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External Degrees and Extension Course Unit

Guidelines for How to Use the Virtual Learning Environment and Learning

Management System of the EDECU

We warmly welcome you as students of the University of Sri Jayewardenepura. From today

onwards, you will be involved in lectures and other academic activities according to the

schedule given to you. As you all know, we use Internet Based Learning Management

System (LMS) for our academic work as we are not able to come to the university.

Therefore, you must have an LMS account to access the Learning Management System and

you must have an e-mail account to create that account. The university has already created a

Microsoft office 365 account (Including an email) and LMS account for you. This e-mail

account is essential for resetting your Learning Management system’s password. Therefore, it

is very useful to use this account during the study period.

EDECU Learning Management System (LMS)

External Degrees and Extension Course Unit (EDECU) uses a Moodle based Learning

Management System as the main platform to facilitate for conducting academic activities.

Links to online lectures, Lecture notes and slide, links to online videos, and messages about

academic activities will be shared using the LMS. Also, you can ask academic related matters

from lecturers and EDECU using the LMS discussion forums. Therefore, EDECU highly

recommends to visit the LMS frequently.

How to access LMS?

LMS is a restricted system and you should log in to the LMS to access your courses and other

information using your username and password. Your username is your registration number

and a three-letter degree code that have been assigned before the registration number.

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Example: if your registration number is 202012345 and if your degree program is Art, then

the LMS username is art202012345. The password is your NIC number.

Please change your password at your first log in. To change the password, click on the profile

icon (top left-right corner of the window) and click on "Profile" to change your password,

then click on the gear icon (top left-right corner) and click "change password" (see the

following image).

Figure 1. Change Password

If you do not know your username or password,

Please click "Forgot your username or password?" from the login page. Submit your

username (if you remember) or email address (the new email address provided by EDECU).

The password reset link will be sent to your office365 email address. Reset the password

using the link sent in the email.

The Homepage of the LMS

Figure 2. LMS Home Page

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In general, when you logged in to the LMS, you will redirect to the LMS homepage (see

above image). It consists of main navigation links and news. Also, you can read frequently

asked questions and ask specific personal questions.

Dashboard – View Courses

The dashboard is the most useful page for students, and it shows all your ongoing courses. In

general, we will register you for the relevant courses before the start of a semester and you

can see your courses in the dashboard.

The main navigation block that contains the link to open dashboard may be hidden, if so,

please click on the icon (see Figure 3) with three horizontal lines to show the main navigation

block. Then click the “Dashboard” from the main navigation block.

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Figure 3. Show hide "Navigation panel" button

Figure 4. Link to Dashboard

Figure 5. Dashboard

If you cannot see a course that you have registered, please try to open the course page using

the course category list. You can see the category list under the “Course Overview” block.

Please select “Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences (New -Intakes after 2020)” (see the

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image below). In case, if you can’t see course categories in your dashboard, go to the

“Home” page.

Figure 6. Course Category List

When you click the “Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences (New -Intakes after 2020)”,

it will expand the list of categories. Please go to the “Bachelor of Arts (General) External

Degree” and then go to the “2020-Year-1” category. Your courses should be under the

“2020-Year-1” category. Please select the course from that list, then you should be able to

open the Course page.

Figure 7. Expanded Course Category List with Courses

Very Important Note: If you cannot go to a relevant course

Due to high workload and practical issues, you may not have registered for all relevant

courses at the beginning of the semester. If so, you can register yourself using the “Self-

Enrolment” option. Also, there may be courses that you can access as a guest user (users

don’t need to register). We always recommend you should first try the “Self-Enrolment”

option. Open a course as a guest user option only if the “Self-Enrolment” has disabled. Also,

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it is important to note that you should self-enrolled to relevant library course to download

pass papers.

How to self-enrol in a course: Click on the course name that you are trying to access, then

you should be able to go to the course page if you have already registered by the EDECU or

if the course is open for the “Guest” users. Otherwise you will see new window (similar to

Figure 9), click on the “Enrol me” button from that window.

Figure 8. Select a course

Figure 9. Self- Enrollment Option

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The following image illustrates inside of a course page.

Figure 10. Inside a course page - General section

In the course page, you will see a list of resources and activities. The top of the page includes

a course description, a discussion forum to ask questions from your lecturer, and other

resources. A course is divided into sections as a series of sessions or topics.

