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An evolving Learning ManagementSystem for new educationalenvironments using 2.0 toolsMiguel Á. Condea, Francisco J. García-Peñalvoa, María J.Rodríguez-Condea, Marc Alierb, María J. Casanyb & Jordi Piguillemb

a Computer Science Department, Science Education ResearchInstitute (IUCE), GRIAL Research Group, University of Salamanca,Salamanca, Spainb Services & Information Systems Engineering Department, UPC -Campus Nord, Building Omega, Barcelona, SpainPublished online: 03 Dec 2012.

To cite this article: Miguel Á. Conde, Francisco J. García-Peñalvo, María J. Rodríguez-Conde, MarcAlier, María J. Casany & Jordi Piguillem (2014) An evolving Learning Management System for neweducational environments using 2.0 tools, Interactive Learning Environments, 22:2, 188-204, DOI:10.1080/10494820.2012.745433

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10494820.2012.745433

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An evolving Learning Management System for new educational

environments using 2.0 tools

Miguel A. Condea*, Francisco J. Garcıa-Penalvoa, Marıa J. Rodrıguez-Condea,Marc Alierb, Marıa J. Casanyb and Jordi Piguillemb

aComputer Science Department, Science Education Research Institute (IUCE), GRIALResearch Group, University of Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain; bServices & Information SystemsEngineering Department, UPC - Campus Nord, Building Omega, Barcelona, Spain

(Received 19 January 2012; final version received 6 August 2012)

The tools used in learning processes are in a continuous state of flux. One of themost significant changes is the application of Information and Communicationstechnologies (ICTs) to educational contexts. This provides new possible ways tocarry out learning activities, new learning services, the possibility to use new kindsof contents and activities, etc. However, ICTs have not provided as manyadvantages as they were supposed to, so changes are necessary. In this context, anew set of tools, Web 2.0, offers a new way to understand the Web, in which theuser is the centre. Further, users can cooperate in order to define contents. Thisconcept is also applied in technology-mediated learning but there are importantproblems when one tries to integrate such tools and concepts with existingsystems. This paper explores the integration of these tools in traditional learningenvironments, the various possibilities and their advantages and drawbacks. Afterthat, an interoperability scenario is described and two experiences are presentedto show how 2.0 tools can be integrated in learning activities, and its effect ineducational process.

Keywords: Learning Management Systems evolution; Web 2.0; interoperability;learning tools; personal learning environments

1. Introduction

The introduction of Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) inlearning processes involves a shift in the set of tools used for learning purposes(Garcıa-Penalvo, 2008). These tools are not always suitable for the task to which theyare applied and they are not always used properly for a specific purpose (Chadwick,2001). Learners and teachers have used the media they can obtain in their context inorder to carry out learning activities and also to improve their results. They have gonefrom using books to using social networks and 2.0 tools by means of Internetapplications. These tools condition the way in which learning and teaching is carriedout and therefore they are one of the causes of changes in teaching practice.

Taking into account this learning evolution, the application of ICT was thoughtto be important, because it was going to provide new ways to improve learning,

*Corresponding author. Email: mconde@usal.es

� 2012 Taylor & Francis

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based on the use of the Internet and computers. However, it did not have theexpected success (Mott & Wiley, 2009; Trucano, 2005). The reasons for this include:(1) institutional resistance to change regarding the introduction of certaintechnologies in formal environments (Mott & Wiley, 2009; Piscitelli, Adaime, &Binder, 2010). (2) Trying to apply this technology even though it is not required orseen as a solution (Chadwick, 2001). (3) A need for digital literacy amongst teachersand students, many of whom are digital immigrants when the younger students arealready digital natives (Bennett, Maton, & Kervin, 2008; Prensky, 2001b). Thisimplies a confrontation and a gap that makes it difficult for them to take advantageof new technologies. (4) Additionally, the most representative ICT tool applied inlearning context, the Learning Management System (LMS), is focused on theinstitution and the course rather than on the learner, which means that they do notsatisfy one of the final learning stakeholders. This makes difficult to adopt and usesuch technologies (Downes, 2005; Mott & Wiley, 2009).

In order to address these problems, there is a trend related with technology-enhanced learning, focused on the personalization of learning, which states thatlearning institutions need to change their strategies. They must provide environ-ments that will be more adapted to the students and open to the inclusion of the newset of Web 2.0 tools, which are under the student’s control. The rationale for the shiftof this ‘‘locus of control’’ is that personalization can improve learning byempowering students to manage learning at their own pace (Attwell, 2007). Theycan do so with their own technology within the context of the activities of their dailylives, which are also managed by the same technologies.

