I know you have been itching to learn how to add a newsfeed to your course and to finally understand what RSS stands for so you can impress all your friends. RSS is a geeky term standing for Really Simple Syndication (also referred to as Web feed, feed, or channel). What this means is that when you subscribe to a site on the Internet, the news is brought to you so that you spend less time looking for updated information in blogs, e-zines, news headlines, audio, or video. The short summary in the RSS includes publishing dates and a link to the source.
“Fantastic,” I hear you thinking! Before I take you through the steps on how to add it to your course, I need to give you a little more information.
Moodle enables you to bring feeds (information) to various activities in Moodle. You can use RSS with
For you to be able to use RSS, it needs to be enabled in the Administration block in the Server subsection. If you don't have administrative privileges, ask your system administrator to enable it. It will also have to be enabled in the Forum activity. When you're making this request, ask the administrator to enable administrative and teacher submitters in the Blocks section. If you need instructions on how to make these changes, see Chapter 13, which provides a brief rundown on many of the Moodle administrative tasks.
The RSS feeds block allows you to bring feeds to a block on the course front page. The block will automatically update to bring in the latest feeds. You can add one or more RSS feeds to your course front page. You create a list of the Web sites and then you can select from the list how many you want to arrive to your activity or course front page block at any one time. Site and course front pages are common places for an RSS feed block(s).
To set up an RSS feed block, follow these steps:
The Remote News Feed block appears, as shown in Figure 12-15.
Moodle takes you to the default page, Configuring a Remote RSS Feeds Block, shown in Figure 12-16.
Allowing for images and logos can eat up your Moodle space, which is particularly problematic if you're on a restricted space budget. I recommend leaving the default No if you need impressive negotiating skills to get more space for your course.
Moodle returns you to the course front page. You see the title of your newsfeed in the block.
Moodle takes you to the Configuring a Remote RSS Feeds Block page again, this time with the Manage All My Feeds tab selected, as shown in Figure 12-17.
Unless you get the privilege to add the feeds, which I strongly recommend, only the administrator has this privilege but can be easily changed to Administrator and Teacher. Bring your system administrator a soda and chocolate ask for this privilege.
Moodle confirms the addition and returns you to the Manage All My Feeds tab, where you can edit it and add another feed. (See Figure 12-19.)
Note that it will take a little time before the server refreshes, and you will see the new news feed in your newly created Remote News Feeds block.
If you set up a forum discussion around a specific learning goal topic, a debate, or a project, you and your learners may find it very useful to enable newsfeeds to be brought to the forum. Forum newsfeeds can generate further discussions and debates. Even though RSS is enabled, it also has to be enabled in the Site Administration block, located in the Modules subsection in Activities under Forum. When you enable RSS, the Forum Editing page includes an RSS section with two extra settings. If you already have RSS enabled for your activities, you don't have to worry about pleading with your system administrator.
To set up RSS in your forum, follow these steps:
If this is a new forum discussion, complete all the fields to set up the forum. See Chapter 8 for details on how to set up a forum.
Moodle returns to your course front page.
Click the new or updated forum, and Moodle takes you to it. Notice the RSS icon shown in Figure 12-21. Whenever you see this icon, a newsfeed is enabled for the activity.
You can add RSS to your glossary, wiki, and database by using a similar procedure as described in the Forum section. You don't have to enable filters in these modules as you have to in the Forum module. When RSS in enabled in your course, it's available to use in the modules.