A COMPARISON AND EVALUATION OF CURRICULUM DESIGN TOOL OF OPEN SOURCE LEARNING MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS

1SHEETAL UPLENCHWAR, 2MANIMALA PURI

1Assistant Professor, Allana Institute of Management Sciences, Pune, 2 Director, Jayawant Shikshan Prasarak Mandal, Group of Institutes E-mail: [email protected], 2 [email protected]

Abstract - Online Learning is becoming an important tool to allow the flexibility and quality requested by learning process. In the recent past, a great number of open source learning management system (OSLMS) has been introduced in the market showing different characteristics and services. All these OSLMS reduces cost acquired by proprietary LMS. Market is occupied with large number of OSLMS. The main purpose of this study is to analyze and explore the right decision when choosing a suitable OSLMS platform to meet the requirements of education system. This study focuses on evaluation of curriculum design tool of seven OSLMS which includes , Atutor, Sakai, Ilias, Claroline, Olat and Dokeos.

Keywords - Learning management systems (LMS), Open-source learning management systems (OSLMS), Curriculum design, Instructional design, Universal instructional design

I. INTRODUCTION standards, although the SCORM standard is unfortunately not as widely supported. LMS have significant role in distance learning. Halls defines LMS as, “Software that automates PeterLengyel MiklosHerdon and Robert Szilagyil administration of training events” [1]. (2006) [4] have done the comparison amongst Atutor, In distance learning process OSLMS are widely used. Moodle and OLAT by considering various OSS extends education beyond the traditional parameters like support and compatibility to where learners build knowledge and standards, content development The study shows that understanding through collaborative exchanges. Moodle is at higher position supporting 13 features This paper evaluates seven OSLMS. Each OSLMS out of 14. Atutor and OLAT support 9 features. program is based on the ability to accommodate different active learning experiences in online Guzin Tirkes (2010) has [5] done the comparison courses. The selected OSLMS are Moodle, Atutor, amongst Atutor, Moodle and OLAT and Dokeos by Olat, Sakai, Ilias, Claroline, and Dokeos. considering support and compatibility, content This paper is organized as follows. Section 1 development and editing tool,. Result of their study is represents brief introduction of paper. In Section 2, shows that Moodle possesses all 17 features, Atutor literature review has been carried out. Section 3 and OLAT supports 12 features, whereas Dokeos shows base for the selection of LMS, need of support 15 features. comparison for selected LMS and general information about selected LMS. A comparative Barbar A.Lewis and Virginia M. MacEntee (2005) study of selected OSLMS is presented in Sections 4. [6] have evaluated WebCT, v.4.1; BlackBoard, v. 6.1; Section 5 displays results of the study. Section 6 Jones E-education; Educator; Angel; .LRN; McGraw represents conclusion of the study. Hill Pageout; Moodle; and e-College A. Study shows that amongst the proprietary LMS WebcCT is at II. LITERATURE REVIEW topmost position. Amongst OLSMS, DotLRN is at topmost position and Moodle is at second position. Jamil Ahmad Itmazi and Miguel Gea (2005) [2] have carried out paper surveys of 58 studies of comparison Selection of OSLMS and evaluation of OSLMS and proprietary system by With the help of result of past studies, the selected comparing functionality. Result of the study shows OSLMS are Moodle, Atutor, Olat, Sakai, Ilias, that WebCT is the mostly used proprietary LMS and Claroline, and Dokeos. Moodle is the mostly used OSLMS. Comparative study of OSLMS features Matjaz Kljun, Jernej Vicic, and Branko Kavsek OSLMS features are divided into category as learner (2007) [3] have reviewed 31 LMS comparison and tool, support tool and technical specification. Support evaluation papers. Comparison methods includes tool includes curriculum design tool, administration Feature comparison , Learning paths support, tool and course design tool having different features. SCORM specs, OSS compliance, The study reveals Following figure shows architectural design view of that present LMS development tries to catch up with curriculum design tool.

