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And in this article, they break down the big three MOOCs and what makes them different from each other.

The year of the MOOCs

How you might teach with a MOOC

Flipping the College classroom using MOOCs

@Komal and Steve - article about MOOC meet ups 

This is the link to a MOOC orchestrated by Stephen Downes, "Change in Formal Education Systems". Unlike the MOOCs that are getting all the press, like Coursera and EdX which are largely replicating a model that pushes content to the learner, this MOOC is actually trying to change the dynamics of teacher-learner interactions. The live session described here is about interaction. "Interaction - The various types and methods by which interaction is supported in formal education, especially student-student, student-content and student-teacher interactions. We look especially at the capacity to substitute one form of interaction for another based on funding, time subject and context."

Analysis of MOOCs and how they might alter higher education. Not many more additional topics from the usual concerns, but they do have some interviews with MOOC participants that give the article more of a personal feel.

Kind of like Professor Dede's post about McGraw-Hill's interest in e-learning, here is a blog post from Pearson about MOOCs. I think his take (Jeff Borden, one of their VPs) is pretty accurate, in that we need a version 2 where it's not as lecture-based as version 1. I would guess that they are working on their own "version 2" solution (perhaps with Knewton?).

Maria, do you know if this event is open to the public, or more a "sponsor-day" event? I would love to go!

Not sure if it's public event, I only know about it because I will be helping with the App Inventor demo. I'll let you know once I know more info.

Kind of interesting...but two schools (HS and University?) in Canada are sponsoring a MOOC for school leaders on how to push your school / organization forward.

MOOC design

This MOOC has a better design than most, and I could get one of the leaders to teleconference with T561, if desired.

I think a live teleconference would be great!

A step to explore models for MOOCs

"Although Coursera's founders have presented their MOOCs as a way to democratize higher education by making it available online, free, to anyone in the world, the Penn survey found that in the United States and developing countries alike, most Coursera students were well educated, employed, young and male."

FYI, I went to Penn last year and was aware of this type of survey. Apparently, if you have a chance to look into their methodology, then they probably select a far larger number of Penn alumni than a representative portion. Considering that many Penn alumni love the idea of taking classes for free at their Alma Mater, I feel a bit skeptical about that reported unusually high percentage of bachelor's degree holders.

I think that this makes a lot of sense. You have to be very self-motivated with a desire to learn AND have the online resources and time to take a MOOC. That's a lot - and I would guess that people who are highly educated tend to be self-motivated. And then young men probably have more time than working parents. There's a lot of constraining factors despite the 'openness' of a MOOC.

Bill Gates on MOOCs.

Trying to move the MOOC conversation beyond hype and toward more careful analysis.

More on MOOCs: "One one side, there are those who portray traditional higher education models as enjoying too much immunity from market forces and public demands for greater academic efficiency and productivity; on the other side are faculty groups and others who are struggling against a narrative of disruption that sees higher education as a business while discounting the issues of academic quality, freedom and governance."

The American Council of Education will review some Coursera classes to see if they will recommend them to other universities as "acceptable." This involves a review by existing professors for course quality. Other interesting tidbits: looks like Coursera will pilot remote-proctoring to verify identity of students; Gates Foundation just gave away $3 million to study MOOCs and create remedial / introductory classes.

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

The Year of the MOOC 

Amazing graph you get on "google trends" when you type 'MOOC'

How a MOOC might help you!

Make your own MOOC!