scholarly journals A pedagogy of abundance or a pedagogy to support human beings? Participant support on massive open online courses

2011 ◽  
Vol 12 (7) ◽  
pp. 74 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rita Kop ◽  
Hélène Fournier ◽  
John Sui Fai Mak
Keyword(s):  
Learning Outcomes ◽  
Online Courses ◽  
Massive Open Online Courses ◽  
Networked Learning ◽  
Information Flows ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Massive Open Online ◽  
Emergent Technologies ◽  
Emergent Learning ◽  
Design Of Learning Environments

<p>This paper examines how emergent technologies could influence the design of learning environments. It will pay particular attention to the roles of educators and learners in creating networked learning experiences on massive open online courses (MOOCs). The research shows that it is possible to move from a pedagogy of abundance to a pedagogy that supports human beings in their learning through the active creation of resources and learning places by both learners and course facilitators. This pedagogy is based on the building of connections, collaborations, and the exchange of resources between people, the building of a community of learners, and the harnessing of information flows on networks. This resonates with the notion of emergent learning as learning in which actors and system co-evolve within a MOOC and where the level of presence of actors on the MOOC influences learning outcomes. <br /><br /></p>

Participating by activity or by week in MOOCs

2018 ◽  
Vol 119 (9/10) ◽  
pp. 572-585 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alok Baikadi ◽  
Carrie Demmans Epp ◽  
Christian D. Schunn
Keyword(s):  
Learning Outcomes ◽  
Design Methodology ◽  
Online Courses ◽  
Massive Open Online Courses ◽  
Learning Activities ◽  
Massive Open Online ◽  
Full Spectrum ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Activity Form

Purpose The purpose of this study was to provide a new characterization of the extent to which learners complete learning activities in massive open online courses (MOOCs), a central challenge in these contexts. Prior explorations of learner interactions with MOOC materials have often described these interactions through stereotypes, which accounts for neither the full spectrum of potential learner activities nor the ways those patterns differ across course designs. Design/methodology/approach To overcome these shortcomings, the authors apply confirmatory and exploratory factor analysis to learner activities within three MOOCs to test different models of participation across courses and populations found within those courses. Findings Courses varied in the extent to which participation was driven by learning activities vs time/topic or a mixture of both, but this was stable across offerings of the same course. Research limitations/implications The results call for a reconceptualization of how different learning activities within a MOOC are designed to work together, to better allow strong learning outcomes even within one activity form or more strongly encourage participation across activities. Originality/value The authors validate new continuous-patterns rather than a discrete-pattern participation model for MOOC learning.

scholarly journals Lessons Learned from Teaching Multiple Massive Open Online Courses in Veterinary Education

2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 22-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jill Rowan Deans MacKay ◽  
Jessie Paterson ◽  
Victoria Sandilands ◽  
Natalie K Waran ◽  
Bryony Lancaster ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Learning Outcomes ◽  
User Satisfaction ◽  
Performance Metrics ◽  
Online Courses ◽  
Retention Rate ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Massive Open Online Courses ◽  
Massive Open Online ◽  
And Performance

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are a rapidly expanding avenue of diversification for higher education institutes. MOOC development is varied, individual course teams may have near complete creative control over the content, style, format and aims of their course, or be led by MOOC-specific teams within their institution. A single institute therefore may offer a wide variety of courses from short introductory level discussions to learning outcomes pitched at the postgraduate level. In this study, we examined the performance of four relatively long-running MOOCs offered by Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies at the University of Edinburgh: EdiVet Do You Have What It Takes to Be A Veterinarian; Animal Behaviour and Welfare; Chicken Behaviour and Welfare; and Equine Nutrition. Comparisons were made between the format and style of courses, their learning outcomes, and performance metrics such as completion rate, user satisfaction and benefit to institute. Retention was a challenge for all session-based MOOCs, with Chickens being most successful at retaining 50% of its potential audience until the start of Week 3. The average retention rate across all lectures and sessions was 38.5% (±14.08). All courses showed a notable female learner bias far above the Coursera average of 39% (Range Chickens: 58.1% ±3.1, Equine: 79.3% ¬±1.69). The majority of learners were North American or European (Range, Animals: 64.0±0.6, Equine 84.0%±3.0%). Across all courses, over 25% of learners had already achieved a Master’s degree or higher. A qualitative analysis of 188 learner stories revealed an overwhelmingly positive experience, highlighting the quality of resources, a perceived friendly relationship with the course instructors and referencing perceived barriers to education in face to face models. In conclusion, high quality digital resources embedded in well-designed courses can be a powerful tool to widen access to science education, however the MOOC platform does not necessarily reach a wide global audience, and may still struggle to widen participation in higher education, and alternative platforms are worth considering.

