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Adding the Microsoft block to your Moodle course opens up the potential to use a number of Microsoft o365 and Teams features with your Moodle course.
(Note: This is an advanced feature! Strong familiarity with Moodle, Office 365, and Microsoft Teams should be a minimum requirement before using this block.)
What is the Microsoft Block?
The Microsoft block is a third-party Moodle add-on from Microsoft that helps Instructors connect their Moodle experience to Office 365 services.
Specifically, it allows for these scenarios within Moodle:
Examples: Why to use the Microsoft Block
Accessing files stored in OneDrive for use in Moodle courses
- One source file immediately updates multiple published locations:
A group of Nursing instructors may have been collaborating on development of a medical terminology document for a number of courses their program will be offering. The master file that everyone has been editing is located inside one shared OneDrive folder. The terminology document may end up being used in multiple offerings of a common medical terminology course, taught by multiple instructors, and the instructors running each course may change from term to term. In the past, any updates made to the master document would need to be uploaded manually to all the variations of the Moodle courses which use that same terminology document. It can be a challenge to track which courses need the new document added, and where in each course the document is located. By adding a OneDrive-connected file into the Moodle course, an active link back to the original OneDrive master document is made (instead of a file upload). Any changes made to the master document in its OneDrive location, by any of its authors, will automatically appear in the document from within any Moodle courses to which it was added.
- Accessing files that are too large to upload into Moodle:
If a file is larger than Moodle's 250 Mb file upload limit, you may not be able to upload it into your Moodle course. However, creating a "linked" connection to the file in your OneDrive folder may let you include it in your Moodle course without hitting the file size limit or waiting for a big upload to complete.
- More examples are available in KB1294 - Using Moodle's Microsoft 365 repository
Creating a Teams Class group as a companion learning space to a Moodle course
- Hospitality Instructor Jane wants to enhance student collaboration in her blended business classes, so she decides to use MS Teams to provide collaborative learning opportunities. Her business students will use Teams after graduation in their careers, and some have already used Teams during their secondary school coursework, prior to entering college. By integrating an MS Teams Class group with her Moodle course, Jane provides her students one-click access to an alternative space for interactive and connected learning. This makes it easier for her Students to communicate and work together in real time, to share documents, to discuss ideas, and to ask Jane questions during scheduled online meetings. Jane uses the chat and comment features to check in with her students, to provide quick feedback and support.
Adding the Microsoft block
The Microsoft block is added via the "Add a block" option, located at the top of Moodle's Blocks drawer. Once added, the block is visible to both Moodle Teachers and Students.
If you've never used this block before, it will initially show that your Moodle user account has no connection to any Microsoft services:
Here is an example of how the Microsoft block looks after the current enrollee has created an active OneDrive connection, and after the Moodle course has had a companion Team activated by the Moodle Instructor:
Caveats and Interoperability
The OneDrive and Teams connections provided through this block are neither mutually reliant nor exclusive: You can use one kind of connection without using the other, or you could use both. A Moodle course enrollee might decide to connect to their o365 account in order to access their OneDrive files, without any companion Team connection. Likewise, an Instructor may create a companion Team for the Moodle course without establishing any file connection to OneDrive.