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A complete list of free online courses offered by Stanford, Coursera, MIT and Harvard led edX (MITx + Harvardx + BerkeleyX), and Udacity

This article looks at one case study in El Salvador where MOOCs have cracked open the door for university reform. Universities in emerging markets operate on really low budgets compared to U.S. universities, and MOOCs give them access to current content, especially important for high-tech subjects.

This is a natural progression for MOOC's. But I have to wonder, if the wave of the future is a MOOC higher education, then how will our young adults develop, socially? developmentally? psychologically? Will we create a society of socially incompetent adults who are not able to work intereactively, or in groups with co-workers, or lacking negotiation skills, or many of the 21st c. skills needed in many workplaces.

The ecosystem continues to build around MOOC's...

One of two articles in the NYTimes they just posted about MOOCs. This one talks about the revolution!

This article links to the contract between Coursera and the University of Michigan, mentioning the monetization possibilities, among others. https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/400864-coursera-fully-executed-agreement.html#document/p40

are you taking the designing a new learning environment online course?

Sebastian Thrun, CEO of Udacity, has openly admitted that his company's MOOC courses are a lousy replacement for actual university class and instead will be taking his company to focus more on corporate training. I personally will reserve further judgement until after I finish the readings for next week.

Grif - where did the Stephen Downes quote come from ? I read the Rebecca Schuman article and don't really agree with her. To expand on the Schuman quote you posted - it's really interesting how she says the massive lecture format doesn't work but then provides two examples of massive technology that do work - texting and World of Warcraft. This relates directly to some of what we talked about earlier this semester. I don't think it's the 'massive,' as Schuman implies, that causes the failure of a MOOC. It's part of the design. Once the design is better and more engaging, then MOOCs may find that they have higher retention rates. Schuman: Successful education needs personal interaction and accountability, period. This is, in fact, the same reason students feel annoyed, alienated, and anonymous in large lecture halls and thus justified in sexting and playing World of Warcraft during class-and why the answer is not the MOOC, but the tiny, for-credit, in-person seminar that has neither a sexy acronym nor a potential for huge corporate partnerships.

The Downes quote was from OLDaily, which is a daily listserve of his that I subscribe too. I think the difference between texting/WoW and MOOCs is that, while both have many many users, the former two have means in which those groups are disaggregated into smaller units that are largely responsible for the UX/individual growth that goes on. I agree with you that massive is not necessarily the failure, in fact, I think it's the best thing they have going for them. However, until the design can leverage meaningful collaboration, like WoW and texting, the massive will remain a burden.

Free webinar on Sept 23 to discuss skills for on-line faciltators

An example of student preconceived notions preventing them from learning scientific concepts.

Thanks, Diana. I can use this article in two of my other classes.

Great video - key quote "You can forget facts but you can't forget understandings." Yes - I would agree that Merseth and a number of other HGSE professors structure their courses for engagement in a similar manner. Requiring reading & active reflection (by via a written brief, case preparation, or online quiz) before the class / lecture is a great way to prep for deeper engagement and understanding. The genius in Mazur's approach is to use technology to assess before class and during class what his students understand and, more importantly, don't understand AND then tailor what he presents next to address misconceptions.

One teacher claims that "The idea is to invert the normal rhythms of school, so that lectures are viewed on the kids' own time and homework is done at school." - Do you agree that this is a good solution? 

I too am intrigued by this "inverting" of time spent in the classroom and at home. My idealized model would be to introduce learners to new material at their own pace out of the classroom (allowing for pausing, note taking, reflecting and/or rewinding) and focus classroom time on face to face guiding and coaching of clusters of students or individual students engaged in applying or exploring the current material. To help facilitate this (and assist with accountability) some brief form of pre-assessment before class or at the start of class could illuminate for student and teacher alike what material has been mastered and what needs more attention. The research report from the TIE Foundations summer reading appears to support this type of hybrid approach. => Marsha Lovett, Oded Meyer, and Candace Thille (2008). The Open Learning Initiative: Measuring the effectiveness of the OLI statistics course in accelerating student learning.

An added benefit of tools such as Khan Academy is the option for reinforcement. In a traditional K-12 school environment students do not have the option to watch a video of their class or spend personalized time reviewing a concept they need more time with during class time due to the required pace of school curriculum. An online learning tool allows a student to watch a lesson as many times as needed and to learn from an expert. Often if a student needs help outside the classroom the only people they turn to is parents, who may or may not know about the content themselves.

The idea of "showing what you know" and earning badges instead of degrees? In this economic downswing, could something like this become the new emergent way of learning and of assessing? Thoughts?

Sounds like the digital badge is more lke a digital portfolio- which I would more likely support. I find it interesting that our education system (which strives and struggles to provide consistent, high quality education from coast to coast) is seen as deficient but this badge proposal will be the answer? It's like the flood of support for home-schooling after a home-schooler wins a national competition but no one knows about the tens of homescholers I had to remediate in rural NH. Standardization is the key for any system to be integrated into another system. The variety of education models we have in our country makes it difficult for employers to integrate employees. If this digital badge concept relies on a variety of models, they will have the same problem.

The prospect of digital badges to show what you know is both exciting with its potential affordances and worrisome with some of its limitations and ambiguity. It'd be great if the ideal came to pass that digital badges would allow valid demonstration of super-specific skills and knowledge over a greater range of fields and topics than what having a B.A. or B.S. currently does. Digital badges could represent the most particular concepts or skills at a granular level even-- those that are essential in the real-world (whether that be desired by employers or otherwise). If the task or test or challenge, or whatever else would be the means of assessment for earning a badge, was carefully designed and evaluated to be a truly valid measure of proficiency, then earning a badge for something would be a clear indication that you know something. But like Allison said, standardization would be key. What would these assessments/ badge challenges be- so that they would be truly valid indicators of proficiency? Who would be the purveyors or authorities to determine the assessments or challenges to accomplish a badge? Given the medium (completing badge assessments on one's own computer or mobile device - from any site they're at potentially) - what's to stop a user from going "open book" or "opening another tab" in order to look up answers to questions or tutorials on how to do a task, in order to complete the assessment? Doing this would allow a user to ace the assessment and earn the badge- but would defeat any value of the badge in truly demonstrating knowledge or skill. By imagining if digital badges did reach mass-acceptance and use in the real world, and we were to ultimately find them all over the internet like we're now finding social media widgets, it made me realize that the "prove proficiency anywhere I am in any way I want" won't work. I changed fields and career paths from what I studied in college, so I definitely appreciate the value in being able to truly show e

New delivery platform, but from what I can tell, same lecture format. "Disruptive" in that it offers students (who might not otherwise be students) a chance to sit in and learn the same content as the rich/smart enough to have a seat at MIT, Yale Stanford, etc.

I read this article this afternoon, and thought of it when I was doing work for my wiki assignment. I am looking into the blog Teachers Love SMART Boards (http://smartboards.typepad.com/) and I saw that the author of the blog also works for Teacher Online Training, which offers courses (for a fee) for teachers interested in implementing technologies in their classroom, or using the technology they currently have in a more meaningful way. The majority of the blog was reviews of free sites or education-oriented tools from outside sources, but there were a few posts that dealt with the programs offered by TOT. It made me wonder whether the blog was intended to be impartial, or a form of advertising... He mentioned his job in the company at the beginning of most if not all of the posts that promoted their programs, but these new guidelines may put this blogger in a sticky situation.

I have viewed these webinars before and I would advise you to give it a go.