Using MOOCs in the process of teaching future engineers mathematical disciplines

2021 ◽  
pp. 45-49
Author(s):  
E.V. Liksina ◽  
◽  
O.A. Vagaeva
Keyword(s):  
Learning Outcomes ◽  
Online Courses ◽  
Educational Process ◽  
Massive Open Online Courses ◽  
Teaching Mathematics ◽  
Open Education ◽  
Time Analysis ◽  
Massive Open Online ◽  
Teachers And Students ◽  
Mathematical Problems

Researched are peculiarities of using massive open online courses (MOOCs) in the process of teaching mathematics to future engineers. The need for democratization, increased accessibility and the trend towards digitalization of education in the future will lead to the widespread use of online courses in education, including technical. As part of the study, a survey was conducted of teachers and students of technical universities in the form of a questionnaire. The survey revealed a fairly high awareness of teachers about massive open online courses (93.3%). Among students, the number of such respondents was only 45.4%. The most popular among the surveyed teachers and students is the online platform “Open Education” — 53.3% and 34.5%, respectively. Note that among the reasons that prevent the use of massive open online courses in education are: lack of free time, lack of skills to work in this format, lack of regulation of the implementation of learning outcomes in MOOCs in the formal educational process. At the same time, analysis of the platforms Coursera, EdX, OpenEducation, Intuit, Lektorium, and Stepik showed that as of January 2021, 150 courses were available in both general and specific math areas. We believe that the active use of massive open online courses in preparation for the educational process can increase the efficiency of mastering competencies in solving practical mathematical problems, which will improve the training of future engineers.

scholarly journals Who studies MOOCs? Interdisciplinarity in MOOC research and its changes over time

2015 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
George Veletsianos ◽  
Peter Shepherdson
Keyword(s):  
Online Education ◽  
Computer Science ◽  
Interdisciplinary Research ◽  
Online Courses ◽  
Massive Open Online Courses ◽  
Networked Learning ◽  
Massive Open Online ◽  
The Past ◽  
Changes Over Time ◽  
Over Time

<p>The complexity of digital and online education is becoming increasingly evident in the context of research into networked learning/participation. Interdisciplinary research is often proposed as a way to address complex scientific problems and enable researchers to bring novel perspectives into a field other than their own. The degree to which research on Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) is interdisciplinary is unknown. We apply descriptive and inferential statistics to bibliometric data to investigate interdisciplinarity in MOOC research. Results show that MOOC research published in 2013-2015 was (a) mostly conducted by researchers affiliated with Education and Computer Science disciplines, (b) far from monolithic, (c) had a greater representation of authors from Computer Science than in the past, and (d) showed a trend toward being more interdisciplinary than MOOC research published in 2008-2012. Our results also suggest that empirical research on xMOOCs may be more interdisciplinary than research on cMOOCs. Greater interdisciplinarity in xMOOC research could reflect the burgeoning interest in the field, the general familiarity with the xMOOC pedagogical model, and the hype experienced by xMOOCs. Greater interdisciplinarity in the field may also provide researchers with rich opportunities to improve our understanding and practice of digital and online learning.</p>

scholarly journals Connecting Learner Motivation to Learner Progress and Completion in Massive Open Online Courses | Relier la motivation de l’apprenant à ses progrès et à l’achèvement des cours en ligne ouverts à tous

