Ross Woods, Mark Anderson, Valerie Bock, 2019
How can we simulate personal attention at MOOC scales?
One apparently successful technique is peer-to-peer support. It's amazing how much students can learn from each other if the MOOC nurtures an environment akin to a community of practice. If MOOC leaders can get the community aspect right, then the large numbers of students in a MOOC can become a strength rather than a weakness.
The MOOC 'Introduction to Computer Science' (CS50) on EdX seems to be achieving this very well. This Harvard program has developed a phenomenal organic peer support system in its associated Facebook group. Student who have difficulty with one of the concepts or assessment tasks can post a question to the group and more advanced peers will quickly give high quality responses. The success of this MOOC reinforces the importance of community; students thrive academically because they feel part of something.
MIT's 'Intro to Computer Science' offers a similar experience. It was well-staffed with people who paid close attention to the discussion sections, and who scurried to publish additional learning aids when it was clear that a substantial number of students were struggling. But there was also a lot of peer help. Perhaps coding courses are unique in this. The open source culture gives a clear sense that, if someone is known as being helpful, it could could enhance their career.
Dan Gilmor's Media Lit class on edX also has some excellent discussions. Again, it helped that Dan and the course team were all over these discussions, even when there were complaints like How come you marked question 10 wrong on the quiz?
The overall impression was that, despite the canned nature of the lectures, this space was for conversation and making meaning. It's not the worst thing when people have to ask really good questions to earn the attention of staff.
Another course is a somewhat less skillful implementation of the Edx platform. The first week features a series of 7-15 minute mini-lectures, which are quite good, especially since they are very introductory. Instead of highlighting the discussion in the left column, it's just another step in the first activity set in a menu across the top, and it's the very last one. The seed was Post any questions
and despite that lame prompt, and the fact that you have to click a button to even see whether there is any discussion happening (the place looks empty at first glance) people are introducing themselves and chatting a bit. The assessment
is an ungraded diagnostic, which has many people concerned because they are not receiving credit, but that issue is being handled in the discussion. It looks like this MOOC provider is still very much in the experimental stages of figuring out how to use this platform well.
Lessons on offer: