Massive Open Online Courses: the Future of Learning?

ALA Annual 2013, Chicago #ala2013 and/or #moocFuture

Massive Open Online Courses

Michelle Keba, Heather Rayl, Ilene Frank, Valerie Hill, PhD

The future of learning?


Massive Open Online Courses

The future of learning?


OverviewMichelle KebaDistance & Instructional Services LibrarianNova Southeastern University

Heather RaylEmerging Technology LibrarianIndiana State University

Ilene FrankDirector of Library ServicesUniversity of the People

Valerie Hill, PhDLISD School Librarian, Adjunct InstructorTWU School of Library and Info Studies

Introduction

Monetization

Copyright

Immersive Learning


INTRODUCTIONWhat are these MOOCs anyway?


MOOCs in the beginning

• First MOOC Offered in 2008– “Connectivism and Connective

Knowledge”– Created by George Siemens and

Stephen Downes at the University of Manitoba

• At this time Dave Cormier and Bryan Alexander coined the phrase “Massive Open Online Course”


What made this course a MOOC?

• Massive– Over 2,000 students signed up for the

course– Had a steady enrollment of 1,870

persistent students

• Open• Online• Course



• Massive• Open

– 24 tuition paying students from the University of Manitoba

– 2,200 non-paying participants from around the world

• Online• Course



• Massive• Open• Online

– Information was conveyed by the instructors via a wiki, a blog, Moodle, Elluminate, and a newsletter

– Students created Second Life communities, blogs, concept maps, Wordle summaries, and a Google group

• Course



• Massive• Open• Online• Course

– Offered over the span of 12 weeks


A New Level of Massive

• In 2011 over 160,000 students enrolled in an Artificial Intelligence course

• The course was co-taught by a Stanford professor, Sebastian Thrun and Peter Norvig, Director of Research at Google


The Launch of MOOC Providers

• In 2012 three major providers of MOOCs, Udacity, Coursera, and edX are launched


Udacity

• Founded by Stanford professors Sebastian Thrun, David Stavens, and Mike Sokolsky

• Includes 25 courses focused on business, mathematics, computer science and physics


Coursera

• Founded by computer science professors Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller from Stanford University

• Offers 378 courses from 81 partners in 25 different categories


edX

• MOOC platform founded in 2012 by MIT and Harvard

• Partners with 27 colleges and universities

• As of June 4th, 55 courses are available for registration


How can I search more than one MOOC provider at once?

• MOOC Aggregators– http://www.coursebuffet.com/– http://www.class-central.com/

http://www.coursebuffet.com/

http://www.class-central.com/


Types of MOOCs

xMOOCs vs. cMOOCs


xMOOCs

• Traditional course/lecture format

• Focus on knowledge duplication

• Emphasis on video presentations

• Follow a linear, instructor lead path

• Objective feedback from online quiz results


cMOOCs

• Based on the principles of Connectivism

• Focus on knowledge creation

• Emphasis on social networked learning

• Course path evolves from student input

• Crowd sourced learning through peer interaction


MONETIZATION

How are these things going to sustain themselves anyway?

Image: DavidDMuir

http://www.flickr.com/photos/daviddmuir/2125697998/


How much does it cost to produce a MOOC?

Image: jsawkins

Image: Ben EllisImage: John Ott

Image: Nomadic Lass

Image: {mostly absent}

http://www.flickr.com/photos/everypassingminute/4203343014/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ezalis/77430740/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/thousandshipz/3097324011/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/thousandshipz/3097324011/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/nomadic_lass/6820209341/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/darrentunnicliff/4469318003/



Image: Nick Ares

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aresauburnphotos/2678453389/



$15,000 - $50,000 in production costs

100 – 300 hours preparation

8-10 hours a week during the class


How are MOOC providers funded?

venture capital

non-profit

$15 million

$16 million

$60 million from Harvard and MIT grants


What are the revenue streams?

Remedial courses for credit for students not prepared for college.

Complete CS master’s degree. Courses still free, but if you want degree, you pay tuition.



Licensing courses for blended

learning



Wants to become self-sustaining

Universi

ty

partners

In-person professor contact

Certification

Course licensing/blended learning


It’s all about volume.

“There's going to be a lot of information about these people taking tests…Just like Facebook makes money…The Silicon Valley view of things in this sort of space is, first, get the volume. Once you get the volume, then you've got the data. Once you've got the data, you sell the data.” Photo credit: Narissa Escanlar


MOOCS AND COPYRIGHTOpen Courses and Access to Resources


Resources for registered students

• We license material from vendors• We link to open educational resources• We invoke rights to fair use, the provisions

of the TEACH Act• We know who to ask for help if copyright

questions arise


What about open courses? A variety of “students”!

MOOC students• may have no academic affiliation with our institution

– or any other• may not be near a public library• may be from anywhere on the planet• may have different demographics than students we

usually serve • may not have the best technology - or different

technology (older computers, mobile tech, limited Internet access)


MOOCs - Operative Term “Open”

So what kinds of materials can we use in online open courses? • Open educational resources • Proprietary resources

– Licensed ? For 140,000 students who are not registered at our institution?

– Fee-based ? For 140,000 students?? – Fair use ? – Permission ?


What resources are used? Two Examples

• A Beginner’s Guide to Irrational Economic Behavior (Duke)

• E-Learning and Digital Media (University of Edinburgh)


Dan Ariely’s Beginner’s Guide to Irrational Behavior (Duke)

• A bundle of Professor Dan’s popular books via Amazon. Geo-blocked!

• Video lectures and Google Hangouts• Many readings from academic journals and

some non-scholarly sources such as the New York Times. Over 400 pages of required reading.