Proceedings of WRFER International Conference, 07th May, 2017, Pune, India 67 A Comparison and Evaluation of Curriculum Design Tool of Open Source Learning Management Systems So learning management system should follow Universal instructional design (UID) principles to deliver quality education to diverse crowd.  UID principle North Carolina State University have suggested 7 UID principles [21]  Equitable use: It includes content accessibility irrespective of location and timing of individual. [21] The table below shows 3 equitable use features related to Moodle, Atutor, Olat, Sakai, Ilias, Claroline and Dokeos. [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] [Refer Table 4 - Appendix A]

Figure 1: Architectural design view of curriculum design tool.  Flexibility in use It is necessary to provide course material in various III. CURRICULUM MANAGEMENT formats like mind map diagram, SCORM text, audio or in video format etc. Curriculum management focuses on designing course Mind map is a diagram. It is use to organize content, recording student attendance, incorporation information. It is built around single idea. [21, 22] of different types of teaching methods, assessment of The table below shows 6 flexibility in use features student, designing of syllabus, learning and teaching related to Moodle, Atutor, Olat, Sakai, Ilias, methods, conducting test, managing roles and Claroline, and Dokeos. permissions. [7] [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] [Refer Table 5 - Appendix A] The table below displays different curriculum  Simple and Intuitive Use management features of Moodle, Atutor, Olat, Graphical user interface will be effective only if it Dokeos, Ilias, Sakai, and Claroline. can be easy to understand. Understanding of GUI [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] Y indicates should not require any technical knowledge or skill, presence of feature and N indicates absence of any past experience. [21] feature. [Refer Table 1: Appendix A] From the table it can be observed all these 7 OSLMS are simple and intuitive to use.  Customized look and feel [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] [Refer Table 6 - Look and feel concept is often related with graphical Appendix A] user interface or GUI. Good looking GUI design  Perceptible Information includes elements like font, colors, layout, menus, Perceptible information is communication of buttons, boxes, and themes used. information in various formats. It includes changing The table below shows comparison of 13 customized font size and style of data. For e.g. - Screen look and feel features related to Moodle, Atutor, Olat, readers and text to speech. [21, 23] Sakai, Ilias, Claroline, and Dokeos. The table below shows 5 perceptible information [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] [Refer Table 2: features related to Moodle, Atutor, Olat, Sakai, Ilias, Appendix A] Claroline, and Dokeos.  Content Sharing [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] [Refer Table7 - LMS will be effective only if the content added in Appendix A] one learning object can be shared by another learning  Tolerance for error: object It is related to how easily a user recovers from The table below shows 5 content sharing features mistakes to avoid further loss. It helps user to perform related to Moodle, Atutor, Olat, Sakai, Ilias, the right task in right way. [21] Claroline, and Dokeos. The table below shows 4 tolerance of error features [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] [Refer table3 - related to Moodle, Atutor, Olat, Sakai, Ilias, Appendix A] Claroline, and Dokeos.  Instructional design and Instructional [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] Standard Compliance [Refer Table 8 - Appendix A] Instructional design is the organized procedure to  Technical and physical effort: design, develop and deliver course content or GUI should be designed in such a way that user has instructional materials. Instructional design is also to perform less number of steps to execute the task. called as designing curriculum with respect to [21]. education. [19] The table below shows 3 low physical effort features related to Moodle, Atutor, Olat, Sakai, Ilias, Claroline, and Dokeos.

