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A remarkably worthwhile podcast episode, discussing digital divide issues, support for mobile phones in MOOCs, and online pedagogy.

I tend to fall into this camp...the best MOOCs will be focused on learning and using best practices for online learning. Obviously, the size of MOOCs make that challenging...

"I soon wasn't watching all the videos, and I certainly wasn't doing the practice homework that no one would ever grade. Honestly, I felt more like an audience member than a student." It seems that we have gotten too reliant on stimulation and feed back. Our entire school system and university system is built around mentoring and motivating, where the teacher has the role of an encouraging trainer more than anything else. Have we lost our ability of independent learning, not for a carrot that a teacher holds out in front of us, but for ourselves? I find myself in the same boat as the author of "Essays on disappointing experience". I am not disappointed with the MOOC experience, but am surprised that it takes such high levels of discipline to sit down and do the assignments asked for in the MOOC. Maybe this is a problem of the well to do, that have on some level lost the connection between the insemination of knowledge and the real possibility of upward mobility? NPR had a fascinating report: How Much Can Children Teach Themselves ( see the link below) and again, the children in question grew up in a poor area of Southern India. (http://www.npr.org/2013/06/21/179015266/how-much-can-children-teach-themselves?utm_medium=Email&utm_source=share&utm_campaign=)