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The MOOC movement is not an indicator of educational evolution

The MOOC movement is not an indicator of educational evolution
Somehow, recently, a lot of people have taken an interest in the broadcast of canned educational materials, and this practice — under a term that proponents and detractors have settled on, massive open online course (MOOC) — is getting a publicity surge. I know that the series of online classes offered by Stanford proved to be extraordinarily popular, leading to the foundation of Udacity and a number of other companies. But I wish people would stop getting so excited over this transitional technology. The attention drowns out two truly significant trends in progressive education: do-it-yourself labs and peer-to-peer exchanges. In the current opinion torrent, Clay Shirky treats MOOCs in a recent article, and Joseph E. There’s a popular metaphor for this early stage of innovation: we look back to the time when film-makers made the first moving pictures with professional performers by setting up cameras before stages in theaters. Two more appealing trends are already big.

The challenges to connectivist learning on open online networks: Learning experiences during a massive open online course | Kop Special Issue - Connectivism: Design and Delivery of Social Networked Learning Rita Kop National Research Council of Canada Abstract Self-directed learning on open online networks is now a possibility as communication and resources can be combined to create learning environments. But is it really? There are some challenges that might prevent learners from having a quality learning experience. Keywords: Connectivism; networked learning; learner autonomy; presence; critical literacies Introduction Something fundamental has changed with the latest developments of the Web: The ease of communication and the possibilities of using aggregators to bundle and filter communications and information have meant that the context of learning has changed dramatically. In e-learning, two major traditions have been prevalent: one where connections are made with people and the other where they are made with resources (Weller, 2007). Connectivism Challenges to Connectivist Learning Self-directed learning.

Size Isn't Everything - The Chronicle Review By Cathy N. Davidson James Yang for The Chronicle Review My reading material to and from London recently for the annual open-source programming event known as Mozfest, or the Mozilla Festival, included two glossy magazines focusing on the future of education: the November 19 cover story in Forbes and the entire November issue of Wired UK, an offshoot of the American magazine. Should educators be delighted by this unexpected attention—or very, very worried? A little of both. Let's look at Wired UK first. Featured are both Negroponte 1.0, the editorial that launched Wired in 1993, and the new Negroponte 2.0. Given that such 20/20 foresight is rare, it is worth paying attention to Negroponte 2.0. He also still maintains a position he stated long ago: "Computers are not about computing, but everyday life." If you are a traditional educator, you should be scared. So what's different in 2.0? "Educational reform" is also on the lips of many college presidents and policy makers these days.

Coursera - the Key to Higher Education Coursera offers free college courses from many top-notch universities from around the globe. Their goal is to make higher education available on a massive scale. Though there are doubtlessly as many stories as there are students, this is my story. I never thought I would have the opportunity to experience higher education, and certainly not in such a format as Coursera offers. Misdiagnosed as 'Emotionally Disturbed' As a child, I had difficulties in school. My parents were horrified when I was diagnosed as 'emotionally disturbed.' I spent a lot of time feeling bad about my status as a college dropout. Coursera - a free education? Not only were the courses free, but they were being offered by quality universities. Introduction to Sociology, and College Life The first class to start was Introduction to Sociology. I even participated in the discussion boards -- socializing in a way that would have never been possible for me in a live setting.

Research publications on Massive Open Online Courses and Personal Learning Environments People interested in Massive Open Online Courses will probably be aware of the research by Helene Fournier and me on Personal Learning Environments and MOOCs. We carried out research in the MOOC PLENK2010 (The MOOC Personal Learning Environments Networks and Knowledge that was held in the fall of 2010). The data collected on this distributed course with 1641 participants has been massive as well. Its analysis has kept us and some fellow researchers busy over the past year. Fournier, H., Kop, R., and Durand, G. (2014), Challenges to research in Massive Open Online Courses, Merlot Journal of Online Learning and Teaching, Vol. 10, No.1, March 2014 Fournier, H., and Kop, R. (2014) De nouvelles dimensions à l’auto-apprentisage dans un environment d’apprentisage en réseau, Association canadienne pour l’étude de l’éducation des adultes Kop, R., Fournier, H., and Durand, G. (2014, In Press), Challenges to research in Massive Open Online Courses, Journal of Online Learning and Teaching

Rethinking Higher Ed Open Online Learning - US News & World Report Karen Symms Gallagher is dean of the Rossier School of Education at the University of Southern California. With the rush of pronouncements, you'd think Higher Ed 2.0 is here, all online, all the time. Brick-and-mortar and ivy are passé. Not so fast. It's worth decoding what's out there and what isn't. Professors at MIT, Stanford, and Harvard and many fine academic minds have put thousands of top-notch college courses online. [Read the U.S. Logging on to these lectures is often like watching through a one-way mirror—albeit for free and, say, with 15,000 classmates. I can't help thinking that the massive open online course explosion so far is a bigger, better delivery system of The Great Courses, which my husband and I have enjoyed for years. Some open online courses award students a certificate of participation, an academic currency without much heft in today's job market. [See the U.S. But that's not what worries me about open online courses. [Read the U.S.

