Category: Top News

Harvard is taking a new approach to MOOCs.

Beginning in March of this Year, HarvardX –the University’s branch of the online learning platform edX.org– has offered course content restricted to alumni.

This new program, called “HarvardX for Alumni” draws from pre-existing HarvardX course such as “The Ancient Greek Here” and “Fundamentals of Neuroscience,” while adding new features, such as forums and live chats with faculty, and seeking a stronger, more explicit focus on networking, both among alumni and between alumni and the University.

In addition, HarvardX for Alumni serves as an experimentation with modular courseware with original material, such as interviews with faculty members.

Portable learning can provide students in developing countries with new opportunities.

The non-profit organization edX will work with Facebook-led Internet.org, Airtel, Nokia and the Government of Rwanda to provide free education to students in this African country on affordable smart phones. This project, called SocialEDU, was announced by Facebook at the Mobile World Congress last week in Barcelona, Spain.

The initiative builds on the success of MOOCs

EdX will adapt course materials for local students. Such students will access a mobile app that will be integrated with Facebook, while Airtel provides free education data for one year and Nokia sells affordable smartphones.

Google is launching its first MOOC.

The course, titled “Making Sense of Data”, will run from March 18 to April 4. It is related to Google’s Fusion Tables – a set of tools for displaying data – and is intended to be for “anybody who works with data on a daily basis, such as students, teachers, journalists, and small business owners, and who wants to learn more about how to apply that information to practical problems.”

Participants will engage with the course material through a combination of video and text lessons, activities, and projects. Google announces that in order to create a more engaging experience, participants will be able to access instant hangouts and live chats from the course for quick help or for direct feedback from the company experts. Students will have the opportunity to complete a final project and apply the skills they learn to earn a certificate.

The course will showcase the collaborative technology of Google and edX using cbX to run courses on Google App Engine.

Previously, Google offered an analytics course.

When it comes to promoting online courses and learning activities, there are many ways we use while working with our clients. Let us share some of them:

1. Blogs and social media sites. We update them 2 or 3 times a week with engaging, useful and informative content.
2. Short, free courses –and/or MOOCs– production. Giving things for free builds more engagement with existing and potential customers, and it allows to generate new leads and grow our community.
3. eBooks. We publish a new one every month. They contain 10 – 20 pages and they have very clear and useful information. Ebooks have become very useful lead generators. eBooks as well as courses can be created by opinion leaders; they can become our best advocates.
4. Weekly, bi-weekly or monthly informative newsletters. We share info about customers’ content, industry news and leaders, interviews.
5. Forums. We start discussions, come up with new ideas, and get feedback and ideas just by listening to people.
6. Testimonials and customer stories. We post positive examples of people who enjoyed our courses.

Academic institutions must leverage the best technological advancements in order to attract students and maximize learning.

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) –that feature a series of short, video segments in which instructors describe a particular concept or skill, and then give exercises, quizzes and exams– is a radical learning and marketing tool, that requires little start up cost.

In our view, it offers universities with a unique chance to promote their services while engaging non-traditional students. Check out these series of MOOCs we filmed for the University of Navarre (UNAV), in Spain. Naturally, one can enroll in them for free.

Intensive coursework is a great way to educate the general population and get free advertising.

Users recognize and appreciate the efforts of MOOCs at universities, and promote them to friends and family through social media sites and emailing. This word of mouth promotion systems benefits all.

[ted id=1913]

MOOCs are a great way to share high-level learning and supplement traditional classrooms.

In this TED conference, head of edX Anant Agarwal shares his vision on blended learning, where teachers create the ideal learning experience for 21st century student.

Is your LMS LTI-compliant?

With the growing acceptance of the Learning Tools Interoperability (LTI) standard, and the 2.0 version on the horizon, LMS platforms are becoming more fluid, with content flowing in and out via many third-party tools.

LTI provides an open, standard way for third-party tools to connect to any LMS (Learning Management Systems); and a wide range of outside software can be implemented. Also, as an open standard, it avoids vendor lock-in. This means that if a school migrates to another LMS, existing third-party tools that are LTI-compliant will continue to work with the new system without needing to tinker any further.

