MOOCs Pedagogy

Learning occurs from the constructivist's standpoint when individuals create their own understanding of the material based on what they already know and what they are learning.  The learning for these individuals involves significant interaction with their peers (Richardson, 2003). In a sense, the learning moment encompasses more than the professor and the content.  The content developer is forced to rethink how to create a learning environment that encourage interaction and the collaboration of ideas amongst students. 

The content, objectives, learners, and professors all play a role in the disseminating of knowledge.  The key is thinking outside of the box when it comes to developing content and identifying new ways to teaching the materials.  As stated by Morris and Stommel (2012), simple and reusable units of learning should be created so it can be applied in different ways, thus the notion of learning objects.  These objects can be helpful for the learning process. Early on, however, it can be difficult to create them because of the many ways of learning and the various types of learners. 

I like the approach Udacity has taken on regarding online learning.  Too many times, we take what's done in the classroom and try to replicate it in some form in the online environment.  While I don't fully disagree with this model (as I'm guilty of it), I believe it does lead to a course with pdf syllabi, talking heads, tons of discussions, etc. My goal is to make learning immersive as highlighted by Morris and Stommel (2012).  Using games is indeed one way to accomplish this; however, the use of case studies and group work encourages interaction and collaboration. In the end, the learning must be student-centered with the professor facilitating the learning.


Sources:

Morris and Stommel (2012). Udacity and online pedagogy: Players, learners, objects.  Hybrid Pedagogy. 
 
Richardson, V. (2003). Constructivist pedagogy. Teachers College Record, 105(9), 1623-1640.