The Dark Side of MOOCs:
Are they that bad?
MOOCs have come to supply educational services for
people who did not have the possibility to get access to specialized or higher
education. However, many scholarly and academic are not sure of MOOCs’ good
impact on education. These specialists in learning point out some of the issues
that need to be perfected to get better and more positive results: MOOC’s
massiveness, divergence with bLearning, and lack of credited value.
A MOOC, by its single nature, implies massiveness; but
what’s wrong with a great amount of students in a course? The fact that a MOOC
gets to have too many class members implies the lack of student rapport on the
instructor’s side. It is simply impossible that an instructor (or group of
instructors) deal with 2,000 students, or more, at the same time. This
excessive number of class participants, no doubt, leads to the absence of
student interaction, an essential element in education considered by many
detractors of the use of MOOCs. That is why, limiting the class size, or
opening several courses –simultaneously- can be a way to give room to some
student-student and student-teacher interaction. Experts, then, need to agree
on the “magical” number of students in a MOOC.
For some education scholars, MOOCs are a synonym of
eLearning, and not of bLearning. eLearning, as most of us are already
accustomed to, implies some sort of guidance by using video tutorials,
instructional audios, and reading on websites or electronic documents. The
former two tools can be great for visual and aural learners, but what happens
to those students who lack these learning styles? Many of these students whose
learning styles repertoires do not include visual and aural learning become the
candidates for dropping out of MOOCs. eLearning (or distant education) is not
for everyone. The lack of teacher/instructor feedback is demotivating for many
students, no matter how many supplementary videos for instruction you provide.
MOOCs with some kind of bLearning orientation can become more beneficial for
students.
The third drawback in the use of MOOCs is its unaccredited
nature. If compared to a webinar, i.e., a MOOC is not recognized by higher
education institutions; however, some great learning can take place for one’s
professional development and life with no need for accreditation. Participating
in a webinar simply implies the sharing of ideas by a speaker, and later on,
the application of those ideas by the participants in their working practices. As
we can see, MOOCs are not the panacea for the cost of higher education fees
either, but a great way to enlarge one’s PLNs (Professional Learning Networks)
as a webinar can be. If anyone is interested in signing up for a MOOC, s/he
should be encouraged to do so bearing in mind s/he is trained to maximize their
professional performance and not to get credits for their higher education.
Being against MOOCs is like not giving people the chance
to access to some sort of education to better perform at work. As Jeff A. Roth
pointed out on his article, 4 Steps for
Successful eLearning Implementation, “By conducting a short survey, you can
evaluate how the features, compatibility, and design are useful to everyone
involved.” Members of the MOOCs’ community and experts in education should help
this educational initiative become better and more successful.
ETo
fully develop and comprehend this teaching issue, it’s advisable to research
and expand these areas:
1
|
What’s a MOOC?
|
2
|
MOOCS and
higher educational learning
|
3
|
MOOCs and PLNs
|
4
|
Reasons to take
a MOOC
|
5
|
MOOCs and
credited courses
|
Professor
Jonathan Acuña-Solano
ELT
Instructor & Trainer based in Costa Rica
Freelance ELT Consultant four OUP in
Central America
For
further comments or suggestions, reach me at:
@jonacuso – Twitter
Other blogs and sites I often write for my students at
the university are:
Cuban, L. (2013) The big
misunderstanding about MOOCs. Washington Post, available at http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/02/24/the-great-divide-over-moocs/
If you want a copy of the article, download it here.
Sunday, March 03, 2013
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