Recently I met with staff from our university's IT Services who are undertaking a review of the university's enterprise systems, including the learning management system. We talked about the value of incorporating Web 2.0 tools within the LMS.
This got me thinking about what the lecturers we've spoken to during this project have had to say about Web 2.0 tools within learning management systems. Those who have used LMS wikis, blogs, etc., have talked about the poor usability of the tools - the word "clunky" comes up time and again. What is perhaps more interesting is that there are some who feel strongly that students would resist using social software that is packaged within an LMS. They believe that branding social technologies with a university logo would make them unappealing to students. There have also been suggestions that it would be inappropriate to contain social software within the virtual walls of the university: that it goes against the ideals of Web 2.0 and open publishing. On the other hand there are clearly administrative advantages to using LMS tools.
The connection between Web 2.0 software and LMS services is clearly of interest to the higher education community at the moment. An online seminar dedicated to the topic will be held in the US in late March. It will be interesting to see how Web 2.0 and LMS tools continue to converge in the near future and what impact this might have on the way Web 2.0 activities are incorporated into university education. Will it make it easier for lecturers to use Web 2.0 tools? Or will the question remain: do Web 2.0 tools really belong in learning management systems?
