Researcher from CRACS publishes book

Álvaro Figueira, researcher at the Center for Research in Advanced Computing Systems (CRACS), published a book on one of the mostly used e-learning systems in the world, currently used by the University of Porto and most of its faculties – the Moodle.

The book, entitled Moodle – Criação e Gestão de cursos online (Moodle – Creation and Management of online courses), was co-written with Carmen Figueira and Hugo Santos of the Faculty of Science of the University of Porto (FCUP). The Moodle is a platform used to create and manage online environments. This Learning Management System (LMS) is widely popular largely because it is a freeware open-source, thus promoting the vast use of the system, both nationally and internationally, namely in universities, high schools and elementary schools.

Generally, this book covers all areas of the Moodle, from its installation on a school server (or on a simple personal computer), to professors providing educational contents, workers who can make course–professor–student associations, and to students themselves, who will thus be capable of understanding better how the system works. This book covers the 1.9.2 version of the Moodle platform.

Álvaro Figueira has a PhD is Computing Science, teaches at FCUP, and is the coordinator of e-learning processes at the same faculty. He is also a member of the jury for the “e-Learning Excellence Award”, an annual event promoted by the University of Porto that awards e-learning practices during a semester. He lectures several courses on e-learning, multimedia and education in the three levels of higher education, having already published several articles on e-learning and Web-based learning.