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Explore a New Learning Frontier: MOOCs
AMOOC is a Massive Open Online Course. It is a gathering ofparticipants, of people willing to jointly exchange information andcollaboratively enhance their knowledge.
Over10,000 learners worldwide have participated in MOOCs on a variety oftopics. MOOCs appeal to knowledge workers, trainers, and teachers.Why? Because MOOCs enable a high-end knowledge exchange to occur. Itis a learning model that fits expert training, interdisciplinarylearning, ad hoc education — any type of learning that allowsinformation to flow within a network of peers.
MOOCsfit the contemporary shift towards networked learning. GeorgeSiemens, one of the pioneers in this area, wrote, “Learning is nowhappeningthroughcommunities of practice, personal networks, and through completion ofwork-related tasks,” in an environment in which, “know-how andknow-what is being supplemented with know-where (the understanding ofwhere to find knowledge needed)” (2005, p. 4).
Useof educational technology is becoming more mainstream through socialmedia and mobile devices. Thus there is rising interest in findingmethodologies that build upon these new technologies to enhance thelearning and teaching process. MOOC is one of these emerging formats.A MOOC can boost your institutional, corporate, or NGO knowledge, ifyou are open to its innovative approach.
MOOCsare organized on the Internet. They can be organized for a shortperiod or take up several months. MOOCs started out as Web-basedcourses, but following the mobile learning MOOC of 2011 (MobiMOOC),a quest started to see if MOOCs can be delivered and followed throughmobile devices or in a ubiquitous environment as well.
Inthis article, I will describe the benefits of a MOOC, its learnerdemands, the facilitator options, and of course the tools needed toset up a MOOC. Those hungry to know more after reading this can alsohave a look at the MOOCguidein Wikispaces.
History of MOOCs
Theterm MOOC seems to be the brainchild of two individuals: BryanAlexander and DaveCormier. The Connectivism and Connective Knowledge (CCK08)course, first organized by GeorgeSiemens and Stephen Downes in2008, picked up the label. They are seen as the MOOC pioneers.
Theidea of connecting to others in order to gain knowledge derives fromthe Connectivismtheory. “In connectivism, the starting point for learning occurswhen knowledge is actuated through the process of a learnerconnecting to and feeding information into a learning community”(Kop & Hill, 2008, p. 2). This idea of collaborative knowledgegrowth comes from the old idea that we should “stand on theshoulders of giants” to reach outstanding results, as Bernard ofChartres and, later on, Newton suggested.
Benefits and challenges of a MOOC
Becausea MOOC is a new learning and teaching methodology, it unavoidably hasits own evangelists and bashers. This results in fruitful debatesclarifying what does and does not work. Here are some of the benefitsand challenges of MOOCs:
12 benefits of a MOOC
All you need is an Internet connection and a device that can connect to it.
A MOOC can be organized at low cost, using free tools to build the course.
You can move beyond time zones and physical boundaries.
You can organize it in any language you like.
You can use any online tools that are relevant to your target region, or that your target population is already using.
It can be launched as quickly as you can inform the participants (which makes it a powerful format for priority learning – for example, in aid relief).
All can share contextualized content.
Learning happens in a more informal setting.
You can connect across disciplines, and, if needed, across corporate/institutional walls.
You don’t need a degree to follow the course, only the willingness to learn.
MOOCs add to your own personal learning environment and/or network.
Lifelong learning skills will be improved, for participating in a MOOC forces you to think about your own learning and knowledge absorption.
Possible challenges of a MOOC
It feels chaotic as participants create their own content.
It demands digital literacy.
It demands time and effort from the participants.
It is organic, which means the course will take on its own trajectory.
Participants need to self-regulate their learning.
To guide or not to guide: a MOOC trainer is a guide on the side
AMOOC is a peer-to-peer knowledge exchange or learning method. Thismeans you do not necessarily have to have one or more facilitators.However it can be useful to provide some guidance during the courseto keep most of the interactions focused.
Anoverall facilitator or coordinator can function as the glue of acourse. An overall course facilitator is ideally someone with contentexpertise and great communication skills. They also need to besocial-media savvy to keep on top of the MOOC.
Mostof the time a MOOC will last for a couple weeks, with each weekfocusing on a particular subtopic related to the overall subject ofthe course. As such, many MOOCs have a different, specializedfacilitator for each week. This approach ensures high-quality contenton expert topics.
Social media are at the center of any MOOC
AMOOC is delivered online. This opens up a variety of online tools youcan use to set up your MOOC. The choice between the different toolsdepends on the dynamics you have in mind. If you know your targetaudience, you can use those social media tools and internet optionsthat your MOOC participants are already using. If you do not knowyour MOOC participants upfront, you might want to think about usingthe most accessible communication tools available. Keep it simple.
So which social media tools could you use?
Anysocial media tool could be used to build the architectural design ofa MOOC, but the five most commonly used at the moment are:
A wiki (e.g., Wikispaces) – The ideal tool to set up your course syllabus.
A discussion group or list-serve (e.g., Google groups) – Enables sharing discussions online and through e-mail while keeping the topics nicely grouped based on their title.
Microblogging (e.g., Twitter) – Allows a quick exchange of resources and thoughts.
Social bookmarking (e.g., delicious) – participants share resources on the Web that can be retrieved later on.