2018 ◽  
Vol 44 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Hedieh Najafi ◽  
Carol Rolheiser ◽  
Laurie Harrison ◽  
Will Heikoop
Keyword(s):  
Learning Outcomes ◽  
Self Efficacy ◽  
Online Courses ◽  
Course Completion ◽  
Task Value ◽  
Massive Open Online Courses ◽  
Learning Goals ◽  
Massive Open Online ◽  
Learner Motivation ◽  
And Task

We examined how massive open online courses (MOOC) learners’ motivational factors, self-efficacy, and task-value related to their course progress and achievement, as informed by learners’ initial course completion intention. In three individual MOOCs, learners completed a pre-course survey to report their levels of task-value and self-efficacy and to indicate their intention to complete each course topic. Using clustering techniques, we identified two distinct groups of learners in the three MOOCs based on self-efficacy and task-value variables: higher-motivation group and lower-motivation group. The higher-motivation group achieved significantly higher grades in two of the MOOCs, and also adhered to their initial completion intention significantly more so than the lower-motivation group. We posit that MOOC completion research should consider learners’ topic-level interest as one success criterion. Further research can clarify perceived task-value in relation to learners’ existing knowledge, their learning goals, and learning outcomes related to the MOOC participation.Nous avons examiné comment, dans les cours en ligne ouverts à tous (CLOT), les facteurs de motivation des apprenants, leur autoefficacité et leur valeur tâche étaient reliés à leurs progrès et à leur achèvement du cours selon l’intention initiale d’achèvement du cours des apprenants. Dans trois CLOT, les apprenants ont rempli un sondage avant le début du cours pour indiquer leur degré de valeur tâche et d’autoefficacité, ainsi que leur intention de compléter chaque sujet du cours. À l’aide de techniques agglomératives, nous avons cerné deux groupes distincts d’apprenants dans trois CLOT selon les variables de la valeur tâche et de l’autoefficacité : un groupe à plus forte motivation, et un groupe dont la motivation était plus faible. Le groupe dont la motivation était plus élevée a obtenu des notes considérablement plus élevées dans deux CLOT et, dans deux cours, ont adhéré à leur intention initiale d’achèvement considérablement plus que le groupe dont la motivation était moindre. Nous posons en principe que la recherche sur l’achèvement des CLOT devrait tenir compte de l’intérêt des apprenants sur le plan des sujets comme étant un critère de réussite. De plus amples recherches pourraient clarifier la valeur tâche perçue relativement aux connaissances préalables des apprenants, à leurs objectifs d’apprentissage et aux résultats d’apprentissage liés à la participation aux CLOT.

Education and the Relation to the Outside: A Little Real Reality

2015 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 273-300 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Savat ◽  
Greg Thompson
Keyword(s):  
Performance Metrics ◽  
Online Courses ◽  
Massive Open Online Courses ◽  
Educational Institutions ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Massive Open Online ◽  
Transformative Teaching ◽  
Control Society ◽  
Brave New World ◽  
Radical Transformation

One of the more dominant themes around the use of Deleuze and Guattari's work, including in this special issue, is a focus on the radical transformation that educational institutions are undergoing, and which applies to administrator, student and educator alike. This is a transformation that finds its expression through teaching analytics, transformative teaching, massive open online courses (MOOCs) and updateable performance metrics alike. These techniques and practices, as an expression of control society, constitute the new sorts of machines that frame and inhabit our educational institutions. As Deleuze and Guattari's work posits, on some level these are precisely the machines that many people in their day-to-day work as educators, students and administrators assemble and maintain, that is, desire. The meta-model of schizoanalysis is ideally placed to analyse this profound shift that is occurring in society, felt closely in the so-called knowledge sector where a brave new world of continuous education and motivation is instituting itself.

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