31–40 of 47 posts
Somewhat related: do Silicon Valley startups consider someone with actual completed MOOC courses an asset when looking to hire?
http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/edx-drops-plans-to-co...
There is another story here. I was involved with OMI before, during and after the initial offering of the Udacity courses. I saw most of it go down. First, it is important to understand the OMI is a school politicized through and through. Jerry Brown has deep connections to the school, having financed much of the schools on-goings and involving himself continually in the school's decision making. The school has perfo…
The continual focus on completion rates is rather misguided. Like others here, I have taken many a MOOC, and consider the experience useful and successful. I have also never completed a single MOOC, doing little of the homework in most cases. I have no use for more pieces of papers, and really no time to do homework, but I get what I want, which is an overview of a subject area and some entertainment while doing the…
Indeed, the relevant number is not (students who complete) / (students who sign up). A better number to look at is (students who complete) / (cost of class) - i.e., an actual benefit/cost ratio. (It's not the best number, since it ignores the value gained by students who partially complete.) If I pay $2,000 and have a 4% chance of completion, that sucks. If I pay $0 and have a 4% chance of completion, that's pure win…
I sure wish everyone would stop claiming (or at least strongly implying) that "MOOC" and "online education" are synonymous. They aren't.
From the perspective of someone in the education space (the physical kind of education involving classrooms and face-to-face conversations), human contact is essential in education. My favorite classes from college were taught by interesting people whose personality and real-world insight gave me a far greater appreciation of the subject than what I could glean from an online video. However, this face-to-face interac…
I'm currently enrolled in an online degree program at the University of Illinois, and while the teachers are good and the material is interesting and challenging, the class is fundamentally less engaging. The closest analogue I can think of is the difference between IM and a video chat. Many conventional college students use study groups to boost their success rates. What is preventing an online course from using vid…
During the courses I took, I noticed certain trends. Students with Indian-looking names were often most concerned about the certificate of achievement given out after the course. In each course I'd see students asking if it were available yet well before the end of the course! I suspect that this may be due to the high importance that Indian society today places on the possession of credentials, even if there's insufficient knowledge and experience to back up those credentials.
Likewise, questions about the marking scheme and grading were often coming from students with Asian-looking names. I suspect that this is due to the high degree of emphasis in many Asian societies that is placed upon obtaining extremely high grades in academic studies, even if these grades don't truly reflect understanding.
And questions asking about exact midterm or exam content tended to come from students with Western European or American names. These societies tend to place a lot of emphasis on getting work done with minimal effort, including getting exam questions in advance to avoid unnecessary, from a grading perspective, studying.
Bring together all of those students, and those types of questions can easily take up 70% or more of the discussion. That doesn't leave much room for other discussion. Even that discussion was usually lacking, due to many students not having a good grasp of the course's language of instruction. Bringing together students with different backgrounds may be a good thing, but too much difference is just as bad as extreme uniformity, if not worse. At least in the case of uniformity there is the similarity that the students have in common.
- Pacabel
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm currently enrolled in an online degree program at the University of Illinois, and while the teachers are good and the material is interesting and challenging, the class is fundamentally less engaging. The closest analogue I can think of is the difference between IM and a video chat. Many conventional college students use study groups to boost their success rates. What is preventing an online course from using vid…
The problem with MOOC forums are that they bring together students with very different expectations and attitudes toward education and learning. During the courses I took, I noticed certain trends. Students with Indian-looking names were often most concerned about the certificate of achievement given out after the course. In each course I'd see students asking if it were available yet well before the end of the cours…
Also, there is no "revolution" here. That's just hype, both from the media and the companies. MOOCs would have existed decades ago, but the cost of distribution of the content was high. With the arrival of YouTube and cheap content delivery networks including Amazon's, MOOCs suddenly eliminated the distribution problem. But it turns out that wasn't enough. When 90% of your "students" fail to complete the courses, you…
But I've still learned a lot, and I've been using some of the stuff I've learned in those side projects.
From the perspective of someone in the education space (the physical kind of education involving classrooms and face-to-face conversations), human contact is essential in education. My favorite classes from college were taught by interesting people whose personality and real-world insight gave me a far greater appreciation of the subject than what I could glean from an online video. However, this face-to-face interac…
However, everyone learns differently. I have found greater success in learning without that kind of interaction. Such contact may be essential for a subset of students, but certainly not all. I find the potential of MOOCs exciting because it finally moves us away from believing the one-size-fits-all model serves all students equally. The future of education is probably not MOOCs alone, or brick and mortar schools alo…
I personally like to learn in isolation, I have a tendency to quickly ~plagiarize ideas of others thinking I understand, so learning alone in my room is better.
Inspiring teachers I've met fits on one hand fingers.
I enrolled on many MOOCs, dropped right away from 50% of them (acute click-itis), got late halfway and dropped 25% (but what I could got was solid improvements), finished the rest with many worthy discoveries and good exercises, surrounded by interesting encounters interactions on IRC.
[1] I'd like to add that an unconfident student will have difficulties with teachers too. Small politics, personal preferences and shallow details will play against you. Think submitting a shitty looking but concise self-critical .pdf summary of your project vs a nicely printed and shiny report but full of fluff.
There is another story here. I was involved with OMI before, during and after the initial offering of the Udacity courses. I saw most of it go down. First, it is important to understand the OMI is a school politicized through and through. Jerry Brown has deep connections to the school, having financed much of the schools on-goings and involving himself continually in the school's decision making. The school has perfo…