The MOOC phenomenon has exploded. What is a MOOC, you ask? MOOC (pronounced “mook” is an acronym for Massive Open Online Course.
MOOCs are courses that are being offered through a partnership between a
learning entity and a business on a Cloud-based platform. MOOCs are also classes that are taught online
to large numbers of students, with minimal involvement by professors.[i]
Most of the courses can be taken at no
tuition cost to participants. In some
cases, there are fees for such things as certificate of completion, books,
etc. Some of the major universities
involved in MOOCs include Harvard, MIT, UC-Berkeley, Stanford, and University
of Texas just to name a few. Major
players in the MOOC space include Coursera, Khan Academy, Udacity, and edX.
The enrollment figures in some MOOC courses are
staggering. Harvard’s CS50x,”Introduction to Computer Programming” course
has an enrollment of nearly 160,000 since it was introduced in 2009. ER22x, "Justice," follows at nearly 70,000.[ii] Sebastian Thrun’s Stanford course entitled “CS221: Artificial
Intelligence: Principles and Techniques” has attracted 160,000 students
from 190 countries.[iii] According to statistics gather by EducationDive.com, edX has enrollment of
1 million registered users for 60 courses as of June 2013, while Coursera has
more than 4 million students for about 400 courses.[iv]
The appeal of MOOCs cannot be measured only by the
enrollment numbers. Participants are using MOOCs to gain educational advantages
including:
·
Personal Learning (Gaining personal knowledge
and skills on subject they want to learn)
·
Precursory learning (Prep work for an upcoming
course)
·
Self-determining learning (For the participant
who wants to gain knowledge on his/her own terms)
·
Accelerated Learning (Some MOOCS have no time
limit and allow participants to accelerate learning)
·
Refresher Learning (When was the last time you
took a Math or English course)
·
Gateway courses (Courses that serve as a bridge
to college courses that is required for a degree or certification)
MOOCs can be a viable tool for institutions of higher
learning, particularly for community colleges in placement and prework. According to Dr. Barbara Illowsky, at De Anza
College in California, MOOCs could help students prepare for and pass basic
assessment exams in English math, and writing.
Dr. Illowsky explains that setting up a system that allows community
college students to take basic subjects MOOCs prior to their enrollment would
likely result in thousands of them being able to place into higher level
courses.[v]
Broward College (through the Canvas
Network) provides the College Foundations:
Reading, Writing, and Math course that serves as a primer for
college-level work.[vi]
MOOCs can also be made available to faculty members to use
as supplementary contents and high quality learning objects that are created
collaboratively with faculty.[vii]The Canvas Network provides
instructors and institutions an open platform to share their expertise and
institutional experience with the world.
It claims to have 4.5 million users.[viii]
MOOCs are distance learning on steroids. They are
enabling anyone who wanted to learn anything in any field to have access to (in
some cases) the best teachers in that field. They provide excellent instruction for the
masses at an affordable price. In part 2
of this blog we will examine concerns and downsides associated with MOOCs.
[i] http://chronicle.com/article/What-You-Need-to-Know-About/133475/
[ii] http://harvardx.harvard.edu/news/harvardx-course-enrollments-break-500k-mark
[iii] http://chronicle.com/blogs/next/2012/05/19/as-elite-colleges-open-to-the-world-online-questions-remain-on-business-plan/
[iv] http://www.educationdive.com/news/moocs-by-the-numbers-how-do-edx-coursera-and-udacity-stack-up/161100/
[v] http://diverseeducation.com/article/53565/#
[vi] https://www.canvas.net/courses/college-foundations-reading-writing-and-math-2
[vii] http://diverseeducation.com/article/53565/
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