MOOCs and Liberal Education

Interesting list.

"the author examines lessons from massive open online courses (MOOCs) for small liberal arts colleges (LACs) in the United States. While some consider MOOCs a threat to LACs, they can also be seen as a provocation to spur small institutions to improve their offerings and assert their place in the higher education landscape. The paper examines how LACs might draw on the best tools, approaches, and structures emerging from the MOOC revolution in order to help students build lifelong learning habits."

A nice survey.

Fascinating reflections and issues. I wonder what a better platform would look like.

Cites fears of legislatures cutting costs even further.

"among academics, there seems to be as yet nothing but the consideration of students around the world as statistical figures." An interesting take on the serious problems of translation and cultural context in education

Yes. Although I rarely hear any academics express interest in this aspect of MOOCs.

<< NOTE: This is an ACTIVIST course, with MOOCs not just the platform but also the subject matter for our online conversations. For example, I am very excited about what we will all learn from a global forum directed at the question: "What is the history of defunding public education in YOUR country in YOUR lifetime?" >> The quote above struck me. Having read this course description makes me wonder, if MOOCs can not also be used a bit differently, to further open up the door to the international arena to our students on campus. I have recently been doing a lot of reading on transcultural literacy and competence, which focuses on being able to successfully navigate cultural differences between any culture and the own. Businesses today train their top executives to be transcultural, being able to work anywhere, and manage and lead in any country. I know foreign language curricula have not been very responsive in adjusting to this new need from firms. To full fill this demand, schools would have to push students to gain competence in multiple languages and cultures, on a more shallow level, instead of the mastery that is demanded in the current curricula in one language and culture. Since most institutions claim, that they promote global citizenship, maybe there is a way of assigning groups, and encouraging international and cross cultural communication between the students on campus, and those enrolled in the MOOC from where ever they might be located. I know that managing this, and keeping on top of the conversation partners could be a night mare, and that it doesn't entirely fit into the MOOC frame work, at least the way I understand it at the moment, but I'd love to hear what everyone else i thinking.

This is a thought-provoking article. More about learner-initiated learning than MOOCs.

Trent's a brilliant guy. Well worth the read.

This does not surprise me.

25%... how would that compare to awareness of other educational technology platforms?

A lengthy op-ed from one of the signers of the SJSU letter.

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=)

Interesting argument. We'll have to see where the money flows, since MOOCs began as academic, non-publishing projects. Maybe they should speak of publishing capturing MOOCs.

It could certainly increase the amount of people profiting from publishings.

A report published Monday by Moody's Investors Service says that the spread of massive open online courses, or MOOCs, is "credit positive" for universities that offer them but "credit negative" for the majority of lesser-known institutions that lack a prominent brand name.

Davidson is planning to run a MOOC soon on the history of higher ed, and has promised to blog her progress in its development.  This is the first installment.

Very useful stuff, seeing one MOOC being made.

Karen Head is an assistant professor in the Georgia Institute of Technology's School of Literature, Media, and Communication, and director of the university's Communication Center. She reports periodically on her group's efforts to develop and offer a massive open online course in freshman composition.

MOOC resource run by the cMOOC founders.