Proceedings of WRFER International Conference, 07th May, 2017, Pune, India 68 A Comparison and Evaluation of Curriculum Design Tool of Open Source Learning Management Systems [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] [Refer Table 9 - REFERENCES Appendix A]  Community of learners and support [1] Hall B, “New technology definitions”, Study group: The objective behind LMS is to http://bandonhall.com/public/glossary/index.html, last accessed on 5th July 2014. provide education globally. So all these globally [2] Jamil Ahmad Itmazi and Miguel Gea, “Survey: Comparison catered students/learners and faculties need to be and evaluation studies of Learning Content Management interlinked, communicated with each other. [21] Systems”, IADIS International Conference on Applied computing 2005, ISBN: 972-99353-6-X. Links to support services: The site should provide [3] Matjaz Kljun, JernejVicic, and BrankoKavsek, “Evaluating link to various services like link to library services, Comparisons and Evaluations of Learning Management events, notices etc. Systems”, Proceedings of the ITI 2007 29th Int. Conf. on The table below shows 2 Community of learners and Information Technology Interfaces, June, 2007, ISBN: 953- support features related to Moodle, Atutor, Olat, 7138-10-0, pages 25-28 [4] PeterLengyel MiklosHerdon and Robert zilagyi, Sakai, Ilias, Claroline, and Dokeos. . “Comparison of Moodle and ATutor LMS’s”, summer [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] [Refer Table 10 - university on Information Technology in agriculture and rural Appendix A] development August 2006, pages-21-28, ISBN-963-87366-0- 7.  Instructional climate: [5] Guzin Tirkes, “Open Source Learning Management System It includes participation in discussion forums, blogs in E-learning and Moodle”, IEEE Educon Education posted Engineering Apr 2010, pages- 14-16, ISBN 978-1 4244- The table below shows 3 instructional climate 6571-2 [6] Barbara A. Lewis, Virginia M. MacEntee, “Learning features related to Moodle, Atutor, Olat, Sakai, Ilias, Management Systems Comparison”, Proceedings of the 2005 Claroline, and Dokeos. [21] Informing Science and IT Education Joint Conference [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] [Refer Table 11- Flagstaff, Arizona, USA – June 16-19. Appendix A] [7] Connell, B. R., Jones, M., Mace, R., Mueller, J., Mullick, A., Ostroff, (1997). “The principles of universal design”, last accessed on 15th March, 2016 1.4.1 Accessibility compliance [8] Atutor demo portal, “www.atutor.ca/atutor/demo.php”, last It includes navigation using short cut keys, screen accessed on 18th December 2014. reader, text to speech techniques etc. [9] Atutor documentation,” www.atutor.ca/atutor/docs/”, last accessed on 18th December 2014. The table below shows 3 accessibility compliance [10] Claroline documentation, features related to Moodle, Atutor, Olat, Sakai, Ilias, “http://www.siteground.com/tutorials/claroline/”, last Claroline, and Dokeos. accessed on 20th December 2014. [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] [Refer Table 12 - [11] Comparison of Moodle and Atutor, “http://skillspark.ca/info/ATutor_vs_Moodle.pdf”, last Appendix A] accessed on 20th December 2014. [12] Dokeos demo portal, RESULT “https://www.softaculous.com/demos/Dokeos”, last accessed th on 18 December 2014. [13] Dokeos documentation,” www.dokeos.com/documentation/”, Result of the above comparison and evaluation is last accessed on 19th December 2014. summarized in the table below. The table shows top 3 [14] Moodle documentation,” http://docs.moodle.org”, last OSLMS related to curriculum design and accessed on 20th December 2014. instructional design features. [Refer Table 13: [15] Olat demo portal, http://demo.olat.org/olat/auth”, last accessed on 25thDecember 2014. Appendix A] [16] Olat documentation,” http://www.olat.org/OLATDOCS/”, last accessed on 25th December 2014. CONCLUSION [17] Sakai demo portal,” www.testdrivesakai.com/”, last accessed th on 25 December 2014. [18] Sakai documentation, “http://sakaitutorials.unc.edu/”, last The summarized table shows that total 65 features are accessed on 19th December 2014. compared related to curriculum design tool. [19] “Instructional design definitions,”http://www.instructionaldesigncentral.com/htm/I th From the above table we can conclude that Moodle is DC_instructionaldesigndefinitions.htm, last accessed on 15 at 1st rank having 64 features. Sakai is at 2nd March, 2016 rd [20] “Instructional design glossary,” rank having 54 features. Ilias is at 3 rank having 51 http://www.instructionaldesign.org/glossary.html, last features. [Refer Table 14: Appendix A] accessed on 15th March 2016 [21] Connell, B. R., Jones, M., Mace, R., Mueller, J., Mullick, A., Ostroff, (1997). “The principles of universal design”, last accessed on 15th March, 2016 [22] “Mind mapping”, www.mindmapping.com/mind- map.php,last accessed on 21st March, 2016. [23] “Screen reader,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screen_reader, last accessed on 23rd march 2016.

Proceedings of WRFER International Conference, 07th May, 2017, Pune, India 69 A Comparison and Evaluation of Curriculum Design Tool of Open Source Learning Management Systems Appendix- A

Proceedings of WRFER International Conference, 07th May, 2017, Pune, India 70 A Comparison and Evaluation of Curriculum Design Tool of Open Source Learning Management Systems

Proceedings of WRFER International Conference, 07th May, 2017, Pune, India 71 A Comparison and Evaluation of Curriculum Design Tool of Open Source Learning Management Systems

Proceedings of WRFER International Conference, 07th May, 2017, Pune, India 72 A Comparison and Evaluation of Curriculum Design Tool of Open Source Learning Management Systems

(Note: Figures in bracket indicates total number of features available for that OSLMS)

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