks are a risk to our School and schools like it. They are difficult to mitigate using automated means, so user training is needed. There are two main types…
more…Plugins we have Developed for our School in Moodle
If we had used an off-the-shelf LMS, our potential to customise the system would have been limited. Part of the reason our School chose Moodle was to allow us to…
more…Our Course Roll-over Process
When setting up your Moodle site, you may want to consider how long courses will live and how you will “roll” them over, which means making them ready for a…
more…Implementing Moodle in a School
TL;DR – School specific bits Setting up user roles, including parentsThe plugins we useOur front page is a portalHow our site is organised Overview This post describes the technical details…
more…An LMS Transition Project
Since I arrived at Canberra Grammar School, an LMS transition seemed to be on the cards. Engagement with Blackboard, the incumbent system, was low and anecdotal reports suggested disatisfaction. A…
more…An EdTech Project Management Process for Schools
When I started as a leader responsible for Educational Technology projects in a school, I lacked a framework to work within. Having come from the software development world, I understood…
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Myths about Analytics in Schools
At recent school level (K-12) ed-tech conferences I’ve witnessed a larger than expected amount of fear-mongering, prognostication and exaggeration. There’s also been a great number of presentations about analytics, pronouncing…
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How electronic forms are changing the business of schools
When I was a student, the only way of requesting information from student families was by using paper notes. In many schools today, that is still the case and the…
more…Advice to IT Job Applicants
I recently posted about my experience organising recruiting for IT positions. I though I would follow this up with advice for those on the other end of the interview panel,…
more…Organising Selection for an IT Position
Over my career I’ve been involved in interviewing and selecting new staff for IT positions on numerous occasions. I’ve learned a few tricks along the way and I thought I should…
more…Learning Analytics – Where’s my data?
A while ago I wrote a blog about learning analytics from different perspectives giving examples of different analytics based tools that could benefit different users. Since then I’ve had discussions…
more…What makes a good research paper?
The submission deadline for the Moodle Research Conference (MRC2014) is approaching fast. I imagine many people around the world are feverishly preparing their submissions. Unlike most conferences, the MRC draws…
more…Agile development and Scrum in an open source project
I was asked by a teacher of software development if I could give an overview of how we use the Scrum Framework in a real-world, open source project, here at…
more…Incentives for Developers
How do you encourage developers to be more productive? A few months ago, I was intrigued by a presentation by Dan Pink, an American public speaker. Here is a version…
more…Open Technical Debt
What is technical debt? Technical debt is accumulated future work that has amassed as the result of decisions made during the development of software (or more generally during the development…
more…Analytics: getting helpful information out of an LMS
At the recent Australian Moot, a hot, emerging topic was “analytics”. Analytics have the potential to help students, teachers and institutions make better choices that lead to improved learning outcomes.…
more…The best Moodle extensions you might not have heard about
Update 3 July 2020: This post is showing its age. Most of the information contained here is now out of date. I’m leaving the post here so there is a…
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Michael de Raadt 