Drop ins: MOOCs and the price of learning

As an undergraduate in the US in the early 1970s, it was not uncommon for there to be people in our classes "auditing" the course. (Auditing in the sense, "listening", i.e. attending but not enrolled.) While auditing was supposed to be governed by regulations there were a range of practices from entirely informal dropping in, … Continue reading Drop ins: MOOCs and the price of learning

MOOCs Stadium Rock or folk clubs

Choose your metaphor. The discourse around MOOCs is congealing around a set of qualities. Bigger better; inherited authority; transmitted knowledge; cognitivist construction; solitary interaction with content. To some extent it is a matter of taste. Or learning preference. Or community. I saw the Police play Twickenham once. It was OK. Entertaining. But nothing was challenged. … Continue reading MOOCs Stadium Rock or folk clubs

The reification of Learning Design

This is a reflection for the OLDS-MOOC on the  underpinning principles that I apply when designing and developing educational interventions at various scales. When IMS LD was developed it aimed to address what were seen as limitations in SCORM (or here)  and IEEE LOM. Learning Design (LD) as a learning technology software specification was intended … Continue reading The reification of Learning Design

Launch of the OLDS MOOC

Well things didn't look promising at 1600. Cloudworks database error, and YouTube livestream not streaming. The QT feed from the OU worked. But the uni-directional presentation with no back channel or discussion forum (well there is Twitter!) made it a bit well... lacking? Twitter was sort of engaged but mostly with the tech problems for … Continue reading Launch of the OLDS MOOC

x v c: falsifiability or hybrid learning in, through and about MOOCs

[This is my abstract for OER13] Two thousand and twelve was the year of the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) (Creelman 2012). The MOOC has become a complex phenomenon leaving aspiring designers and conveners with many questions and decisions to make. Speaking loosely, observers notice two broad categories of MOOC. cMOOCs are the earlier form, … Continue reading x v c: falsifiability or hybrid learning in, through and about MOOCs

Open is as open does – what do you want in an #fslt #oer #mooc

As planning gets underway to run a mooc based in the first instance on OCSLD's First steps into learning and teaching (#fslt) in higher education I have been struck by a couple of questions. First is when does a mooc start? Second is how open should the mooc planning process be? The questions are related. … Continue reading Open is as open does – what do you want in an #fslt #oer #mooc

Extending your online course

Last month I and some colleagues developed, ran and participated in an online course called extending your online course. The course site is here: https://sites.google.com/a/brookes.ac.uk/extending-your-on-line-course/ My reflective blog for this course is here: http://extendingonline.brookesblogs.net/ It was one of the best learning experiences I have participated in in recent years. I mention this now by way … Continue reading Extending your online course

Extending your online course

I am developing a new online course on "Extending your online course" (how meta is that). We go live with it on 2 November 2011. This four-week short course focuses on enhancing teaching and learning by using new technology and tools - social media - for interactivity and engagement. What does that mean? We are … Continue reading Extending your online course

Teaching across two sites using “Classroom” audiographics – trials and tribulations

Audiographic tools can enable teaching and the support of learning across two or more sites but our university's classroom computing infrastructure cannot support audiographic tools: local hardware is not up to the job. I conducted a trial this week to test these propositions. Context Our University has four main campuses. We are structurally divided into … Continue reading Teaching across two sites using “Classroom” audiographics – trials and tribulations