Tina Pintar in Breda Poličar, Gimnazija Poljane, Ljubljana
Virtual classroom Moodle can be an efficient aid to the students with their self-directed learning. It is constantly available, students can adapt the pace of learning and thus they become more independent learners. At high school Poljane virtual classrooms have been in use for several years, yet they differ considerably and sometimes they serve more as a depository of learning material and not so much as a tool for self-directed learning. First, our teachers have been engaged in two European projects, ITEMS and MUST. They have acquired a broad knowledge and a lot of new ideas how to manage their virtual classrooms in order to help their students achieve their goals, namely – gain new knowledge. This is how virtual classrooms for Mathematics, Informatics, Chemistry, Geography and Visual arts have been created. Since teacher’s competence in virtual classroom management is essential, group of teachers, members of e-School Development Team, proposed a project of structured courses abroad. The ultimate goal was to spread the knowledge and increase the number of teachers using virtual classrooms. Student’s profit is the possibility to study at their own pace. The project proposed is an Erasmus+ project, entitled Creating virtual Poljane and spreading e-horizons, and it gives our teachers the possibility to gain new knowledge for creating learning materials, tasks and tests in the widespread virtual platform Moodle. It includes also the use of ICT tools (specially the use of the educational applications for mobile phones). Eighteen teachers of different subjects are in the process of learning about new teaching methods, which will efficiently enrich their teaching practice. Students, on the other hand, have been always responsible for their learning achievements, but by using these new technologies, this task is only made easier. A well prepared quiz is thus a great learning tool as well as a way to deepen the already acquired knowledge. Students get at every quiz attempt an immediate feedback on their knowledge. If a quiz of random generated parameters is used at Mathematics for example, students practice their knowledge until they master the task. At Visual arts memorising a huge quantity of visual material with field terminology is vital. To improve this skill such a quiz has proved to be really useful. Finally, a teacher can evaluate students’ work and progress by using the Moodle gradebook, (s)he can check their activity reports and analyse their answers. By doing this, a teacher knows perfectly well which tasks have been done many times, where mistakes are quite frequent and knowing all that (s)he can adapt her/his work in the classroom and explain again what needs to be explained. Moodle, self-directed learning, project USP.eH, Mathematics, Visual arts.