The most important element in this new paradigm is the user, and a user that isgoing to participate in the learning process as a ‘‘prosumer’’, that is to say, not only aconsumer of learning contents but also a producer (Schaffert & Hilzensauer, 2008).She is going to use a set of tools that complements the institutional learningenvironments, often known as 2.0 tools. The Web 2.0 rises as a new way to use theWeb (and not as a technology), supported by a set of technological applicationsintended to facilitate cooperation between their users (Segaran, 2008).

There is a number of factors that contribute to the success of Web 2.0 tools, suchas the new role of the user, that participates as a content producer; tools that are notbound to a context, since they reside in the cloud; software that can be used as aservice in different environments; the cooperation with others to use and build theweb, etc. These factors are reflected when applying Web 2.0 tools in learningprocesses since it involves defining new communication styles, new roles, newlearning scenarios, and wide set of new learning activities, that is to say, new learningchallenges (SCOPEO, 2009). This does not mean, however, that all those factors arenecessarily made available. Through the use of 2.0 tools, learners begin to participateactively in classes using very different kinds of tools and devices, enabling pedagogicapproaches sometimes known as ‘‘eLearning 2.0’’ to be adopted (Downes, 2005).

Learning by using 2.0 tools has an enormous potential, as evidenced byexperiences such as those carried out by Jenkins (2006) or Downes (2005), and it isincreasingly expanding in different areas of education (De Pablos, 2007). However,despite all this potential, it is necessary to take into account several problems thathave appeared when using these tools: (1) improvisation in the use of 2.0 tools andthe customization of learning can lead to the wrong idea that learning should not beplanned. It is necessary to validate and evaluate the use of 2.0 tools in learningactivities (Suarez, 2008); (2) the possibility that students do not create products and

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prefer to copy and learn using very specific media (BECTA, 2008); (3) the difficultyto support 2.0 tools by LMS (Mott, 2010; Sclater, 2008); and (4) the inclusion of 2.0tools in learning processes is going to make bigger the gap between digital nativesand immigrants (Bennett et al., 2008; Prensky, 2001a, 2001b).

It is necessary to facilitate the use of 2.0 tools from institutional learningcontexts, and this can be achieved by changing the existing learning environments. Apossible way to do this is through the Personal Learning Environment (PLE).Personal Learning Environments facilitate the users’ learning process by allowingthem to use those tools they want and not binding them to an specific institutionalcontext or learning period (Adell & Castaneda, 2010) such as the traditional LMSdoes. A PLE is best understood as a concept, not a thing. As Wilson has remarked‘‘The PLE is not a piece of software. It is an environment where people, tools,communities and resources interact in a flexible way’’ (Wilson et al., 2007).

However, the introduction of a PLE does not suppose the demise of the LMS(Adell & Castaneda, 2010). Learning management symbols have been highlysuccessful in stimulating online engagement by teachers and learners and besidesthey are widely used, and large investments have been made on them (Sclater, 2008).The likely coexistence of LMSs and PLEs introduces a requirement for interopera-tion between the two. That is something necessary because if 2.0 tools are to be usedin learning activities through the use of PLE, the activity carried out with those toolsshould be taken into account in the institutional environments.

Wilson and others proposed three possible ways to integrate PLEs and LMSs(Wilson, Sharples, & Griffiths, 2008):

(1) PLEs and LMSs could exist in parallel, as formal and informal environmentsrespectively, without any interaction or integration of the activity thathappens in those contexts.

(2) One could open the LMSs through the inclusion of web services andinteroperability initiatives. This integration trend includes: iGoogle basedinitiatives (Casquero, Portillo, Ovelar, Romo, & Benito, 2008), socialnetworks connected with LMS (Torres, Edirisingha, & Mobbs, 2008), theLMS that offers support for implementations of interoperability specifica-tions (IMS-GLC, 2011), PLEs with specific communication protocols (vanHarmelen, 2006) or integration based on service-oriented architectures –SOA (Peret, Leroy, & Lepretre, 2010). There exist two main difficulties forthese initiatives are: institutional barriers to the opening of formalenvironments and the fact that those initiatives are focused on informationexportation and not on interaction exchange. That is to say, communicationis oriented in one direction, from the LMS towards the external tools;basically exchanging information about what happens on the platform andproviding no information or interaction back to the LMS.

