Talk:Massive open online course

Material to add
I'm copying these from Talk:Massive open online course/Archive 2

Sjgknight (talk) 10:41, 29 April 2015 (UTC)
 * parking a good source.
 * Good Guardian link on moocs and privatisation http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2013/apr/29/massive-open-online-courses
 * Although I've archived it, there may still be something in the table of opportunities/challenges http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Massive_open_online_course/Archive_1#Opportunities.2FChallenges_-_a_suggested_table
 * Looking for some academic articles on mooc history: one article in the 'Electronic Journal for English as a Second Language' http://tesl-ej.org/pdf/ej64/int.pdf, a French https://translate.google.com/#fr/en/http%3A%2F%2Fsticef.univ-lemans.fr%2Fnum%2Fvol2012%2F13r-cisel%2Fsticef_2012_cisel_13rp.html 'sticef' article (g'translated), the http://publications.cetis.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/MOOCs-and-Open-Education.docx CETIS report 'MOOCS and HE' (.docx) - which makes too much use of Wikipedia as a source, and the JIME article http://jime.open.ac.uk/article/2012-18/html Making Sense of MOOCs: Musings in a Maze of Myth, Paradox and Possibility - which similarly relies far too much on Wikipedia as a source. There might be some bits in some of those to incorporate though
 * Criticism of many moocs in current instantiation http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2013/05/06/essay-suggests-moocs-are-losing-their-original-worthy-goals
 * interesting questions
 * MOOCs: A Systematic Study of the Published Literature 2008-2012 http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/1455/2531
 * OER - a historical perspective http://repository.jisc.ac.uk/4915/ Will attempt to look at some of these links soon, should have lots of useful content/be useful for citations
 * New report from UK Govt BIS (Business Innovation Skills) "Office The maturing of the MOOC: literature review of massive open online courses & other forms of online distance learning" https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/massive-open-online-courses-and-online-distance-learning-review Looks very good and covers a) some of the debates which should be better stated on the article page here, and b) provides some sourcing for some things (e.g. the precursors section & whether MOOCs are a continuation of online/distance learning). I'll put this as further reading in the article
 * Looks like some scholarly articles emerging recently, eg Ebben, Maureen, and Julien S. Murphy. "Unpacking MOOC scholarly discourse: a review of nascent MOOC scholarship." Learning, Media and Technology 39.3 (2014): 328-345.
 * http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/news/us-mooc-platforms-openness-questioned/2002938.article
 * http://www.downes.ca/cgi-bin/page.cgi?post=60169 EdX goes Open Source
 * http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/sweating-the-details-of-a-mooc-in-progress/43315 description of mooc design
 * http://www.downes.ca/cgi-bin/page.cgi?post=60194 Does Europe need its own mooc
 * http://moocnewsandreviews.com/ - reviews and news on moocs
 * http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/04/19/despite-courtship-amherst-decides-shy-away-star-mooc-provider  just parking
 * Educause is a pretty good source http://www.educause.edu/search/apachesolr_search/mooc?filters=sm_cck_field_super_facet%3A%22EDUCAUSE%20Library%20Items%22

Rewrite
This article clearly needs a lot of work, going well beyond implementing some of the suggestions above. As a start, I've just done some reorganising and a bit of cutting to reduce redundancy in the current article in my sandbox. I'd like to copy this version over to the main article (is there a template to make such a proposal?) and see if anyone has thoughts/wants to continue those edits, it is very much a work in progress but the current article so clearly needs works I'm taking the WP:BOLD line... User:Sjgknight/sandbox/Massive online open course. Sjgknight (talk) 10:27, 29 April 2015 (UTC)
 * I've just gone ahead and done this, the sandbox history shows the incremental changes. Any thoughts ? Sjgknight (talk) 10:35, 2 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks for following through with this. More than a few steps in the right direction!
 * I'm still concerned about the use of primary sources, non-independent sources, self-published sources, and outright linkspam. --Ronz (talk) 15:05, 2 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Agreed. I'm partly looking for validation/sanity check(!) and to get some of the editors I know have contributed and had concerns about the article but who have mostly disengaged a bit/given up hope (me included) re-engaged. E.g. your edit just now. I also think the shape of the article now makes it at least a bit easier to go through and clean up 'as you go' where there was a lot of structural stuff to do before (some of which is still true). So clearly clean-up is still an issue, any other key things? Sjgknight (talk) 15:12, 2 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Glad to have you working on this!
 * Give the topic, I think it is safe to assume we'll have much better sources available to use in the future. Until then, we do the best we can with what research we can find, along with the often-gushing articles promoting this relatively new medium for education. Hopefully we can keep the outright (self-)promotion at bay. --Ronz (talk) 16:36, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