Virtual classrooms (e.g., Elluminate) – Enable synchronous sessions (live meetings) so that people can put forward different questions. Virtual classrooms also allow more human, immediate interaction to occur, and they are ideal to give an expert the floor to express her/his framework of ideas.
TheMOOCguide mentioned earlier offers a wider variety of useful tools.
Self-regulated learning is crucial
AMOOC is built around a learner-centeredapproach. This means that the participantsare responsible for their own learning. As such, it’s important tomake MOOC participants aware of self-regulatedlearning and its challenges.
Downes(2007) emphasized that in order for a network to support knowledgedevelopment it needs to be “diverse, open, autonomous, andconnected.” This open exchange of information through the use ofsocial media results in a massive amount of shared content, due tothe participant interactions. Even beginning with only a few formalresources, the discussion threads, the reflections shared by theparticipants about a topic, and the additional resources suggested bythe participants and/or facilitators will result in a feeling ofinformation overload. This overload sometimes results in participantsdropping out of a MOOC, especially if no accreditation or reward isoffered at the end of the course.
Onaverage, older or more experienced learners are better equipped tostay on top of the information flow within a MOOC thanks to theirlifelong learning experiences. Here is alist of guidelineson how to cope with the information overload.
How mLearning fits MOOCs
Inmany emerging regions of the world, mobile access is the main way toaccess the Web. This makes a mobile MOOC very interesting as a way tokeep in touch with a large learner audience spread all around theglobe. There is also an ongoing shift towards ubiquitous learning,allowing people to access information no matter what device they areusing.
Butit is not only the ubiquity that makes MOOCs a good method forenhanced mobile learning (mLearning). A MOOCs informal nature, andthe fact that a MOOC is not constricted by time or space, brings itvery close to the general specifics of mLearning. As such it onlytakes a small step to open up the MOOC format for mobile devices aswell.
Make your resources mobile accessible
Ifyou consider starting a mobile MOOC, remember that you will belimited in the type of resources you will be able to use. WithmLearning, you also have to take into account the data transfer cost.Mobile internet access can bring along high costs for the user,depending on their region or mobile subscription. Make sure you havea solution to keep mobile costs limited, and inform your targetpopulation on how to do so.
Mobile social media tools
Becausemobile devices are getting smarter all the time, most of theWeb-based resources listed earlier are also mobile accessible (e.g.,Google groups, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook). Only the wikis andvirtual synchronous classrooms are not always very mobile friendly.Nevertheless, you can work around these limitations, for instance byusing YouTube to publish reformatted recordings from synchronoussessions. Here is howyou could do the reformatting.
Anotherlimitation occurs when you want to put all your MOOC spaces into aone-page mash-up (e.g. pageflakes, iGoogle). This will demand abigger screen to keep an overview of all the content. Nevertheless, amobile MOOC is possible, taking into account current mobilelimitations.
The MobiMOOC Case: the first MOOC to look at mLearning
MobiMOOCwas a course that ran from April 2nduntil May 14th2011. The course focused on the subject of mobile learning and wasdelivered over six weeks, each of which had a different angle and aspecialized facilitator:
Introduction to mLearning (Inge de Waard),
MLearning planning (Judy Brown),
MLearning for development (Niall Winters),
Leading-edge mobile innovations (David Metcalf),
MLearning in a mobile-connected society (John Traxler), and
MLearning in K-12 settings (Andy Black).
Toget an idea of what this MOOC was like, feel free to have a look atthe resources: the coursesyllabus, the mLearningdiscussions, bookmarks,and the recordings ofthe synchronous sessions. MobiMOOC allowed all of theparticipants to connect no matter what their expertise, age, ormLearning background was. The collaborative effort of exchangingquestions and discussing them transformed all the participants’ideas into new mLearning insights. This sometimes resulted in new,full-blown mLearning projects that transcended the course.
Join the Change, MOOC !
AsMOOCs are new, lots of research still needs to be done. With thischallenge in mind, George Siemens, Stephen Downes, and Dave Cormierhave put together the “Mother of all MOOCs,” called Change,which will run for nine months (September 12, 2011 to May, 2012)!Feelfree to join, as a participant or as a researcher.
Conclusion
Theeffect of a MOOC is not to be taken lightly! Many participants whowent through a MOOC have had a powerful learning experience, which,in some cases, resulted in strong personal or professional projectswith impact. On the other hand, the dropout rate in a non-creditedMOOC is high, and some participants simply do not like the chaos of aMOOC. Nevertheless, it is a worthwhile method to explore!
References
Downes,S. (2007). What Connectivism Is. Connectivism Conference, Universityof Manitoba. Retrieved from Webhttps://halfanhour.blogspot.com/2007/02/what-connectivism-is.html(accessed 26 May 2011)
Kop,R. & Hill, A. (2008). Connectivism: Learning theory of the futureor vestige of the past? International Review of Research in Open andDistance Learning, Volume 9, Number 3. Retrieved from Web https://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/523/1103(accessed 18 May 2011)
Siemens,G. (2005). Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age.InternationalJournal of Instructional Technology and Distance Learning,January 2005, Volume 2 Number 1. Retrieved from Web https://www.itdl.org/journal/jan_05/article01.htm(accessed 18 May 2011).