(3) Integration of external tools into the LMS. In these initiatives, the user mightnot decide which tools she is going to use and they will be limited toinstitutional decisions. Some initiatives that can be included in this group are:LMSs defined for the integration of external tools (Booth & Clark, 2009),Google Wave Gadgets integrated into Moodle (Wilson, Sharples, Griffiths, &Popat, 2009), PLE introducing tools based on log analysis (Verpoorten,Glahn, Kravcik, Ternier, & Specht, 2009), initiatives based on toolintegration driven by learning design activities (de-la-Fuente-Valentın,

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Leony, Pardo, & Kloos, 2008), integration architectures (Alario-Hoyos &Wilson, 2010), etc. These initiatives pose several problems, such as:integration problems between tools, context integration difficulties, inflex-ibility for customization by the student, and so on. Those that best overcomethese problems are the ones that define a learning platform starting fromscratch or from a previous institutional development. This will greatly limitthe scope of use of the solution, which will be applied to a very specificcontext.

In order to carry out learning activities using 2.0 tools and also to take theminto account in the institutional environment, the third scenario of Wilson isconsidered. This is because in this way it is possible to integrate not onlyfunctionality but also the outcomes that the learner has achieved in 2.0 tools.There are several ways to implement this scenario but the problem is how toachieve this in a way in which the institutions must not change their LMS orinvest money to adapt them. This could be done without using interoperabilityspecifications or web services, but the LMS should provide support for externalactivities. Such type of solution has a lower cost of development and investmentbut represents a greater effort by the teacher, because she has to check in aspecific moment what the user has done in that external learning tool. This issomething that, depending on the tool applied (some but not all tools providemonitoring services) and on the number of students that participate, can be reallyhard work. This solution is described in (Conde, Garcıa-Penalvo, & Alier, 2011)through a possible interoperability scenario. In such scenario (that within thepaper is called ‘‘the interoperability scenario’’), interaction is the responsibility ofthe teacher. The user carries out activities in the PLE, the teacher checks theresults of the activities (which implies more work for the teacher) and measures itin the institutional context, i.e. using a Moodle external assignment. This scenariofacilitates that the user can define their PLE simply using different kind of toolsand services (Adell & Castaneda, 2010; Attwell, 2007; Downes, 2010), or byaggregating them in different kinds of spaces and representing them in differentways (Al-Zoube, 2009; de-la-Fuente-Valentın et al., 2008; Godwin-Jones, 2009;Martindale & Dowdy, 2010; Palmer, Sire, Bogdanov, Gillet, & Wild, 2009;Poldoja & Laanpere, 2009; Santos & Pedro, 2009; Torres et al., 2008; Tu,Blocher, & Gallagher, 2010; Wilson et al., 2009). Moreover, this solutionaddresses some of the four ICT problems described above. It tries to reduce theresistance to the change of institutions by facilitating the use of 2.0 tools fromthe institutional learning environments without any development cost; it allowsthe integration of informal, formal, and non-formal learning (because the learningthat takes place in 2.0 tools can be related with informal learning activities); andit helps customize learning because it facilitates the integration in learning systemsof tools more oriented to the user and not so focused on the institution.

Two different possibilities of the integration of 2.0 tools that employ this solutionwill be explored with two pilot experiences. The first one is related to use 2.0 tools toenrich the institutional learning environments providing ways to facilitate students’and teachers’ collaboration and also to open up communications in the course toparticipants who are neither members of the course nor the institution. The secondone considers the application of Web 2.0 tools to enrich the institutional learningtools and facilitates the evolution of the monolithic institutional learning

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environments, which means using such tools as a learning service that could beemployed from the LMS.

Both pilot experiences are presented in this paper. One of them is more focusedon the quantitative description of the improvements that this kind of tools provide inlearning activities and the other explores the validation of the scenario from thestudents’ and teachers’ perspectives. After the presentation of these experiences,some conclusions are provided.

2. Application of micro-blogging to enrich in the context of a Software Engineering

subject

In this section, one can see the description of an experience in which a 2.0 tool hasbeen applied to a University subject. Specifically, we describe the application ofmicro-blogging tools to enrich interaction during the course, combined with the useon an LMS and face-to-face class sessions. This is an example about how to gofarther than the simple use of the LMS through the use of 2.0 outside theinstitutional context. It requires that the activity performed in such tool is consideredby the institution, and this is something that should do the teacher. She has to gointo the informal context, check the student’s activity and evaluate her into the LMS.This section describes how the experience is carried out and what results areproduced.

