Evaluation of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs): A Case Study

Brenda Cecilia Padilla RodríguezUniversidad Autónoma de Nuevo León

Terese BirdUniversity of Leicester

Gráinne ConoleUniversity of Bath Spa

Global Learn, Berlin April 17, 2015

Massive Open Online Courses

The technological infrastructure has the potential to support large-scale use (Steward, 2013).

Delivery is via the Internet.

Any person in the world with Internet access can participate free of charge, without having to meet any strict pre-requisites of knowledge or demographics (Anderson, 2013).

MOOCs are coherent academic interventions with a defined set of learning outcomes (Youell, 2011), and (usually) start and end dates.

M

O

O

C

MOOCs by the University of Leicester

Forensic Science and Criminal Justice

12,511

England in the time of Richard III

10,066

Designed at “entry level”

25 November 2013 31 March 2014

MOOCs by the University of Leicester

6 weeks 2 study hours18 pages of materials

Text, audio, images, videos,

animations

Discussions, quizzes

Weekly emails

Twitter: #FLRichardIII

#FLForensicsLeic

Twitter chat (Forensic Science)

MOOCs by the University of Leicester

Data Sources

• Learning analytics

• Surveys

o 1 pre-course – demographic profile of participants

Richard III : 22.8% (n=2,285)

Forensic Science: 6.5% (n=813)

o 2 post-course

Standard FutureLearn instrument (RIII: 8.3%, n=833; FS: 9.3%, n=1159)

Designed by the University of Leicester (RIII: n=391, FS: n=140)

Participants

• Female (70%, 76%)

• Over 45 years old (77%, 54%)

• Mostly from the UK (76%, 77%)

• University studies

Participation in the MOOCs

Forensic Science and Criminal JusticeEngland in the time of Richard III

Reasons to drop out: Not enough time, losing interest or motivation and

failing to keep up as the course progressed

Participation in the MOOCs

Discussions occurred naturally, always!

Over 7,000 comments –

35%, 41% of them unsolicited!

8-9 comments per learner

Conversations via Twitter

Facebook groups

Learners’ Feedback

• Main reasons to enroll in the courses:

o to learn new things (85-88%)

o to try out FutureLearn or MOOCs in general (34-53%)

o to try out learning online (33-46%)

• Favourite aspect: learning about the topic

• Level of the course:

o Richard III: about right (69%), basic (30%)

o Forensic Science: about right (77%), basic (19%)

• Preferred activities: interacting with content (reading articles, watching videos, following links to other related materials and doing quizzes)

Learners’ Feedback

Structure: clear (97-99%)

Educators: engaging (90-91%)

Amount of time required: about right (85-86%)

Overall experience: satisfying (88-91%)

Expectations: met (49-55%) or exceeded (37-42%)

Optional comments: positive (69-82% of total comments)

Learners’ Feedback

• “…not knowing if someone had liked or commented on your posts made it difficult to strike up a dialogue which I would have liked.“

• “…far too many comments to make it sensible and the comments rarely seemed to [match] ones I shared or felt relevant to what I was wanting”

Highlights

• Openness towards online education

• MOOCs as lifelong learning

“I really enjoyed this course. I took this course because I recently retired and had some spare time on my hands. I am

not trying to further my career prospects or my academic prospects. My memory is not good at the best of times, and I

take these courses to keep the little grey cells working.”

Highlights

• MOOCs as an introduction to the topic and degree programmes

o “This course was very useful as it showed I could go 'back to school' and learn something that I was interested in”.

o “Definitely worth looking at a free (rather large) bite size chunk of what the studies involve so that you can determine whether or not you would like to take this further as a study option.”

• MOOCs as part of a student recruitment strategy