rWorld2

The feeds are starting to come in to the FSLT12 blog aggregator. And it is already a rich source of information and potential conversation. Questions are being asked about what makes a good teacher, and what makes a bad one! Jenny Mackness addresses the issue of blog aggregation generally in a MOOC. We are struggling with this and will be making changes to the template so that syndicated feeds only show the first 100 words or so.

But my question is more about the nature of conversation in this context. I will need to locate references, or ask if anyone has any to support my assertion, here. I wonder if this new epistolary form may be going a bit Baroque or even Rococo.

Read the rest of this entry »

Jo Badge pointed me to a post by Stuart (no other id given), “Learning objectives or not?“, which started with this intentionally provocative statement, “A good teacher states clear Learning Objectives. The best don’t. Discuss.” I commented on the blog and repost my comment here.

My perspective is from higher education. Courses are required to be described by our QA regime in terms of “intended learning outcomes” (i.e. objectives). As a teacher, I am quite dogmatic that this be done carefully because it helps shape assessment and teaching strategies. It gives prospective students “fair warning”. In this transitional era of increasing fees and turbulent funding models it lets people know, in part, what they are paying for. But, whether objectives are revealed before, during or after a teaching session is a part of teaching strategy. And, it is essential that we not fall into the trap set by Diana Laurillard that objectives be “necessary, sufficient and complete.” As a teacher I hope for and expect extensive creative – even subversive – appropriation of everything that goes on. Sometimes it helps to ask people to express their own objectives before a session, or their own outcomes after a session. Finally, I try to keep a clear line between “aims” and “objectives”. Aims describe what we, the teacher, the institution, the QAA, the professional bodies, etc. intend. Objectives describe what the learners will be able to DO after the session, module, or course. This, for me, means always writing objectives using verbs which describe actions visible in the world, not descriptions of interior (psychological) states. Yes, we want them to “know” and to “understand” and to “appreciate”, but how will we see that understanding in action? What will they DO to enable us to determine that they indeed understand?

Dave Cormier has written a thoughtful critique from a cynefin perspective of massive open online courses (moocs) as an approach to learning the “basics”. I reduce his argument almost to absurdity, but it is extremely relevant to a massive open online course that I, Jenny Mackness and Marion Waite are developing. Our mooc is called “First steps into learning and teaching in higher education” (First Steps 12 or #fslt12). And, it is very much about “the basics”.

I suspect that what is at work are some unexpressed assumptions. Dave, who has a lot more experience of moocs than I, is coming from an informed and mature perspective, which emerges from and is aligned with the Connectivist principles promoted by George Siemens and Stephen Downes. I take the view, however, that a mooc  is by itself a “non-defined pedagogical format to organize learning/teaching/training on a specific topic in a more informal collaborative way” (MOOC Guide). The principles of a MOOC are: Aggregation, Remixing, Re-purposing, Feeding forward.

Recent courses that can be described as massive, open and online, but might not self-identify with connectivist principles, include the recent much-discussed Introduction to Artificial Intelligence from Stanford University, which has stimulated new learning provision through Udacity and Coursera. MITx, soon to launch is also making massive open online provision, but may not be explicitly connectivist in conception.

Like Dave, I do not want First steps 12 to “descend into anarchy”. But then I have never equated anarchy with chaos. However, I do not regard fslt12 as anarchic in conception. I would like to think that my leadership style is consultative, open, facilitative, collaborative and collegial (others might disagree!). But I do accept that First Steps 12 will be led by the course team and they will be led – to some extent – by me. If it all comes crashing down, I know who my boss will talk to! So I take some responsibiity.

I also expect that the course team will provide a core set of Open Educational Resources (OERs) that can be used by new lecturers and educational developers.

Dave asserts:

If you are looking for ‘best practices’ in a given domain, the MOOC is a fantastically inefficient way of acquiring them.

I am not sure this necessarily follows. The course team can provide scaffolding and direction, even if complicated, complex and sometimes chaotic practice is allowed to spin off.  Dave even acknowledges this.

We tend to pull together materials, and have expert centred discussions that are fairly restrictive.

In the end, his conclusion is that

The complex domain is where the MOOC really shines.

This is where I hope First Steps 12 takes us.

Well I am as excited as the next geek, about the rasberry pi launch. Good on them for getting it going. What will be really interesting is seeing how the “ecosystem” develops as people start hacking them and sharing the results. Will everyone run a server in their pocket? Can we develop a mesh of rasberry pis? Does it even do wifi? Someone will need to develop a wrist or sunglasses monitor and portable power supply.

Alistair Creelman draws our attention to this chart from onlinecollegecourses.com. He says:

What is amazing is that although the present OCW movement dates back to 2001 so few university teachers and leaders I meet have even heard of it. This is not a future vision or a possible scenario, this is happening now. Most of it has already happened. It’s time to step out of our academic cocoons and see the opportunities.

This is one question that the OCSLD First Steps into learning and teaching in higher education mooc will be addressing.

Via: Online College Courses Blog

Last month I and some colleagues developed, ran and participated in an online course called extending your online course. The course site is here: https://sites.google.com/a/brookes.ac.uk… My reflective blog for this course is here: http://extendingonline.brookesblogs.net/

It was one of the best learning experiences I have participated in in recent years. I mention this now by way of returning to this blog after what could appear as a gap in my activity.

I feel the need to reflect but all I can say is that I feel tired and ready for a break from the academy.

I finished off the working year writing a bid for a grant to go beyond even Extending your online course, helping to lead us into open academic practice in a big way. Fingers crossed.

These are the things that keep it worth working.