2.1. The subject

The experience has taken place in an elective subject of Polytechnic University ofCatalonia. This subject is called ‘‘Social and Environmental Aspects of InformationTechnology (ASAI)’’. This topic could be chosen by students belonging to variousstudies, such as Degree in Informatics Engineering, Diploma in Computer Softwareand Diploma in Computer Systems. During the course, students consider theenvironmental and social effects, and the impact of information technology, itshistory and the legislation that affects it. At the same time, they should not overlookethical requirements and professional ethics. The generic character of the subjectmatter and the practical impossibility of addressing the field in its entirety also implythat students must be able to make critical readings of the diverse range of generaltexts used during the course. It comprises 7.5 credits (5 h of class each week in a 13or 14-week term). The sessions could be split as follows: 1 h for teacherpresentations, 2 h on computing history (student assignments) and 2 h on the‘‘social impact’’’’ of computing (student assignments). In addition to these sessions,and to complete the 7.5 credits, students have to perform some personal work. To doit, they can make use of the University Online Campus, called Atenea (based onMoodle); the use of Twitter (http://Twitter.com/) as a social work tool has beenproposed too.

The subject evaluation consists of: a final exam that represents the 40% of thefinal grade; several surveys and presentations that suppose the 30% ofthe final grade; and a 30% that is dedicated to other activities related to theparticipation of the student. In this case, active participation in Twitter supposesthat 30%.

In the following sections, the tool that has been applied to the subject isdescribed, as well as the results that the application generates.

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2.2. The tool to apply and the context

The 2.0 tool that has been used in this course is Twitter, a microblogging tool.Microblogging is a quite widespread activity that consists on the act of broadcastingshort, real-time messages. It is seen as an increasingly popular and socially acceptablemeans of information exchange (Grace, Zhao, & Boyd, 2010). This kind of activity isa smaller version of weblogs enriched with features for social networking (Bohringer,2009). It allows users posting short messages into their public microblog space, sub-scribing to other user’s spaces, listing messages related to a specific issue, and so on.The content of the users’ messages goes about their activities, opinions, and status;sharing news and opinions with interested readers; and seeking knowledge andexpertise in other public messages (Java, Song, Finin, & Tseng, 2007; Zhao &Rosson,2009).

There exist some previousworks that discuss the possibility to usemicroblogging asa learning tool (Ebner & Schiefner, 2008; Grosseck & Holotescu, 2009; Skiba, 2008;Ullrich et al., 2008). The aim of this experience is to take into account, from the LMS,the activity that occurs into amicroblogging tool included into a personal context; andin this specific case to evaluate the quantitative improvement it brings about.

In order to do this, during the course, some activities have used Twitter tocomment news related to Information Technologies. All the students’ tweets arecanalized through the hash-tag #asaifib (a word that begins with the # symbol and isused in each tweet related to a specific context or activity) and publications areshared with all people looking for that tag. Students are supposed to use the tag andto be subscribed to any messages that include it, so that all of them can see anymessages related to the subject. However, how can one analyze that information?How to measure it in the LMS? And how does the users’ learning improve by it?

2.3. The application and results

As commented above, learners of this subject have used Twitter and the hash-tag tocomment news, issues, and the face-to-face sessions related with the subject. Thissupposes a huge amount of information that the teacher should check first, to laterevaluate it in the LMS. In order to support that information management, it isnecessary to use an analysis tool. During this experience, we used Twapperkeeper,which has recently been included in Hootsuite (http://hootsuite.com). It generatesreports with statistical information about different aspects related to the activity insocial networks. In this case, the report will be based on students’ tweets containingthe hash-tag #asaifib.

With that statistical information and real students’ tweets, the teacher canevaluate the participation of the user and the quality of that participation. Thus, shecan assess student’s activity in the LMS. To do that, the teacher uses an offlineassignment in Moodle. This activity defines a space into the context of the LMS (theASAI course) in which the teacher is able to include the evaluation of an activity thatis not in the LMS.

Students tweet their opinion about different issues and news using Twitter (thatmay or may not be integrated in their PLE). The teacher should access the analysissystem (Hootsuite), check the activity of each student, analyze the quality of thetweets; and evaluate and provide feedback to the user through the offline activitydefined in Moodle. The student can review results and feedback through suchactivity. In this way, an easy integration of the LMS and the 2.0 tools is achieved.

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The results of Twitter application to the subject are as follows: 954 tweets weresent during the term in which the subject is carried out. There were 169 Twitter users,which shows that including Twitter in a subject does open it to other users, becausethe subject had only 46 students and 2 teachers, so other users were participating onit (amongst them, one can find several experts in issues related to the subject). Fromthose tweets, 80% (763) were made by 35% (57) of the Twitter users, somethingnormal because the users that have participated more during the course werestudents and teachers (a total of 48 users quite near to the 35% previouslycommented).

Regarding the improvement in the grades of the users using Twitter, one shouldlook at Figure 1. It shows the differences in grades between the students withoutTwitter (taking into account just the exam and the surveys that the student performs)and using it to supplement the subject (considering the exam, the surveys, and theTwitter activity). In this figure, one can see the grade in a 0–10 scale. Without usingTwitter there is one more failure and there are significantly worse grades than usingthe tool.

It is especially significant that for this specific experience and without a controlgroup, there is an improvement in the middle section grades. That is to say, grades inranges between 5–7 and 7–9 are better, while the grades of the best and the not verydiligent students have not changed. A more detailed distribution of grades in thoseintervals can be seen in the Table 1. It includes the number of students’ grades, theaverage grade of each interval and the total average grades, comparing the resultsbefore the application of Twitter and afterwards. It should be noted that the totalaverage grade was increased by almost 0.5 points. There are better average gradesalso in the intervals 7–9 and 9–10 (with a greater number of students after theapplication of Twitter). This shows that, in this specific experience, grades can beimproved using this tool.

The experiment presents a quantitative perspective of the use of 2.0 tools inlearning activities combined with the LMS. The gathered results allow us to validate‘‘the interoperability scenario’’ from a quantitative point of view, but it should alsobe checked through other experiments that include control groups, and in the

Figure 1. Grade differences between the students that use Twitter and those that do not useTwitter. There is a clear improvement of the grades especially in the section between 5 and 7,and 7 and 9.

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context of other subjects. It would be also interesting to consider it from a qualitativepoint of view.

3. The use of two Web 2.0 tools from a PLE to complement a subject

The previous section has described the application of a 2.0 tool to a subject during acourse and it has taken into account the results of that action. In this section, one cansee the results of the application of 2.0 tools (included in a PLE) to a differentsubject. Results are validated in a quantitative way from the perspective of studentsand teachers.

In this case, two tools have been represented as widgets and introduced in awidget container. This container provides users with a space in which they caninclude these tools and any others they use to learn (that is to say, this space is thePLE). In the LMS, both tools are applied in two specific activities. The idea is thatstudents can focalize their learning in a completely personal environment and thatthe teacher has knowledge about what students do with their 2.0 tools. In order to dothis, the teacher uses the LMS as the institutional space for the learning activity buthas also access to the activity of students in those 2.0 tools.

3.1. The subject

During the academic year 2011–2012, there began theAdaptationCourse to theDegreein Computer Science studies of the University of Salamanca. It appears in this year tofacilitate the adaptation to new learning programs derived from Bologna process tostudents in previousComputer Science learning programs. In the context of this course,there are different subjects and the experiment has been applied to the ‘‘ProjectManagement Subject’’. This subject studies Management Activities related withSoftware Engineering: SoftwareMeasurement, Effort and Cost Estimation, Planning,Risk Management, Quality Management, and Software Configuration. The subjectcomprises six credits (4.5 theoretical and 1.5 practical). These credits are distributed in20 face-to-face hours, 6 practical seminars, and 2 tutorial sessions, complemented withseveral hours of student personal work. The evaluation of the subject consists of a finalexam that supposes 40% of the final grade, several surveys, and tests that the usershould complete during the subject (20%) and a final project (the remaining 40%).

Sessions are supplemented using Moodle as a space to discuss issues related withthe subject, download documentation, submit surveys and works, and so on. But this

Table 1. Grade distribution using Twitter and without it. The table shows the number ofstudents with grades in each interval, the average grade of each interval and the total averagegrade before and after Twitter application to the subject.

Grades distribution before and after applying Twitter

Grades intervalsGrade without

TwitterGrade withTwitter

Average gradewithout Twitter

Average gradewith Twitter

Between 0 and 5 7 6 0.66 0.08Between 5 and 7 21 14 6.38 6.25Between 7 and 9 16 24 7.50 7.94Between 9 and 10 2 2 9.16 9.35Total 6.02 6.46

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space does not include some of the tools that the user employs to learn, such as Flickrand Wordpress. In the following section will be described how these tools areadapted to the subject.

3.2. The tool to apply and the context

As commented above, the Project Management subject makes use of Moodle tosupplement the learning activities. This platform does not include certain 2.0 toolsthat could be useful for the students learning and that they normally use.

Taking into account that the institutional environment is used during the course,it is not possible to incorporate new tools in an easy way, so the best integrationalternative could be previously mentioned ‘‘the interoperability scenario.’’ In thiscase, tools are presented as widgets and they are included in a widget container thatallows students to combine different tools they use to learn, the PLE. These widgetsare not integrated into the LMS but the activity that students carry out in them istaken into account from the institutional learning platforms. The students can carryout various activities in the PLE and later the teacher should be able to gather thatactivity and measure it from the platform.

Taking into account this possibility, first of all one must define the tools included.For this experience, the tools were Flickr (http://www.flickr.com) and Wordpress(http://wordpress.org). The first one is used because it allows the user to upload andshare photos with others, to use groups of photos with the same theme, and so on;and these functionalities can be exploited during the course. Wordpress is consideredbecause it is a way to allow students to show their opinion outside the institutionalenvironment.