Figure 11. Inside a course page - A Topic/Section view

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Sections have links to online lectures, lecture notes, slides and recorded videos. Most of the

videos are posted on YouTube, and you can easily watch them even using a mobile phone.

Moodle Mobile App

With the Moodle Mobile app, you can learn at any time with these app features: Easy access

to course content - Browse the contents of your course /courses even when you are offline.

Connect with course participants - quickly find other people in your courses.

Figure 12. Moodle App

With the Moodle Mobile app, the following features are available.

Easily access course content

Check the content of your courses even when you are offline.

Connect with course participants

Quickly find other people in your courses.

Office 365 Account and Email

The University provides a personal Microsoft Office 365 account for all students. It includes

an email account and online office applications and online cloud storage. We highly

recommend to use this official email address to interact with university resources such as

LMS, Library etc.

What is your Office365 email address?

If your registration number is 202012345, then add the three-letter degree code before the

registration number and “@edecu.sjp.ac.lk” after the registration number. For example, if

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your registration number is 202012345 and if your degree is Art then your email address is

“art202012345@edecu.sjp.ac.lk”.

How to access your Office365 account?

Go to the website below and click the login button. Then enter your username and password

in the appropriate places

URL: www.office.com/

Your email address: registration number and edecu.sjp.ac.lk

Example Registration Number: 202012345 Username: art202012345c@edecu.sjp.ac.lk

Password: Pass @ 123

Please change your password when you first log in. To change your password, click on the

profile icon and initials (top right corner) and then click on "My Account".

Figure 13. Office365 Home page

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Other useful software

Online lectures will be conducted using Microsoft Teams and Zoom. Both MS Teams and

Zoom can be accessed from your web browser. But, it is easier to attend online lectures using

desktop app or mobile app. Therefore, it is better to install MS Teams and Zoom PC app or

mobile apps.

Zoom

Zoom is a cloud-based video conferencing service that you can use to interact with others

while having live chats over video or audio-only. We use Zoom as one of the platforms to

conduct online lectures. You can join Zoom meetings using your web browser but we highly

recommend to use ZOOM app to join online Zoom meeting rooms. When you join online

lectures using the Zoom app, you will get a more stable audio and video stream. Visit the

zoom.us website and create a free user account.

Figure 14. Zoom App

MS Team

In addition to ZOOM, we use Microsoft Teams as an alternative platform to conduct online

lectures. When you join online lectures using the MS Teams app, your audio and video will

be more stable. Go to Office365 and click on the MS Teams icon or go directly to the team

page from teams.microsoft.com. Click on the installation icon (see bottom left corner) in the

first time.

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Figure 15. Microsoft Teams

Pearson e-Library App

External students also can access some of the Digital Library Resources. As one of them, you

can read over five hundred e-books. Although these books especially bought for Management

students. There are books in the field such as Economics, Research methods, Mathematics,

Statistics and Information technology that can be useful for Humanities and Social Science

students too. Therefore, all students enrolled in the Learning Management System can use

these library resources including all Humanities and Social Science students. To do this you

need to create an account on the Pearson Library electronic website. It requires a password

and is available only to students who are registered for our external exams. To get the code,

sign up for the course that is set up so that you can view the code at the link below. First

download the relevant code from the course page provided by the following link and make a

note of it.

http://learnext.sjp.ac.lk/course/view.php?id=457

Then open an account on the Pearson e-Library website. To do so, use the link below.

https://elibrary.in.pearson.com/CreateAccount

For more information, visit the relevant web page of the library at the link provided in the

color and see the user guide.

http://lib.sjp.ac.lk/pearson-e-book-library/

These books can be downloaded to a mobile phone and can be accessed even when there is

no internet connection. Replace the Pearson mobile app for If you are using an Android

mobile phone, you can use the relevant app by following the link below.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.pearson.android.pulse.elibrary&hl=en&gl

=US

Buy an Internet Packages for 200 per month

All of the Sri Lankan Internet Service Providers (ISP) provide a special low-cost education

package to use Internet for LMS, Zoom meetings and MS Teams. You can activate this

option as an additional option. You can buy a package about Rs 200 and it will be adequate

for a month. You should activate his package every month. You can get more details from

the following website or from individual ISP web sites.

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http://www.trc.gov.lk/2014-05-13-13-23-17/press-room/949-special-wfh-study-

packages.html