Samples of third-party applications that are sitting out on the cloud include the video capture program Panopto; the digital storytelling and collaboration app VoiceThread, the anti-plagiarism software known as Turnitin, and an asynchronous learning tool called YouSeeU that can be used for online student presentations and discussions.

The Canvas LMS is leading the LTI charge. It maintains an LTI directory of compliant applications at edu-apps.org, listing over 125 apps. Included are familiar names like YouTube, Khan Academy, Twitter, WordPress, McGraw Hill Campus, CourseSmart, Ted Ed, Wikipedia and DropBox. Some apps require an administrator to install them, but others are designed for a user to plug into the LMS themselves.

A list of both platforms and tools that are certified to be LTI-compliant is maintained at www.imsglobal.org/lti/.

Some large institutions, like the University of Michigan and Western Governors University, are already building according to LTI standards.

By the end of the year, Coursera.org will offer 50 Spanish-language MOOCs.

This initiative comes as a result of a partnership with the Carlos Slim Foundation, a Mexican philanthropic organization.

“Our alliance with Coursera will allow training in Mexico, Latin America, and in the Hispanic community in the United States, promoting human capital at the highest level,” said Carlos Slim Helú, the businessman and philanthropist behind the foundation.

The partnership will focus on courses tailored to Latin America’s employment needs in computer science, health care, and public health.

The Carlos Slim Foundation plans to reach low-income communities by offering MOOCs at its Telmex Digital Libraries, a network of more than 3,000 computer centers that provide free Internet access.

Coursera, a leading MOOC provider, has announced that it will begin offering free professional development courses for K12 teachers. Many of the courses will focus on the skills that teachers need to effectively design and teach online courses.

The courses will be provided by seven leading schools of education, including the University of California at Irvine (UC Irvine) and Vanderbilt University’s Peabody College of Education, along with several other partners such as leading museums and other educational institutions.

“MOOCs will definitely become an important piece in a teacher’s professional development,” says Melissa Loble, Associate Dean of Distance Learning at UC Irvine. That’s because MOOCs are easier to fit into a busy schedule than an on-site course and they offer a broad range of topics to study, she adds.

For instance, courses involve integrating engineering into science, engaging students through cooperative learning, and putting the new Common Core standards into action.

> MOOC: Emerging Trends & Technologies in the Virtual K-12 Classroom

MOOCs can be a great way to supplement and enhance K12 students’ curriculum. These courses can work very well for blended and individualized learning –because they can be a solution for students who need extra time to succeed.

Some K12 educators are beginning to incorporate them into their classrooms.

MOOCs can help students accomplish their personal goals, such as learning new languages, or studying specific disciplines. In this type of learning environment, MOOCs would be similar to attending after-school activities, field trips, visiting museums or researching topics of interest.

Some revealing samples we have extracted from this article:

• Andover (Mass.) Public Schools’ students get high school credit for the course but no grade upon completing the courses.
• The University of Miami’s Global Academy, which is a virtual high school, developed its first MOOC specifically for high school students last year. The three-week course focused on preparing students –mostly juniors– to take the SAT II test in biology. Also, the high school has provided a MOOC to prepare students to take the Advanced Placement calculus exam.
• The math, biology, and physical sciences’ teachers from Brown University Continuing Education from both middle and high schools are using the MOOC as a mini-unit in their classes, or as an after-school project.
• Enterasys launched a MOOC initiative to provide students who are interested in learning more about IT. The free technical education classes provide technical skills achievement in fundamental areas around IP data networking, wireless technologies and security concepts—all key areas of recognized growth within the IT space. Unlike traditional MOOCs, the Enterasys MOOC is self-paced and students can attend the weekly scheduled module when it is best for them.
• Reynoldsburg (Ohio) City Schools’ eSTEM Academy combines MOOCs with live classroom instruction for grades 9 through 12. Teachers use the online content along with the problem-based learning work that is part of the academy’s goal.

Additional readings:

• MOOCs go to K12: Higher ed trend expands to high schools
• Tips on using MOOCs successfully in K12