Once defined, the tools should be used in activities along the course. In order todo that, the teacher defines one offline activity based on Flickr and another based onWordpress. The first one supposes that the students should upload a Gantt Diagram(with the distribution of the effort of a project) into a Flickr group defined for thesubject. In this way, all of the students and teachers subscribed to that group can seethe diagram. In the Wordpress activity, the students write their opinion in their blogsabout an effort estimation technique.

In order to carry out these activities, the students could access the above-mentionedtools using their web interface or through the widget container in which there is oneFlickr and oneWordpresswidget (Figure 2). Of course, there are other tools the studentcan use to learn. To implement those widgets, the W3C specification has been used(W3C, 2009), since this way it is possible to assure the portability of the solution. Thecontainer should be able to represent that kind of widgets and also as many others aspossible. The container that best fits this isApacheWookie (Incubating) that allows therepresentation of W3C widgets, Google Wave widgets and, by integrating ApacheShindig, Open social widgets (Wilson et al., 2008).

The activity that takes place in the tools is also accessible to the teacher using theFlickr and Wordpress web interface, so that the teacher can enter the 2.0 tools, checkthe activity, and evaluate it from the LMS.

3.3. The application and results

In order to validate quantitatively the experience that took place during the ProjectManagement Subject, a pilot experiment has been carried out. Specifically, all 40

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participants in the course have been involved. The methodology used to validate thesystem is a quasi-experimental design (Campbell & Stanley, 1963, 1970). Thismethodology is used because in this experiment, pre-established groups of students(class-groups) are used, so it is not possible to have a complete randomized group ofpeople (Dendaluce, 1994; Nieto & Necaman, 2010). Thus, experimental design is notapplicable.

Quasi-experimental design implies the definition of a hypothesis that is checkedusing an experimental group and a control one (independent variable). In bothgroups, the same tests are applied, a pre-test at the beginning of the experiment and apost-test after it. The students of the experimental group test the system (that is tosay they use the 2.0 tools in the PLE) while the people in the other group do not.After running the experiment, data are analyzed by using probabilistic techniques tovalidate the initial hypothesis.

The scientific hypothesis of this experiment would be ‘‘The possibility that thestudent can carry out activities using 2.0 web tools and said activity can be taken intoaccount into the institutional environment, helps to have a better knowledge aboutstudents’ skills and also to further their learning.’’ To test this hypothesis, someasserts have been proposed to the students and they have graded their agreementusing five value levels (1 ¼ Strongly disagree, 2 ¼ disagree, 3 ¼ indifferent, 4 ¼agree, 5 ¼ Strongly agree).

. In the pre-test:. I1. I use online 2.0 tools (such as Flickr, Wordpress, Wikipedia, Slideshare,

etc.) to support my learning and share information, resources, andopinions with other people.

. I2. In my opinion, the use of online 2.0 tools (such as Flickr, Wordpress,Wikipedia, Slideshare, Twitter, etc.) gives me other valid perspectives.

Figure 2. Flickr and Wordpress widgets. The figure shows a widget on the left side thatrepresents the Flickr tool and on the right side the Wordpress tool adaptation, these tools areused in Wookie Apache (Incubating) as the PLE.

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. In the post-test. I3. Learning platforms as Moodle do take into account what I do in other

contexts, such as sharing photos in Flickr and opinions in Wordpress.. I4. Moodle cannot access to what I do in the online 2.0 tools, so the

institution has no access to it.

The scientific hypothesis is accepted if the results of the pre-test are similar inboth groups (which prove that both groups are similar and have a commonknowledge and background) and the results of the post-test between the personsinvolved in the experimental group and the control group are different (those whohave tried the tool should answer in a different way). So we propose the followingnull hypothesis for both groups H0: mE ¼ mc. To check it, two statistical tests areapplied, Student’s T-test and the non-parametric Mann–Whitney U-test. The secondone is applied to further validate the results of the first, because the sample consistsof only 40 students, and this number is near to the limit for the application ofStudent’s T-test and also because the scale used to measure students’ perception isnot exact (it is an ordinal scale). The results of the first test can be seen in Table 2,with a signification of 0.05. If the signification of the item is below 0.05, the nullhypothesis is accepted, if not, it is rejected.

In Table 2, one can see that in both pre-test items, the null hypothesis is retained(that is, the experimental and control group answer more or less the same) and in thepost-test, the null hypothesis is rejected (the results between the experimental andcontrol group are different). These results are also endorsed by the Mann–WhyneyU-test (Table 3), so it can be affirmed that the scientific hypothesis is correct. That isto say, the students that have carried out the pilot experience consider that the

Table 3. The results of the Mann–Whitney U-test. The table shows the signification per eachitem of the pre-test and post-test.

