What are MOOCs?
by Dr. Marshall G. Jones, Winthrop University Used here with permission. Visit his Free Online Learning Tools site.
MOOC stands for Massive Open Online Course. The massive part refers to the numbers of students who can enroll in the course. And the numbers are massive. One of the best known MOOCs was taught by Stanford University Professor, Sebastian Thrun. He taught a MOOC on artificial intelligence. The course was open, anybody could enroll, and it was free. 160,000 students enrolled in the class. In case you are curious, that is more than the total number of people enrolled in all artificial intelligence classes in the United States that year combined.
Thrun was so moved by the experience that he said: "Having done this, I can't teach at Stanford again. You can take the blue pill and go back to your classroom and lecture to your 20 students, but I've taken the red pill and I've seen Wonderland." (See this article for a full story.) And so he left Stanford to start a company called Udacity, which is one of a growing number of companies focused on developing free online courses available to anyone, anywhere. MOOC providers vary. There are companies who are creating courses. There are consortia of organizations who are working together to offer them. Some are created by people as they take the class. Some of the most well known providers at the moment are:
MOOC stands for Massive Open Online Course. The massive part refers to the numbers of students who can enroll in the course. And the numbers are massive. One of the best known MOOCs was taught by Stanford University Professor, Sebastian Thrun. He taught a MOOC on artificial intelligence. The course was open, anybody could enroll, and it was free. 160,000 students enrolled in the class. In case you are curious, that is more than the total number of people enrolled in all artificial intelligence classes in the United States that year combined.
Thrun was so moved by the experience that he said: "Having done this, I can't teach at Stanford again. You can take the blue pill and go back to your classroom and lecture to your 20 students, but I've taken the red pill and I've seen Wonderland." (See this article for a full story.) And so he left Stanford to start a company called Udacity, which is one of a growing number of companies focused on developing free online courses available to anyone, anywhere. MOOC providers vary. There are companies who are creating courses. There are consortia of organizations who are working together to offer them. Some are created by people as they take the class. Some of the most well known providers at the moment are:
- http://www.udacity.com. A start up by former Stanford Professor Sebastian Thrun. Classes are typically created by the company. Teachers are from a diverse set of backgrounds, and may or may not be associated with a university.
- https://www.coursera.org. Coursera partners with Universities around the world to offer free courses.Courses are offered in partnership with universities, and the course instructor is typically associated with the university.
- https://www.edx.org. EdX is a consortium of universities that offer MOOCs. MIT, Harvard, UC Berkley and the University of Texas system are some of the well known members of this non profit offering MOOCs. Courses are offered by the university, and teachers are typically associated with the university.
- https://p2pu.org/en. Peer to Peer University works on a model of people creating course materials together to study various topics. So the course is a collaboration of peers working together. There may not be an instructor in the traditional sense.
- https://www.uopeople.org. The worlds first tuition free online university. Information from their "about" page: "Founded in 2009 by educational entrepreneur Shai Reshef, UoPeople is affiliated with the United Nations GAID, the Clinton Global Initiative, and Yale Law School ISP. UoPeople has signed collaborative partnership agreements with New York University (NYU) to accept students; and with Hewlett-Packard (HP), through the Catalyst Initiative, to provide student internship opportunities. UoPeople offers undergraduate programs in Business Administration and Computer Science. To date, more than 1500 students from 132 countries have been accepted. Of students polled consecutively each term, 95% would recommend UoPeople to a peer."
There are more MOOC offerings available as well beyond those listed above. MOOCs typically have a start and stop date, like a traditional course. You may find emails or Tweets saying that a MOOC is forming and will begin on a particular day. There are also MOOC-like offerings. If you are confused about whether or not something is a MOOC or is an Open Educational Resource (OER), you aren't alone. Technically speaking, a MOOC could be a kind of OER. Some might argue that because you can't modify it or reuse it, then it really isn't an OER. Others might counter, well it is, but it has the most restrictive type of Creative Commons License. And then, we all just get more confused. Certainly, there are distinctions. MOOCs are typically complete, self-contained courses. But what a MOOC does and how it functions will vary from MOOC to MOOC, from provider to provider. I'm not convinced that the terms really matter all that much at this point. An OER may be more like a reusable learning object, something that can be used in a variety of different courses in a variety of different ways. But whether or not iTunes U is a MOOC or an OER probably depends on your perspective and your needs. It may be analogous to the term Web 2.0, where it refers generally to some broad ideas but may not have a specific technical definitions. Again, opinions will vary, and I'm sure there are eloquent people who could tell me why there are firm definitions and why they matter. This link leads to a great article about MOOCs and MOOC comparisons.
At this point in time, MOOCs are getting a great deal of attention. And with good reason. Free classes from some of the world's finest learning organizations is a good thing. But there are things to be aware of and cautious of. Some of those issues are listed below:
My sincere thanks to Dr. Jones for sharing the information above.
Another interesting insight into MOOCs can be had from a TED talk that Daphne Koller gave, "What we're learning from online education?" Daphne Koller is enticing top universities to put their most intriguing courses online for free -- not just as a service, but as a way to research how people learn. With Coursera (cofounded by Andrew Ng), each keystroke, quiz, peer-to-peer discussion and self-graded assignment builds an unprecedented pool of data on how knowledge is processed. With Coursera, Daphne Koller and co-founder Andrew Ng are bringing courses from top colleges online, free, for anyone who wants to take them.
At this point in time, MOOCs are getting a great deal of attention. And with good reason. Free classes from some of the world's finest learning organizations is a good thing. But there are things to be aware of and cautious of. Some of those issues are listed below:
- Drop out rates. They are high in many MOOCs. There may be many reasons for this, but the fact is that while thousands of people sign up for class, thousands don't finish them.
- Cheating. As is the case in many online classes, we don't really know who is doing the assignments. There are strategies to deal with this, but at this point many of them are experimental.
- Assessment. Much of the work done in MOOCs is assessed through computer gradable tests. While this is convenient, it does raise questions of cheating and what kind of learning is happening in the MOOC. Organizations offering MOOCs are aware of this and are working on these issues. There is much talk of new methods of managing learners, such artificial intelligence and the use of advanced learning analytics to manage this. But at this point, much of it is still experimental and in development.
- Credit. Free learning is nice, and life long learning is a noble goal. Now that the courses are available, many people want some way to certify what they know. Many of edX's partners will offer an exam, for a fee, to certify that someone has mastered the content. Others are looking at how we can provide credit for these experiences. None of these credit issues has been resolved at this point, but there is movement in that direction.
- Quality. While many MOOCs are excellent, some aren't. They suffer from issues related to production value. Videos may not play on all computer systems. There may be spelling errors in content. There may be broken links. Some of these issues are things that you wouldn't see in a commercially available course. There are also content errors, or at the very least perspectives that are presented as "settled" when in fact they are still in debate in many fields.
My sincere thanks to Dr. Jones for sharing the information above.
Another interesting insight into MOOCs can be had from a TED talk that Daphne Koller gave, "What we're learning from online education?" Daphne Koller is enticing top universities to put their most intriguing courses online for free -- not just as a service, but as a way to research how people learn. With Coursera (cofounded by Andrew Ng), each keystroke, quiz, peer-to-peer discussion and self-graded assignment builds an unprecedented pool of data on how knowledge is processed. With Coursera, Daphne Koller and co-founder Andrew Ng are bringing courses from top colleges online, free, for anyone who wants to take them.
Page last modified June 18, 2019