Classroom of 2020: The future is very different than you think Imagine: you wake up at 9:23 a.m. one September morning in 2020. Your alarm failed to sound and now you’re late. But don’t fret. Your commute to school consists of carrying your laptop to the kitchen table. No need for a back-to-school outfit, as you settle in wearing pyjamas. When you load today’s lecture video you don’t see your professor; instead, a classmate appears on the screen. Your classmate uses the word “atavistic” and you pause the lecture to look it up. After a while, your eyes wander to the window. If the above seems like a far-fetched prediction of what a classroom might be like in 2020, you’re behind the times. This is the brave new world of higher education, where students teach professors, technology enables digital note-passing and online courses enroll thousands of students. In an era when a student can access more information through her cellphone than a professor can consume in a lifetime, is the university as a physical place obsolete?

Mettre en ligne des cours, ils s’en mordront les doigts ? Publié sur le blog : Veille et analyse TICE Le développement médiatisé de la mise en ligne des cours, en particulier dans le monde universitaire, (cf. Les universités d’élite s’ouvrent au web, de Tamar Lewin dans le supplément du NY Times livré avec le Figaro en date du vendredi 30 Novembre) est un phénomène qui mérite d’être examiné sous plusieurs angles. Dans ce même article est évoquée la notion de MOOC ( Massive Online Open Courseware). Ce type de dispositif semble à « la mode » comme le confirment la présentation de M Dillenbourg lors du dernier séminaire de l’IFE sur les sciences de l’Apprendre ou encore sur le MOOC Itypa ( Plus largement on entend, particulièrement depuis l’été dernier, monter un flot d’informations et d’interrogations sur l’enseignement inversé, le « flip teaching » ( ou encore sur flipping classroom ( ) A suivre et à débattre

Jump Off the Coursera Bandwagon - Commentary By Doug Guthrie Like lemmings, too many American colleges are mindlessly rushing out to find a way to deliver online education, and more and more often they are choosing Coursera. The company, founded this year by two Stanford University computer scientists, has already enrolled more than two million students, has engaged 33 academic institutions as partners, and is offering more than 200 free massive open online courses, or MOOC's. A college's decision to jump on the Coursera bandwagon is aided—and eased—by knowing that academic heavyweights like Harvard, Stanford, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are already on board. As one college president described it to The New York Times, "You're known by your partners, and this is the College of Cardinals." In our haste to join the academic alphas, many of us are forgoing the reflection necessary to enter this new medium. Coursera and its devotees simply have it wrong. The recent history of the newspaper industry is instructive.

Coursera will profit from “Free” courses, competition heats up. Are MOOC’s really about FREE education? Coursera reveals how it intends to generate revenue off of “freely” available MOOC’s. In fact, many MOOC companies are launching business models where students and institutions will pay.Competition heats up between MOOC’s and traditional LMS companies. To be clear Coursera, Udacity and others are simply learning management systems bundled with high quality content. In fact “It’s an LMS [learning management system] that’s wrapped around a very high-quality course,” says Daphne Koller, a Coursera co-founder. According to contract documents, Coursera will pay the universities 6 to 15 percent of revenues, which will be determined on a per-course basis and dependent upon the duration of the course, the number and quality of assessments. So what’s the MOOC model? There are 8 possible monetization strategies that MOOC providers like Coursera, or Learning Management System providers could adopt:

A Quick Guide To The History Of MOOCs This Is How Students Use School Websites 8.45K Views 0 Likes It's important to have a proper appearance online. So why are there so many unhelpful school websites out there? Why TED Talks Have Become So Popular 5.67K Views 0 Likes TED talks are useful and free ways to bring high-level thinking and through-provoking ideas into the classroom and your home.

The future of MOOCs MOOCs get a bad rap. Dismissed as prescriptive, or teacher-centric, or unsocial, or something else, it’s like a badge of honour to espouse why you dislike MOOCs. Despite their pedagogical flaws, however, MOOCs provide unprecedented access to quality content for millions of learners. It’s all very well for Apple-owning, organic-buying professionals to cast aspersions, but consider the girl in Pakistan who’s too scared to set foot in a classroom. Consider the teenager in central Australia whose school has only one teacher. Don’t all these people deserve a better education? Sure, the pedagogy may not be perfect, but the alternative is much worse. MOOC proponent George Siemens distinguishes between two types of MOOC: the xMOOC and the cMOOC. The former is the subject of such disdain. In contrast, the latter leverages the connectedness of the participants. The cMOOC’s participant is active whereas the xMOOC’s participant is passive. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Studying on campus will become a status symbol.

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