Criticism
The criticism section should discuss the drop-out rate (and the challenge to the figures): www.katyjordan.com/MOOCproject.html, https://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/news/mooc-completion-rates-below-7/2003710.article, www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/dcs/people/.../daniel_onah_edulearn14.pdf, http://mfeldstein.com/the-most-thorough-summary-to-date-of-mooc-completion-rates/; www.edcentral.org/pay-attention-supposedly-low-mooc-completion-rates/ 195.166.150.98 (talk) 22:00, 13 August 2015 (UTC)


 * WP:BOLD ... it is already under Massive open online course though Sjgknight (talk) 16:45, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

Without a counterpoint, the last line in the second paragraph is an opinion and presents a negative bias. Please delete: "Robert Zemsky (2014) argues that they have passed their peak: "They came; they conquered very little; and now they face substantially diminished prospects." or add a statement or describe the position of those Robert is arguing with. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:400:C001:265A:75DC:BE8D:7923:740A (talk) 11:13, 24 October 2015 (UTC)
 * It is definitely presenting an opinion with a negative bias, and in the end it does not immediately pertain to the definition of a MOOC. As such it should not be included in the opening paragraphs. However, it is referenced and relevant to the criticism section, so it might belong under there rather than being deleted outright. I'll go ahead and move it. 112.204.248.202 (talk) 00:46, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

Second Life TOS 2.3 Predatory
Why would a bona-fide use case, like MOOC, want to deploy a predatory vendor, like Linden Lab? There are non-predatory choices available...

Second Life TOS 2.3 violates Berne Convention for Protection of Literary + Artistic Works http://zvon.org/law/r/bern.html#p~9

Remedy > Endorse Education Grid Intellectual Property Policy http://mediagrid.org/policy/Media_Grid_Intellectual_Property_Policy.pdf

20:57, 21 December 2015 (UTC)84.140.244.227 (talk)

The creator of Second Life now says in 2015 > Philip Rosedale: I was wrong with Second Life https://www.facebook.com/groups/quality.immersiveworld.journalism/permalink/954221431315089/

21:10, 21 December 2015 (UTC)84.140.244.227 (talk)

Mogul
I don't think that this site is a MOOC but someone has put it on this page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Darabaf (talk • contribs) 18:34, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

Relevance Criteria
What does it take for a MOOC provider to be recognized as notable? O.tacke (talk) 16:13, 12 September 2016 (UTC)

I too have the same question? I wanted to add information about IITBombayX, which is offered by IIT Bombay. Since I am part of the IITBombayX team, I understand that there is a CoI. However, the MOOCs offered through IITBombayX started in 2015 and is quite popular among participating institutions.--Learn.jkmadathil (talk) 02:14, 7 October 2017 (UTC)
 * In general, when information is removed because "it is not notable", it's usually because an editor is expecting an article to already exist (See WP:Write the article first), and the editor is expecting that Wikipedia's notability guidelines should be met.
 * For inclusion in this article, it would be best to demonstrate that the provider is notable itself, and that the provider is notable within the MOOC industry as verfied by an independent source documenting the context in which it is notable. --Ronz (talk) 03:25, 7 October 2017 (UTC)

This article is a bloated nightmare.
This article is a bloated, repetitive, list-crufty nightmare. Could someone with some encyclopedic editing skills clean it up, significantly?
 * 184.66.82.46 (talk) 14:29, 9 March 2017 (UTC)

Typically fewer than five percent of the students would complete a course.
Regarding pre-internet courses:  Typically fewer than five percent of the students would complete a course. As far as I know, this is still correct for current courses, at least for the free ones. It might be the ones that have some charge do better. Gah4 (talk) 02:25, 7 October 2017 (UTC)

Completion rate is not a good indicator
Add a paragraph in the section "completion rate" as the second paragraph. Besides some factors cause the low completion rate in MOOCs, the inequality in receiving knowledge triggered by different characters of individual also has huge influence on the consequence of completion rate. Actually, MOOC is not as fair as we expected in receiving knowledge due to the different characters of individual. Russian researchers Semenova, T.V. and Rudakova, L.M, indicate that MOOC is designed to decline the unequal access to getting knowledge (229)," but that doesn't mean different individual can enjoy the same equality in course completion rate. From their research, there are three main factors cause the inequality, which are education level, experience on MOOC and gender. The data shows that 18% high-education learners(People is studying in college or further) complete the course while it is 3% in common people. To be more visualized, about 84-88% learners who have completed the course are high-education people (236,237). Besides educational level, 65-80% learners who have completed the course are those who have at least one experience of using online learning platform comparing to 6-31% who have no experience (236,237). Furthermore, there is also difference in gender. In general, 6–7 percent more men participated than women because women are supposed to do household, which distract women's attention in learning (236,237). S ZhouShen0926 (talk) 04:13, 7 December 2017 (UTC)