DVpresent Signification Result

Pre-test results for Mann–Whitney U-testI.1 0.449 Retain null hypothesisI.2 0.930 Retain null hypothesis

Post-test results for Mann–Whitney U-testI.3 0.000 Reject null hypothesisI.4 0.000 Reject null hypothesis

Table 2. The results of the Student’s T-test. The table shows the medium and variance foreach item of the pre-test and post-test, the result and the bilateral signification.

DVpretest XE SXEXc SXc

t r

Pre-test results for Student’s T-testI.1 3.80 0.951 4.00 0.918 70.677 0.503I.2 4.20 0.894 4.15 1.040 0.163 0.871

Post-test results for Student’s T-testI.3 4.50 0.513 1.85 1.182 9.197 0.000I.4 1.65 0.587 4.15 1.040 79.362 0.000

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possibility to take into account what they have done in external 2.0 tools from theLMS as something useful for their learning. In addition, they also think that itfacilitates teachers and people in charge of such institutions to have a betterknowledge of the learners’ skills.

To support this conclusion, an opinion assertion about the experience was posedto the students of the experimental group. This assertion is: ‘‘I would like that theactivity that I carry out in Flickr, Wordpress or other 2.0 online tools was taken intoaccount into my institutional subjects.’’ Seventy-five per cent of the students agree orstrongly agree with the assertion, so with this, joined to the statistical results, it canbe concluded that in the opinion of the students involved in the experiment, thescenario is useful for them and the 2.0 tools should be considered in formalenvironments.

In order to take into account also the opinion of the teachers several semi-structured interviews have been carried out. On them, the system is presented to theteachers, they use it, and their opinion is recovered. The results are: (1) 100% of theteachers agree or strongly agree with the necessity to use other tools that thoseprovided by the LMS to teach the subjects; and (2) 70% of the teachers considersthat this evaluation can be difficult for them specially in groups with lot of students,because they have to use several contexts to evaluate them.

The conclusions obtained from these experiences allow the validation ofscenarios but always from the students’ and teachers’ perception; as a futurework, they should be checked in other contexts, with other kind of students, etc.

4. Conclusions

In the present paper, the idea of how to enhance the existing LMS by taking intoaccount the activity carried out by the students in external 2.0 tools is described.These 2.0 tools provide new possibilities to teachers and learners. Students are goingto use them from different environments in most of the cases outside of theinstitutional environments. This supposes that the integration of what happen insuch tools should be included into the LMS. In order to do this, there are severalexperiences, but taking into account the stiffness of the institutional learningplatforms, one needs a light integration scenario in which the teacher can carry outmost of the integration activities.

The chosen scenario has been implemented in two different subjects of twodifferent universities. These experiences consider different 2.0 tools and are evaluatedtaking into account different quantitative aspects (improvement in grades, andteachers’ and students’ perception).

From the Twitter experience, one can conclude that the application of 2.0 tools inlearning activities and its consideration from the LMS increase students’ motivation(as shown by the number of tweets during the experience) and this could lead to animprovement in their grades. It has been possible to see that this improvement ismore focused on the medium grades and produces an increment in the number ofstudents that pass the subject. It also improves students’ participation, i.e. while thestudents need a motivation to use forums, chats, or wikis included into the LMSsubjects, the use of other tools such as Twitter (commonly used by students)motivated them enough and gave place to the inclusion of lot of contributions intothe subject. From the experience is also possible to see that the students come intocontact with other people related with the subject issues (for example, experts),

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which will further their learning. These results show that for this specific experience,the use of Twitter is positive to enrich the existing LMS, because it motivates thestudents to participate in the subject and facilitates them to interact with expertpeople from outside of the institutional environment, which could lead to animprovement in their grades in the subject. That is to say, the use of this toolprovides another collaborative channel between the people involved in a subject andalso with people from outside the institution. In a future work, it would be useful tocompare these conclusions with a control group and carry out more experiences inother contexts and evaluate the experience from a qualitative perspective.

From the second experience, it has been possible to check that, in the opinion ofteachers and learners that have participated into the experience, it is useful to includethe activity carried by the students in 2.0 tools. In this way, the student carries outthe activities with tools not conditioned by the institution, out of a learning contextand can combine them with other tools she normally uses to learn in an informalway. In addition, such activities are considered by the institutions, which can obtainmore information that indicates whether students understood a concept. This canhelp them discover other learning necessities, to have knowledge of other students’skills, etc. In this way, it is possible to manage in a better way their learningnecessities. However ‘‘the integration scenario’’ implies too much work for teachers(especially in class groups with lot of students) so other possibilities ofinteroperability scenarios should be considered in a future work. Also in a futureresearch, it would be desirable to carry out other experiences to compare the resultsin less controlled learning contexts and with students from other levels (high school,secondary school, etc.).

