As a dedicated educator constantly striving to enhance the learning experience, I have integrated a variety of custom design elements into my Moodle courses to simplify the creation process and engage students more effectively. My approach includes using design boxes for tips, questions, scenarios, warnings, and feedback, each thoughtfully paired with handcrafted avatars that serve as course moderators. These avatars are not just digital figures; they are drawn by hand to add personality and depth, representing a wide range of ethnic backgrounds such as Middle Eastern, Asian, Black, and White, as well as captivating animal characters. This artistic touch helps students form a personal connection to the course material, making the digital learning space more inviting and relatable.
To further aid in course organization and user-friendliness, I employ tags that categorize content by date and other criteria. To have my colleagues also use the designs, I made a contribution to the c4l Plugin from roger Segu. This integration allows me, and other educators, use the design directly in the tiny Editor in Moodle. The designs I’ve implemented are tested for accessibility to ensure they accommodate all students, including those with disabilities.
These enhancements are currently in use in Mebis, a large Moodle instance supporting over 2 million students and 400,000 teachers, proving their effectiveness and adaptability in diverse educational environments.
In sharing my course designs, I aim to help educators to explore the potential of custom elements in their own teaching practices, fostering environments that are not only educational but also engaging and inclusive. This abstract outlines my journey from wining the Moodle love competition to develop design elements and avatars for teachers to use into their Moodle courses.