E-Learning and Digital Media

• Video clips – trailers, animated shorts, etc. from YouTube, Vimeo

• Readings from open access scholarly journals• Some secondary reading suggestions were not

available for free online• Students shared their digital artifacts on the

course site – and via links.• Students were reminded about copyright and the

use of digital images , etc. in their projects


Make Some Deals, Get Permission

• Kevin Smith tells how contacting the media dept of a textbook publisher was effective

• Coursera has made deals with some textbook publishers to allow use in MOOCs


Who owns the course? Who owns student work?

• For stand-alone open courses it’s up to each institution to set policies

• For MOOCs using other platforms (Coursera, edX, Udacity, etc.), check the Terms of Service.


Coursera Terms of Use

https://www.coursera.org/about/terms Take the course – but don’t take anything (?)

https://www.coursera.org/about/terms




Coursera: Students Permission to Use Material

• https://www.coursera.org/about/terms• Permission to Use Materials• All content or other materials available on the Sites, including but not

limited to code, images, text, layouts, arrangements, displays, illustrations, audio and video clips, HTML files and other content are the property of Coursera and/or its affiliates or licensors and are protected by copyright, patent and/or other proprietary intellectual property rights under the United States and foreign laws. In consideration for your agreement to the terms and conditions contained here, Coursera grants you a personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable license to access and use the Sites. You may download material from the Sites only for your own personal, non-commercial use. You may not otherwise copy, reproduce, retransmit, distribute, publish, commercially exploit or otherwise transfer any material, nor may you modify or create derivatives works of the material. The burden of determining that your use of any information, software or any other content on the Site is permissible rests with you.




Coursera: User material submission

• By submitting the Feedback, you hereby grant Coursera and the Participating Institutions an irrevocable license to use, disclose, reproduce, distribute, sublicense, prepare derivative works of, publicly perform and publicly display any such submission.


Course ownership: Coursera andU of Illinois example

• Does the University retain ownership of the content in a Coursera course?

• The content in our MOOCs is governed by the same rules of ownership as apply to our on-campus or traditional online courses, i.e., unless otherwise agreed to by the instructor, intellectual property rights to any course content created by the instructor independently and at the instructor’s initiative, rest with the instructor. Where the course support provided by the University is over and above the University resources usually and customarily provided, as will likely be the case with most MOOCs, course content created by the instructor shall be owned by the instructor and licensed to the University. See “The General Rules Concerning University Organization and Procedure,” Article III, particularly Section 4(b) at http://www.bot.uillinois.edu/general-rules.

http://mooc.illinois.edu/resources/faqfaculty/

http://www.bot.uillinois.edu/general-rules


Contrast: OERu – OER only

OER university• A collaboration of

universities to provide courses for self-directed learners using open content (with no cost to students)

• Collaborating universities will assess the work and offering credits (with some cost to students)

http://wikieducator.org/OER_university/Home


MOOCS, IMMERSIVE LEARNING, AND THE FUTURE


How we collaborated• We met on twitter #moocmooc• We contacted by email• We talked on google hangouts• We presented in Second Life• We did a run-through on Blackboard

Collaborate


How we learned

• We collected a literature review• We used content curation• We explored MOOCs


Mighty Bell: Collaboration Space


A content curation site


MOOCs&

LibrariansACRL

Virtual World Interest GroupFeb. 17th, 2013Panelists: Valerie Hill, PhDMichelle KebaIlene FrankGeorge Djorgovski


My research topic:Virtual World Librarianship

Hill, Valerie (2012). Factors contributing to the adoption of virtual worlds by librarians. PhD Dissertation, Texas Woman's University.


Coursera: Top Universities offer MOOCs

MOOCs on Libraryand

Information Topics


Coursera MOOC


Can a MOOC take place in a virtual world?

• Massive (virtual worlds can hold only so many avatars)

• Open (virtual worlds are open on a global scale)

• Online (virtual worlds are online)• Courses (Courses can take place-

both synchronous and asychronous)


MOOC Classmates



Anne Frank MOOC

Fall 2012Educators met weekly for MOOC office hours on Wed. evenings. Assignments presented in a 3D virtual world.

Students “enter” the cramped annex where Anne Frank livedin hiding.


Mixed Reality & Media Formats


Experience History in 3D


Collaboration Across Distance

Meeting for “class in the park in Amsterdam”




Exploration of new media is like “entering

the book”.


Personal Reflection

Immersion in the experience can help students understand history on a deep, personal level.


Advantages of MOOCs

• No cost (or low cost)• Personal interest• Convenient (no travel)• Access to experts and global

participants


Disadvantages of MOOCs

• Lack of assessment• Accreditation & quality assurance• Future of academic careers• Potential for isolation


Can MOOCs provide high quality resources and opportunities to promote information literacy?

The future is ripe with possibilities.


Role of Information Literacy Librarian

•Taking the library to new spaces•Embedded librarians•Redesigning our physical spaces•Balancing tradition & innovation


Information Literacyin the Digital Age

• Intellectual freedom• Intellectual property• Critical inquiry• Evaluation of content• Navigation of the “flood”


Role of Personal Responsibility(We live in a global, participatory, digital culture.)


The library and the librarian are not synonymous.

Take a risk and go where nolibrarian has gone before!

“It may be that the great age of libraries is waning, but I am here to tell you that the great age of librarians is just beginning. It’s up to you to decide if you want to be a part of it.”

~T. Scott Plutchak


Contact UsMichelle KebaDistance & Instructional Services LibrarianNova Southeastern University

Heather Raylhttp://HeatherRayl.com

Ilene Frankhttp://sites.google.com/site/ilenefrank/

Valerie Hill, PhDhttp://vhill.edublogs.org/[email protected]

Introduction

@operopis

@ifrank

@valibrarian


Education

Massive Open Online Courses: the Future of Learning?