With these two experiences, the final conclusion can be that using 2.0 tools students’activity can be applied from institutional context. This does not mean that such toolsshould be integrated into LMS, something that would change the context of the toolsand would constraint the use that students do of them. The idea is to facilitate carryingout external learning activities based on 2.0 Web tools in their personal learningenvironments in order to improve their learning. The teacher in LMS assesses theactivities by accessing the external 2.0 Web tool; in this way, it would be possible tohave more information about informal learning activities from the institution. In futureworks, other interoperability scenarios will be described that propose ways to facilitategathering information automatically from the PLE to the LMS.

Acknowledgements

This work is partially granted by the Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Trade of Spain (TSI-020302-2010-2 project), the Ministry of Education and Science of Spain (TIN2010-21695-C02project) and the Regional Government of Castilla and Leœn with the GR47 project.

Notes on contributors

Miguel A Conde studied Computer Science in Salamanca and now is a PhD candidate. From2002 to 2004, he was working in educational environment, teaching several courses related tocomputers. In 2004, he decided to begin working in software development environments andhe worked for GPM, a web development and multimedia company. In 2005, he began workingfor Clay Formacion International R&D department, where he was involved in differenteLearning projects. Now, he is researching at the University of Salamanca as a member ofGRIAL (Research Group in Interaction and eLearning – http://grial.usal.es) and also workingthere as a teacher. His PhD thesis is focused on the merging of informal, non-formal andformal environments. He has published more than 50 articles about eLearning.

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Francisco J. Garcıa-Penalvo holds a PhD in Computer Science (2000, University of Salamanca,Spain). He works as a professor in the Computer Science Department of the University ofSalamanca. Dr Garcıa is the GRIAL (research GRoup in InterAction and eLearning) head. Hismain research interests are eLearning, Computer & Education, Adaptive Systems, WebEngineering, Semantic Web, and Software Reuse. He was a member of the Technological andAcademic Committee of the White Book for Digital University 2010. He was Technology andInnovation Vice-Rector of the University of Salamanca from March 2007 to December 2009 andthe President of the Technical Committee of the SCOPEO observatory, an observatory foreLearning activity, innovation and trends, from its inception until December 2009. He has morethan 100 papers published in international journals and conferences.

Marıa J. Rodrıguez-Conde is University Senior Lecturer in Research and AssessmentMethodology in Education. At present, she is the director of the University Institute ofEducational Sciences, member of the Governing Council of the University of Salamanca andsecretary of the University Teaching Committee. She teaches Statistic Analysis of data in theEducation and Programme Assessment Methodology stream in the Pedagogy degree. She isteaching Master and Doctorate courses on Educational Research and Assessment (Universityof Salamanca, University of Cadiz, University of Cordoba and Pontifical University ofSalamanca). She has extensive experience in information analysis and eLearning, andauthored more than 50 researching papers in education and social sciences. She leads anddevelops research activities in several projects, including regional, national and international.

Marc Alier is PhD with Cum Laude, Sustainable Development PhD program of the UNESCOCHAIR in Sustainable development at UPC. Lecturer and researcher at UniversitatPolitecnica de Catalunya, Facultat d’Informatica de Barcelona. Leading the Services forUbiquitous Social Humanistic Information Technologies and Open Source (SUSHITOS) taskforce of the GESSI research group of the UPC. Since 2003, he has been doing research on ICTapplication in education, with special focus on the use and development of Free Open SourceSoftware. Since 2004, he has been actively participating in the Moodle community asdeveloper and researcher. Since 2005, he has been a member of the scientific committee of theSpanish Moodlemoot conference.

Marıa J. Casany is an engineer in computer science since 1996. From 1996 to 2004, she workedas project manager for the Catalan Institute of Technology and Ludoland. She taught at ESSIfrom 1999 to 2002. She has worked as a consultant at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunyasince 2008 and as a professor at the Universidad Politecnica de Catalunya since 2004. She hasa diploma of advanced studies in Computer Science and has published in various journals andinternational conferences.

Jordi Piguillem is a computer engineer since 2006 and holds a Masters degree in ComputerScience. He has a diploma of advanced studies in Computer Science and received a scholarshipfrom Google Summer of Code in 2008. He received the David Luque ICT innovation award.He is a developer of the official version of Moodle.

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