Design

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 * Install the Certificate module, so parents can print out a nice certificate they can hang on their wall every time they pass a course. :)
 * On the front page, show screenshots of a "Featured Course" for visitors. Might be useful to grab their attention. Don't want to make the home page too "Moodle-y."
 * Add a "Chat with a Teacher" block. If a teacher happens to be online, and doesn't mind being chatted with, the parent can initiate a live chat session and ask questions.
 * Include a general Forum that anyone can contribute to.// <--who will monitor this for inappropriate language, bots, etc? //
 * // May have to reconsider this. //
 * Try to use video / audio wherever possible; format text for screen readers, etc. Use embedded videos rather than linked videos, for better engagement.
 * So this site can be accessed properly in schools, we may want to explicitly not use YouTube (Can use Vimeo?) (Vimeo is often blocked, too) for hosting videos, since many schools block it. Would it be useful to have our own media-sharing site set up with phpMotion or osTube, that all course videos (and audio?) can be hosted on? The alternative is to just convert all videos to Flash format first before uploading them to Moodle, and then use the JW Player (or another suitable free Flash video player).
 * Try to make it non-state or country specific as much as possible.
 * Avoid making it look too "commercial". We aren't selling anything here, so let's not look like a used car salesman eying the '96 Taurus that just pulled into the lot.
 * NO GOOGLE ADS. :)
 * This is really thinking far ahead, but would it go against the non-commercial philosophy if we got sponsors involved? **If this concept grows - some one will need to sponsor the project**. Maybe give away gift certificates to parents who complete the most courses, or contribute the most to the online learning environment?
 * We could set this up on a Moodle Network, so schools and districts can let parents sign on from their own Moodle systems. Good idea! More and more districts are setting up Moodle servers.
 * Parents should be able to make course requests -- not like a volunteer instructor would request a course, but parents could just request a topic, which would be saved to list that volunteer instructors could view. This way, we have an idea of what parents want. We could also set up polls for parents to vote on new courses to be added. Yes, the choice activity is good way to gather participant feedback.
 * Keep it simple and organized. We don't want to overwhelm parents.
 * Articles that focus on particular topics from reputable sources are always good discussion starters.
 * A discussion forum for parents would be helpful.