 * It would be interesting to see completion rates for free vs. non-free courses. For free courses, some might sign up with no intention of completing the course. Non-free courses should cause students to try harder, to avoid wasting money. Gah4 (talk) 08:30, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
 * I agree what you talk about, but the completion rate for non-free course could be influenced by other factors such as more detailed sources, high-quality class and more helpful teaching assistant. Unless, we can do research on the same course with different prices or free, but who is going to take non-free course instead of free one. At the same time, I don't think those non-free courses can be called MOOC because MOOC(Massive Open Online Courses) should be "Open" to everyone. However, MOOC now is tend to design for high-education individual while people really need free courses can't gain high-quality courses in their language. There are over 70% courses only support English. Actually, there is another paying pattern is more interesting. You can get your money back when you complete your course, which I think is more effective to cause students to try harder.ZhouShen0926 (talk) 03:24, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Before talking about the factors influence the completion rate, it is better to acknowledge the limitation of completion rate. Here is what I want to add: Completion rate is a objective indicator which can't reflect the actual gain of every learner. Because different learners who enrolled in the course have completely diverse purpose. For example, someone enroll the courses just for interest while others is going to find the extrinsic value through the course. They may drop the course if they find that course is not interest as expected or not helpful for them. What's more, some learners take the course as a pastimes (322). ZhouShen0926 (talk) 04:05, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
 * An anecdotal data point, I just stopped in the middle of a free online course, because the courseware stopped working. Had this been a paid course, stiffly worded e-mails and phone calls would already have gone to the educator. But as the provider doesn't owe me anything, I am sort of stymied. My case would typically not be something that showed up in statistics, I imagine, other than in the number of students who did not complete the course.--2A02:A466:2A7B:1:AC16:D61A:6D64:AEBB (talk) 11:59, 7 July 2023 (UTC)

Add a new section in article "The future of MOOCs"
Since we have found many problems about the pattern of MOOCs, the future of MOOCs should be discussed either. Researchers have supposed some possible change through reflecting the situation now.ZhouShen0926 (talk) 05:33, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Shouldn't it be noted that E.M. Forster first invisioned MOOCs in his story "The Machine Stops" in 1909?
Shouldn't it be noted that E.M. Forster first invisioned MOOCs in his story "The Machine Stops" in 1909? 2604:2000:F64D:FC00:A42F:1625:F650:FC9D (talk) 16:15, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Requested move 5 April 2022

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: not moved. Per WP:COMMONNAME. Colin M (talk) 18:26, 15 April 2022 (UTC)

Massive open online course → Open online course – Massive open online courses are very well known term, but open online course is also often used. Actually, an open online course makes 11 400 000 000 search results, while a massive open online course only makes 2 220 000 000 search results. See also Google Books ngram that tell the same thing. Some want to specify that the course is massive, but open online course is a general term.

I would also look at the reason why mentioning the adjective massive is so important for some. If the title of the article is massive open online course, then someone can assume it only applies to massive courses, but this is not the case. If the title of the article is open online course, anyone will understand that this applies to open online courses (massive or not). So this is WP:PRECISION. Solving the issue by creating two different articles does not make sense, as the difference in the term used is mainly a nuance difference.

Also see these links: UNESCO, CIVIS, Agripreneurship Alliance, University of Helsinki

-- Avoinlähde (talk) 13:38, 5 April 2022 (UTC) — Relisting. Natg 19 (talk) 01:21, 14 April 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
 * Oppose. "Massive open online course" is by far the common name for this. In this case we have lots of reliable sources (including peer-reviewed sources) that use MOOC. You can either check the ones already cited in the article or have a look at google scholar. In this case google search hits or ngrams are going to be misleading because one phrase contains the other. - MrOllie (talk) 14:25, 5 April 2022 (UTC)
 * There are many sources for both, and your comment not change PRECISION. -- Avoinlähde (talk) 15:33, 5 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Yes, and most that are actually about this concept use MOOC, including the University of Helsinki link you provided above. Minimizing the number of words isn't the end-all, otherwise we'd be calling this 'online course' or something. It is valuable to distinguish from online courses that have a cap on the number of participants, especially since so many people have been exposed to that sort of online learning during the pandemic. And, of course, WP:COMMONNAME also matters. - MrOllie (talk) 15:37, 5 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Did I say that the term MOOC is not used? The idea is not to question that term, but to say that an open online course is also used and more universal. Of course, the University of Helsinki also uses the term MOOC, but like many other universities, they primarily talked about open online courses. Good point, but it is good to remember that the course is not open if participation is restricted. If it were restricted it would be a "regular" or closed or some other online course, but not an online course. Yeah, it’s awesome that at times like these, people from different starting points get to learn. -- Avoinlähde (talk) 15:56, 5 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Oppose. I appreciate Avoinlähde's boldness but I agree with MrOllie that the current title is the common term. ElKevbo (talk) 01:52, 14 April 2022 (UTC)

Similarity to mook
Is it worth noting how close this acronym is to a word (mook) that has been used as a derogatory term against people of color? Simple Googling will find you examples. I'll add to criticisms section unless I'm missing something. briardew (talk) 16:07, 27 February 2024 (UTC)