56 knowledge to being an influencer and role model of class, connecting with
students in a personal way that addresses their own learning needs, and moderating discussions and activities in a way that collectively leads students
towards the learning goals of the class
.
Moodle is useful software for e-learning which is very beneficial for both teacher and student. Moodle is free to download, change, share, improve and
customize to whatever the teachers want it be. It is easy to be used and modified based on the purpose of the learning. It was designed to help teachers and students
with various features and interesting facilities. It provides document sharing, assessment, quiz, survey, polling, learning activity record, search engine, and
content based hyper multimedia. Moodle is also supported by 83 language packs, including Indonesian. Moodle is widely used, domestically and globally because it
is the largest community of users around the globe for distance learning software Dvorak, 2011: 12. Moodle is available in some free hosts in the Internet so that
teachers can choose the theme and then create learning model from it.
2.1.7.2 Features of Moodle
Moodle has been used by lots of educators because it is equipped with various features to build up a course such as resources, assignments, chats, forums
and quizzes. Moodles modular construction can be extended by creating plugins for specific new functionality. Moodles infrastructure supports many types of
plug-ins such as resource types, activities, data field types, graphical themes, authentication methods can require username and password accessibility,
57 enrollment methods, and content filters. Moodle users can use PHP to write and
contribute new modules. Teachers can put any kinds of learning materials in the form of Microsoft Word document, Power Point files, Flash animation and others.
In Moodle, teachers can drag favorite teaching resources straight onto the page and search for and embed multimedia. Teachers can get the students working and
learning together in forum, wiki, and glossary. In evaluating the learning, teachers can assess the students and feedback with self-grading quizzes. Here are
some of the features offered by Moodle:
1. Resources and Activities Resources and Activities are two unique utilities, each providing you with a
different set of tools to help add content and interactive modules to your course Dvorak, 2011: 60.
Figure 2.4 Resource Features in www.iceportal.tk
by Siska 2013
58 Figure 2.4 presents the interface of Resource feature in Moodle. The
Resources in this site allow the teacher to add content to the course in various forms. They can link to the Internet, or upload files such as PDFs, Word
documents, PowerPoint files, videos, and audio files. There are separate drop- down lists in each of the courses sections for Resources and Activities. There are
some features which are offered in this section, such as Assignments, Chat, Database, Froum, Glossary, Lesson, and Quiz.Figure 2.5 shows the interface of
Activities feature in Moodle.
Figure 2.5 Activity Features in www.iceportal.tk
by Siska 2013
59 2. Assignments and Quizzes
In this section, teachers can choose and specify the question types such as True and False, Matching, Multiple Choice, Short Answer and Essay. Teachers
can also manage the submission date. The assignments and quizzes can be done online or offline. Students can directly do the assignment online and check their
grades directly. Besides, students can also download and upload the files to do the assignments. Teachers can give the grade, comments or feedback to the
students‟ work.
Figure 2.6 Assignments and Quiz Setting Page in www.iceportal.tk
by Siska 2013
Figure 2.6 shows the interface of Quiz feature in Moodle. The type of the quiz shown in the figure is a multiple choice question.
60 3. Forum
This is an interesting and communicative activity offered by Moodle. This feature accommodates the discussions between teacher and students. There are
two kinds of forums; they are the general forum and the learning forum. The general forum is an open forum for anyone who wants to share hisher opinion
about certain topic.
Figure 2.7 Forum Setting Page in www.iceportal.tk
by Siska 2013
The learning forum is the students‟ forum where the students can state their response to a question posed by the teacher or peers. There is a variety of formats
for this feature, such as NewsAnnouncement forum and General Forums. The news or announcement forum is used by the teachers to post messages for
61 announcements only to everyone on the course and students cannot reply to these
messages. General Forums can be named as anything because there is no limit to
the number of forums which can be in a course. This type of forum is for discussion with the teachers and between students. Figure 2.7 shows the interface
of Forum feature in Moodle. The teacher uploaded the announcement about the final project to the students.
4. Chats
This feature is a real-time synchronous discussion offered by Moodle instant messages which enable the students communicate with teachers directly.
This is an interesting way to make the students and the teacher keep in touch each other and discussed certain topic. Figure 2.8 below shows the icon of the Yahoo
Mesenger and Facebook icons to connect the teacher and the students in popular
social media.
Figure 2.8 Chat Setting Page in www.iceportal.tk
by Siska 2013
62
2.1.8 Learning Model
