What
is a LMS?
A learning
management system (LMS)
is a software application for the administration, documentation,
tracking, reporting and delivery of electronic educational technology (also called e-learning) education courses or
training programs.
LMSs range from systems
for managing training and educational records to software for distributing online or blended/hybrid college courses over
the Internet with features for online collaboration. Colleges and universities
use LMSs to deliver online courses and augment on-campus courses. Corporate
training departments use LMSs to deliver online training, as well as to
automate record-keeping and employee registration.
LMS
is the backbone of most e-learning activities. LMSs are built on various
platforms, commonly PHP, .Net or Java and they will hook up to a database such
as PostgreSQL, MySQL or SQL Server. There are many LMSs out there, both
commercial and open source.
LMS Functionality
v Course Content Delivery
v Student Registration and Administration
v Training Event Management (i.e., scheduling,
tracking)
v Curriculum and Certification Management
v Skills and Competencies Management
v Skill Gap Analysis
v Individual Development Plan (IDP)
v Reporting
v Training Record Management
v Courseware Authoring
v Resource Management
v Virtual Organizations
v Performance Management System Integration
Easy
GUI
GUI
stands for Graphical User Interface. Most LMSs offer customization options for
the interface to allow the user to give a unique flavor to his learning
platform. Although the GUI is there to make the environment more aesthetically
pleasing, it’s also meant to be functional.
Customization
Aside
from the GUI an LMS will oftentimes offer several different options for
customization to tailor the system to your needs. Language options,
notification settings and other important features can be changed to suit the
way you want your LMS to work for you. This is great because one LMS can be
used by many different types of users, each with unique preferences.
Enrollment
The
system may allow students to enroll online and keep track of their details,
course progress and test results for you. It may also allow students to pay
their course fees online via credit card, debit card or PayPal.
Virtual
Classroom
Your
LMS may integrate with whiteboard systems for virtual classroom sessions and
help you to schedule sessions too. It may offer you the ability to send out
invites or reminders for classroom sessions and integrate with an online
calendar system or with Outlook.
Social
Networking
An
LMS may be able to integrate with social media so you can share your content or
news items via Twitter or Facebook etc. at the click of a button.
Communication
LMS
system should also have built in functionality for communicating with your
students, such as sending out a bulk email to everyone on a particular course,
to individual students or to students studying a particular pathway. You should
also be able to schedule automatic emails which can be very useful for
notifying students of an upcoming test or virtual classroom session. A LMS may
provide you with a chat room or a forum that you and your students can use.
Course
pathways
With
your LMS you should also be able to specify the details of a course with a
flexible work flow to set students on certain ‘learning pathways’.
Reports
Any
good LMS will have a reporting system you can tap into, generating reports that
you can export into Excel, and also offering you graphical representation of
your data for ease of understanding.
Help
with content creation
Being
user-friendly is more than just a phrase. It’s an action. When entering into
your LMS for the first time it’s good to have at least a sample of a course to
get you going. An example of how to upload, manage, and distribute content
within the system can go a long way with a new user. Templates are also good at
getting new users going.
Testing
Tests are an important part of many online courses and most
LMSs will have plenty of functionality related to this. You'll want a robust
test environment with various types of tests available to you and some built-in
templates to use as a starting point. It's likely that you'll have the ability
to randomize test questions and set a time limit for tests. With the test
environment being within your LMS, you should also be able to rely on the
security of your system. Test results will be stored and available to you
within the reporting area of your LMS. You should also be able to set up a
multiple choice test to be self-grading and choose to have the results
delivered just to you, or perhaps also displayed instantly on-screen for your
students.
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