A Thought About MOOCs and Their Role in Education.

I quote from an article in The Economist:

EdX, a non-profit MOOC provider founded in May 2012 by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and backed with $60m of their money, is now a consortium of 28 institutions, the most recent joiner being the Indian Institute of Technology in Mumbai. Led by the Open University, which pioneered distance-learning in the 1970s, FutureLearn, a consortium of 21 British, one Irish and one Australian university, plus other educational bodies, will start offering MOOCs later this year....... 

On July 10th Coursera said it had raised another $43m in venture capital, on top of the $22m it banked last year. Although its enrolments have soared, and now exceed 4m students, this is a huge leap of faith by investors that the firm can develop a viable business model. The new money should allow Coursera to build on any advantage it has from being a first mover among a rapidly growing number of MOOC providers.

 What do we want people to get from schooling? Let me suggest that our objects include at least:

• facts
• skills, including but not limited to reading, (w)riting and (a)rithmetic
• information literacy -- knowing where to find information and how to evaluate it and its sources
• understanding of how natural, cultural and technological systems work
• abilities that will contribute to the students ability to earn a living and contribute to the economy
• a basis for good citizenship
• an enthusiasm for learning
• a basis for future learning
• ethics and moral behavior
• a willingness and ability to help others to learn
• a willingness, ability and enthusiasm for continuing (self) education
• a basis for effective participation in family and community life
• a basis for a happy, healthy, productive life

Obviously, not every minute in every class of every year in every school contributes equally to achieving all of these objectives.

The MOOCs will without doubt change the efficiency with which some of these objectives can be achieved in some circumstances. Institutions of higher education should adjust how and what they teach through other means as they introduce the MOOCs in their curricula.

I think a lot of these objectives can best be achieved by personal contact with professional educators. Indeed, some of what we want students to learn is implicit knowledge and understanding, and some is only transmitted by the example of professionals. Automating some aspects of teaching should allow educators to focus more on what can not be taught through technology alone.

I suspect that a lot of educators are not very good at helping students achieve many of these objectives. I have learned a lot in the process not only of being a student myself, but from my students in teaching and in team teaching from my peers, and I wish I was better at teaching.