Hi folks, On Tue, Feb 24, 2009 at 5:54 PM, Marshall Hampton <hampto...@gmail.com> wrote: > > I am interested in this too, although the way my university sets up > its moodle server I can't really hack it at all. I would be interested > on working on a concrete project - what is a simple goal to get > started?
I'll be working on a proof-of-concept integration with Moodle. For this, what I have in mind is that, say, one is managing a maths course and wants to create a set of self-tests for students to take as the course progresses. A self-test in this respect is meant to help students grasp concepts introduced in classes/lectures. So a "typical" test might contain a number of multiple choice questions---other types of questions are possible like multiple selection, free-form response, etc. but let's keep it simple for now. I know this can be done using HTML, PHP, MySQL without involving Moodle, but please bear with me for a moment, since I'm describing a simple prototype of a Sage/Moodle integration. OK, back to our typical multiple choice self-test. For concreteness, let say our test is on basic calculus, in particular differentiation. A multiple choice question on differentiation might ask a student to find the derivative of f(x) = x^3 + x, for example, and underneath the question is a choice of 4 possible answers, one of which is the (best/correct) answer. As a first direction into this Sage/Moodle integration, assume those questions are static, by which I mean that every student is presented with the *same* question and the *same* set of possible solutions. Then a basic, crude prototype here is to figure out how to get Moodle to communicate with Sage in order for Moodle to make use of Sage's maths capabilities. Let me explain further what I have in mind. Going back to our example of the function f(x) = x^3 + x, say the student is asked to find the derivative of f(x). A set of 4 multiple choice answers might be: Question 1 [ ] f' = 3x^2 + 1 [ ] f' = 3x^2 [ ] f' = x^2 + 1 [ ] f' = x^2 Say the student has answered all questions on a test and now submits the responses for grading. Upon submitting the answers, Moodle would then invoke Sage to verify the answers. In the case of "Question 1" above, Sage would compute the derivative of f(x), pass the computed answer back to Moodle so that Moodle can grade the test. These are some of my first thoughts on a crude Sage/Moodle integration. I've used Moodle in the past, but not as a course admin, so my knowledge of Moodle internals is next to nothing. However, I see this Sage/Moodle integration as a challenge I really want to tackle because other course management systems I've used in the past, either as an end user or as a course admin, have failed in some cases miserably for me. To be honest, I've very little idea on how this can be implemented so suggestions are always welcome. But in the end, I want to get across something that demonstrates that Sage and Moodle can talk with each other. -- Regards Minh Van Nguyen --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ To post to this group, send email to sage-devel@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to sage-devel-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel URLs: http://www.sagemath.org -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
