OER

Read this post earlier to day - http://hapgood.us/2013/05/09/creating-the-education-death-star/

I am not at all sure why we want to control the way students move through material.  Even if it material we are selling them do we have to control the path as well as the content?  

Where did you earn your credit part 2

For a few months I was a part of the "Granny Cloud". That means I was partnered with a school in Columbia (an experiment in moving beyond India) in reading a d talking with school children. It wasn't specifically a Hole in the Wall, in fact, my volunteer time was sponsored by a Columbian school and the children were provided with technology to communicate with me by the school. It's wonderful that Sugatra Mitra won the TED prize this year, but I think we need to be careful when we look at what the Hole in the Wall project and the Granny Cloud has shown us.

The people who have successfully skipped college and become amazingly successful came from very successful backgrounds. They had a lot of support to begin with. Yes, Indian and Columbian children can learn on their own, but can they learn everything they need without guidance? Without assistance? And if everyone is learning everything on their own where is the future knowledge coming from? Research universities do quite a lot of.... research.

Much knowledge acquisition is still easier with guidance of some sort. And much research is still easier when a group of people is gathered together in one location whether or geographic or digital. These twin goals of the university seem to be forgotten in the debate on the irrelevance of higher education, whether it occurs face to face or digitally.

Where did you earn your credit?

From Tony Bates, http://www.tonybates.ca/2013/02/07/who-is-giving-credit-for-moocs/

Students need clarity rather than confusion about what they need to do to get a university place, but above all they need a rationale and fair system with as few barriers as possible. MOOCs are not particularly helping with this, but they are opening up the discussion about what should count for credit in or admission to a university program, and it’s about time.

No kidding.  Clearly we need to be careful as having a canon of learning that many people know is important to civilization as we know it.  I would also never say that learning critical thinking skills and writing skills is not important.  Really though, do you learn how to write in that freshman composition class with its five essays?  Or are your skills more of a compilation of other sources?  And if they are, how can a university value those other sources and give you credit for your skills?  Unfortunately that question has recently led us to an expansion of high stakes testing.  Surely there are more ways to assess credit from sources other than traditional classes from regionally accredited institutions.  And, at the risk of sounding incurably romantic, there is an entire population at risk here - all of those world wide whose parents are not able to support their children for four years of college.

Gathering Credits

First daughter is attempting to graduate a semester early.  That means she is gathering up all of the college credits she earned (or maybe earned) in high school -- AP and dual-enrollment (CU Succeed) and figuring out what she could take online this coming summer and transfer back into Eckerd.  It's a ridiculously complex process for a single semester of college.  And I do understand why we never bothered back at the beginning of college when we all assumed she would want the full 4 years. Last week I also talked to a nephew who ways he has around 160 credit hours and yet no degree. Possibly he has the same problems gathering up credits from a variety of sources and feeding them into a program.

I am impressed by students who come to StraighterLine and take both tests and classes and then manage to transfer them to a college or university where they count towards a degree.  I can not imagine the average student taking enough random MOOCs and any other sources of credit and putting them together in something close enough to a degree that some college somewhere would stamp "completed" and a BA on it. It's a great thought, but someone has to do the organization and someone has to be able to sit down with these students and figure out where the holes in their education really are.  In a world like this do completion programs shrink to 1 semester? Smaller?

Finance

The finance piece of MOOCs is important and it still looks to me like only StraighterLine is addressing it.  I read yet another article on poor pay for adjunct instructors.  Will mentor pay be any better?  (Assuming MOOCs move us towards a mentor model rather than the traditional faculty on the stage model.) 

In the online world it does feel to me like the interaction between learners and instructors and between learners and other learners is necessary to developing  critical thinking skills.  Both of those forms of interaction require skilled activity on the part of the instructor which translates into time on task.   If education becomes more individualized that will possible require more time on task... and more funding.

MOOCs again

Are we really all going to learn from the best? And do the best really all work at Ivy League universities? I think my community college background is showing here, but I have some doubts about the Ivy League approach being taken by Coursera, Udacity, and EdX.

Grading and Learning

How much does the process of grading get in the way of a conversation about the content with your students? How do you move it out of the way? Or conversely, does the process of explicit evaluation help the conversation?

