Nepuga and Fapuga Attend Moodle Moot Brasil 2023

On April 26, 27 and 28, members from various departments of Nepuga/FAPUGA attended the 23rd edition of Moodle Moot Brasil in São Paulo-SP. The event, held in several countries, is aimed at the educational community, users and developers of the Moodle platform, the LMS (Learning Management System) used in thousands of educational institutions around the world.

Staff from the Marketing, IT, People Management, Registrar and Pedagogical departments of Nepuga/FAPUGA were selected for the conference. Over the 3 days of immersion, they focused on finding improvements to the current teaching system and virtual environment, as well as refining processes underway since last semester.

After two years held remotely, in 2023 Moodle Moot Brasil returned to an in-person format. Bringing together more than 250 people at the Mackenzie-SP campus, the audience was made up of representatives of educational institutions from several Brazilian states.

Moodle: The World's Most Popular Learning Platform

Moodle is open-source LMS software, meaning the Learning Management System allows partners and developers in the community to contribute to building customized solutions, suggesting feature improvements and building new plugins.

During the event, speakers from the company itself, partners and guests from the Moodle community shared insights with participants and reinforced the importance of gamification and interactive content, especially for courses in the distance learning (EAD) format.

All the activities were designed for a very select audience: the Moodle Community. That is what the platform's users (students, teachers and institutions) are called, and during the event participants were able to ask questions, get support and even have live consulting sessions to arrive at the best solution.

There was plenty of time for questions, and a learning atmosphere took hold of the participants, who interacted with the speakers and with each other, generating new ideas that were listened to attentively by the platform's developers . 

The Nepuga/FAPUGA team was not left out, and had the chance to ask questions about some of the platform's features, learn about the best plugins already available, evaluate the Moodle app and discuss tips for gamifying the Moodle virtual environment.

Gamification of the Nepuga/FAPUGA Moodle

Gamification is a technique that has been used more and more in virtual learning environments. This strategy consists of turning game elements into teaching tools, with the goal of increasing students' motivation and engagement in the learning process. By adopting gamification in the undergraduate and postgraduate virtual environment, Nepuga/FAPUGA aims to create challenges, virtual and physical rewards, rankings, interactive video lessons and other mechanics that encourage students to dedicate themselves more to their studies and to interact with the content more actively.

“Taking part in Moodle Moot was an enriching experience for deepening knowledge of gamification and how to apply it in the Study Portal. The importance of training teachers and students to use the platform efficiently was highlighted, in order to improve teaching and learning and bring students closer to the institution. Strategies for creating interactivity in Moodle were also presented, such as activities, rewards and motivational messages,” says Ana Luiza di Santo, Supervisor of Nepuga's Pedagogical Department, who attended the conference.

Since 2022, Nepuga has been adding features to create a more engaging and enjoyable learning experience. Now, with the ideas presented at Moodle Moot 2023, the intention is to speed up the development of gamification within the student portal even further, improving students' level of discipline and motivation.

Development of New Features in the Nepuga/FAPUGA Moodle

Adding to the learning experience at Nepuga/FAPUGA, the institution has been working on developing new Moodle features, including:

-Update to Moodle 4.2;

-Improvements to the points and rewards system;

-Better report generation;

-Integration API with instant messaging systems;

-Implementation of the Moodle BMA app;

-Moodle Workspace for institutional development;

-Custom avatars and daily point rewards;

-Interactive classes using H5P content;

-Nepughetty® marking simulation;

-Better portal responsiveness and UX;

-Linking achievements to competencies.

Currently, a large number of students are active in the Nepuga/FAPUGA virtual learning environment. That is why the institution's priority is to use new resources to improve theoretical teaching. This way, future specialists will be much more confident and prepared in Clinical Immersion, where they will have the opportunity to perform procedures Hands-on on real patients.

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