Thanks to the Mindful Learner, we have another quality edu-blog resource to add to our OPML files! But in a post that (rightfully) takes eLearning providers to task for being better marketers than educators, he misses a key point: judging the quality of an eLearning offering requires more than sitting alone in a room with the “program.” When it comes to eLearning, the proof isn’t just in the pudding, it’s in the total dining experience!

Timothy Takamoto, posting in the Penn State Distance Education Online Symposium (DEOS) LISTSERV, describes how and why one educational CMS — Moodle — natively supports constructivist-based learning. Insightfully, he also points out how (thanks to Moodle’s active open-source development) users can take advantage of Moodle’s triggering and testing modules to produce a drill-and-test course design that competes with the best (or worst?) WebCT or Blackboard has to offer.

Three weeks ago, we launched Ellis College, and with it released our new community learning platform and a first set of undergraduate courses in business targeted to the working adult population. Now, I may be just a bit biased, but I do believe that for supporting socio-constructivist learning, the “Ellis Community Learning Platform” is the most robust technology environment on the market today. I realize this is a bold claim. To support it, we plan to devote significant time in the coming months documenting, justifying, and empirically testing our assertions.