Friday, January 4

Facebook - Study Groups (LMS, Too!)

When we think of Search, we think of Google!

When we think of LMS, we think of Moodle!

When we think of Food, we think of Noodle?

Having a tough time getting everyone on the same page in your study group or group project (Yeah, especially in a formal LMS!)? Study Groups, a new Facebook application lets you quickly and easily collaborate with your classmates and plan out homework for your courses.

  • Create to-do lists and track who's responsible for what
  • Schedule and agree to meetings
  • Discuss the finer points of this week's assignment
  • Share notes and files in one place
  • Create a public Study Group to collect the thoughts and ideas of users around the world on a given subject

When we think of social networking, we think of Facebook! Not only is Facebook giving Google a tough time (Threat: Advertising Model and Revenue! Soon Search?), It might over time (sooner rather than later!) also evolve into a potential Learning Management System (LMS), or a Course Management System (CMS), as Moodle calls it! With so many innovative companies producing applications for Facebook, it would not surprise me if Facebook will enable users soon (functionality already there?) to create their own online courses (perhaps even Universities, but with a slight cost to it!), providing basically all the features (quiz, forum, wiki, blog, assignment, content management, announcement, course registration, etc.) that you usually find in LMS/CMS tools. Not only would it be free on the software side, it will require no cost on the hardware and hosting side, too. Yeah, we probably would not even need to register the students, because they would already be on Facebook. This is getting interesting :)

3 comments:

Cathy Garland said...

Your readers might be interested in an LMS that combines secure social networking called Scholar360. It has all the academic features that teachers need to educate and social networking features that students love. Best of all, it's secure.

http:/www.scholar360.com

Dave said...

Hi Zaid, I'm one of the creators of the Study Groups app. Thanks for the reference! Combining the ease of use and social networking features of Facebook with intuitive learning tools has proven to be quite effective. We've got some new functionality in the works that will help us continue on the path to a full-fledged LMS.

-Dave

ZaidLearn said...

Hi Dave,

Thanks for the update. So, my predictions are not so bad after all :)

I am looking forward to engage with the LMS evolution or revolution :)

Cheers

Zaid