Final Group Project Report

GDIT 711 Distance Learning Global Leadership Seminar

Spring 2015

Emtinan Alqurashi, Elif Gokbel, Vanessa Steiner

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MOOC: Design and Development of Educational Technology, MIT

Rationale:

“This course explores educational technologies, outlines the theories that

influenced their development, and examines their use.” We chose this course because of

the topic, course sequence, and length of the course. This MOOC explores Educational

Technologies that we are all interested in and also outlines the theories which affect our

current studies and research. Along with the professional videos, activities, and course

projects we felt that this course best allowed us to all engage in something we were

interested in while allowing us to expand our learning by connecting our own areas of

interest to the activities.

Issues:

The three main issues found in the MOOC are:

1. Reading materials (either outdated, too long, or sometimes irrelevant).

2. Videos (either too long or too many).

3. Goal-oriented (There are no specific goals to achieve in each week).

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PART 1: READING MATERIALS

Participants’ thoughts about possible problems for reading materials

What would you think to be a problem for the reading materials?

Concerns:

- Out-dated materials

- Length of readings

- Relevance of readings

Solutions:

1) Suggest the learners find their own articles which are relevant to the weekly topic

and share them with the MOOC

2) Simply update the reading material to articles which have been written within the

last five years

3) Reducing the number of the reading materials and providing a follow-up activity

after reading to help students analyze concepts for a deeper understanding

Participants’ reflections to solutions:

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How do you feel about these possible solutions? Do you think they would be beneficial as

a learner or do you have other suggestions? Please explain.

Solution #1: Suggest the learners find their own articles which are relevant to the weekly

topic and share them with the MOOC.

Participant#10: “The relevant reading materials can be provided in a separate place so

people could go and look at, it would be less overwhelming”

Participant#8: “ Having each learner to find articles, it may be too many.”

Participant#7: “The level of participants’ previous knowledge might differ. Then, how can

we trust their judgment?”

Two participants commenting on the solution disagreed with our solution for reading

materials while a participant partly agreed with the statement. Each addressed different

aspect of the proposed solution, including providing a separate place for articles,

participants’ level of previous knowledge.

Solution #2: Simply update the reading material to articles which have been written

within the last five years

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There were six written responses for this solution. Three of them were agreed while the

other half were partly agreed with the idea and concerned about the importance of

including the theory-based seminal, old works.

Solution #3: Reducing the number of the reading materials and providing a follow-up

activity after reading to help students analyze concepts for a deeper understanding.

Participant#2: “I like the idea of reducing the number of materials and providing a follow

up activity. In my learning, it helps me better to have a deeper understanding that when

you do an activity, it helps you reiterate what you have learned. So I did like that idea”.

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From the findings, we should consider solution#2 as best solution with a small revision:

“Updating the readings (except theory-based, seminal works,etc.)”

Because our participants were concerned about the importance of including the theory-

based seminal, old works and the publication date is not important for such studies.

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PART 2: VIDEOS

Participants’ comments about the videos:

Issues:

- Number of videos

- Rigid consistency of the videos

Solutions:

Solution#1: In place of a video, have a hands-on activity so the learner can be an active

participant of the class.

All of the respondents agreed that short video segments is a good solution. Two of

respondents have added that this can be along with hands-on activities.

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Solution #2: In place of some of the videos: have the learners search for their own video.

Two of respondents have said that this could work with small groups only. However, One

said it could create a lack of focus for the learning task. Another two respondents claimed

that they have no desire to to search for their own videos. One of the respondents

believed that this can create difficulty for instructors to track learning progress.

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Solution #3: Make the videos optional while providing the same information in another

format such as word, powerpoint, etc.

All of the respondents agreed with this solution except for one. They believed it’s

important to consider learning differences and styles, variety of information and mixed

materials. One said it’s still important to reduce the number of videos. One has disagreed

with this solution as it would be too much for the learners and for instructors as well.

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By examining all of the three solutions, it seems like solution # 3 is preferred by the majority of participants.

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PART 3: GOAL-ORIENTED

Issues:

- No specific goal to follow for certain activities

- The MOOC is very specific in some activities but in other sections it has no goals

- inconsistent

Solution #1: For the activities, include goals the learner should be working towards or a

small task they can complete on their own.

Participants’ Reflections: 100% of the participants agreed with this solution (seen by

green check marks and comments)

Solution #2: Mix up the instructions and/or tasks for

different areas in the course allowing students more

freedom in certain parts while more structured in others,

varying the timing.

Participants’ Reflections: The feedback was favored

against this solution, participants stating that they

preferred the consistency of the course.

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Solution #3: Insert a checklist along with the Activities, readings, and/or videos to keep

the learner on task and help highlight the main points.

Participants’ Reflections: 7 out of 8 participants agreed with this solution

Final Findings:From the findings, we should consider using SOLUTION #1to solve our issues in our MOOC due to high number of participants in favor of the ideas.

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Rationale & Reflection

After examining our results, we have come to three different conclusions about

improving the MOOC based on our presented issues. First, for the readings we concluded

that Solution #2 (with a small revision), updating the readings (except theory-based,

seminal works,etc.), is the most important. This is ideal for the best learning for the

MOOC students. It is vital to provide your students with accurate and up-to-date

information. Second, in the video section we found that best solution is Solution #3, make

the videos optional while providing the same information in another format such as word,

powerpoint, etc. The participants expressed their preference for varied use of materials

within a course, as long as it did not overwhelm the learner. Lastly, for the goal-oriented

section, we examined the results and found that we should focus on Solution #1, for the

activities, include goals the learner should be working towards or a small task they can

complete on their own. This solution will help keep the learners on task and staying

focused on the main points of the week. In a MOOC, it is important to give the learners

structure but allow them the freedom and flexibility to bring their own ideas into their

learning. With these revisions to the course, we feel that we are on our way to meeting

these requirements and giving the learner a high level educational experience.

The MOOC experience was very beneficial and important to all of us from

choosing the course to writing this reflection. Successful collaborative work was critical

for a successful learning experience, as we had to work together day and night to

complete this work. First, we chose this MOOC because (a) it explores Educational

Technologies that we are all interested in, (b) it gives an outline of the theories that

affected Ed Tech development and examines their use, (c) there are video interviews with

experts in the field are provided as course materials, (d) length of the MOOC is six weeks

which is convenient for our class schedule, (e) We felt that this course best allowed us to

all engage in something we are interested in while allowing us to bring our own areas of

interest to the overall project. Criticism is one of the skills we learned during our MOOC

course by looking at strengths and weaknesses and how to improve them in order to

enhance the learning experience. Testing the identified issues was a bit of a challenge at

the beginning as it was a new experience, but have learned a lot from eventually. After

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we presented the suggested solutions, the participants either agreed or disagreed with

them by showing green check marks and also submitting their reflections, both written

and spoken. This helped us see how people look at things from different angles, and

that’s why it is always important to investigate a second person’s opinion when making

choices or decisions.

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