Still thinking about the future

I liked this article:  http://www.contactnorth.ca/sites/default/files/contactNorth/files/pdf/publications/5_wishes_for_the_future_of_online_learning.pdf.  I especially liked the wish that we would all focus on pedagogy.  I completely agree that there has been too  much focus on video and reproducing lectures.  Sure that is one way to get content to someone, but there are many other ways that might be more effective.  I love the idea of gaming and situation analyses.   In my class, with my limited time and technical skills I have tried to make a few of the assignments relevant -- teach your neighbor or write an analysis for your boss kind of thing.  That only goes so far though.  My hope is that organizations like the Gates Foundation will spend their money creating really interesting courses that approach learning and teaching in different ways, maybe including the lecture, but not focusing on it.

List of Papers on Education

Lots of good reading in this list:

http://www.nationalaffairs.com/blog/detail/findings-a-daily-roundup/a-terrible-thing-to-waste

HT to Tyler Cowen of Marginal Revolution

Lisa

Future of higher Ed

Okay I could not resist the post title since it is still the first week of January. And it's a silly title as it implies a disintegration or disappearance. That's not what is happening though .... Or maybe it is a disintegration in the sense that the landscape is not as carefully maintained as it once was. Certainly students have more options now than they had even a decade ago.

The largest change is that colleges and universities are beginning to allow students to have those options and to integrate them into their college degree plan. As the pool of 18 year olds whose parents are willing and able to fund four years of college gets tighter more types of colleges find themselves looking at other demographics. And other demographics come with baggage... err... learning... from other places. They have more skills, learning, and understanding picked up on the job or from workplace education classes or from random classes from many colleges and universities. And they want credit for those skills and those learning experiences. How to assess that learning and integrate it into the current AA or BA is perhaps the question for the next few years. We don't want to lose the strengths that come from a liberal arts education, but we also need to truthfully assess our students as they come to us. And that doesn't mean asking them to take classes on material they already have a solid understanding of, even if they picked that understanding up in a non-traditional place.

The future of higher ed is exciting as long as we understand that learning can take place apart from the traditional academic campus and as our students become more integrated outside of campus they will want to see that reflected on their degree plans.

Who is not ciritcal of MOOCs?

I have been reading critiques of MOOCS, of which there are legion.  The best I have seen is here:  http://edtechnow.net/2012/12/29/moocs-and-other-ed-tech-bubbles/.  The bottom line for me is that there is no business model.  Everyone teaching appears to be paid by someone else.  This of course is a strength of StraighterLine -- there is a business model.  I have to say I am insanely curious about the outcome of the College Algebra experiment from the perspective of the MOOCs.  Will learners pay more for a name brand? And if they do will adjunct faculty earn more for teaching in the future?

Interaction and Learning

From Terry Anderson (http://terrya.edublogs.org/2012/12/18/connectivy-your-course/)

An avid reader might note that the advice above tends to contradict the 1st theorem of my Interaction Equivalency Theory namely:

Deep and meaningful formal learning is supported as long as one of the three forms of interaction (student–teacher; student-student; student-content) is at a high level. The other two may be offered at minimal levels, or even eliminated, without degrading the educational experience.

This implies that one can still learn without enhanced interaction (that grounds connectivist pedagogy). I still believe this to be true. People can and do learn in a very broad array of models, models, contexts and personal inclinations. However the second theorem posits that:

High levels of more than one of these three modes (student-student; student-teacher, student-content) will likely provide a more satisfying educational experience, though these experiences may not be as cost or time effective as less interactive learning sequences.

As I redesign my economics course I of course like that quote because it gives me permission to back off on some of the interaction in the course.  The Reflection assignments work on the student-content interaction, the first 2 assignments and the discussions work on student-peer interaction (okay and student-teacher).  That leaves my comments on reflections and other grading for student-faculty.  I have all three built into the class, but the focus is on student-content.

Where's the Viola?

Michael Feldstein just posted a few thoughts on what is missing from xMOOCs and from publisher material on eLiterate, http://mfeldstein.com/ .  I am curious how many students had a college experience that included long thoughtful discussions with either faculty or peers about the content?  And then of course I am curious where you went to school.

I am back thinking about my economics courses again.  I do try to spend time in the discussion area, but I have my questions there focused on application, not on theory.  Perhaps this semester I will move them to theory.  Maybe that will help me spot not only the that a student has a problem with indifference curves, but exactly where the problem is and how to solve it.  This is the sort of thing that is easier to build into an online course than it is to build it into a F2F course - for more students, not just for those who sit in the front of the classroom. 

I am also wondering about the intersection of xMOOCs and providers like StraighterLine.  Do we get to take over the lower level courses, those where at most universities the discussion taking place is between peers, not between students and faculty?  The PSY 101's that are taught in giant lecture halls anyway?  Clearly there is plenty of room for improvement there, particularly in STEM fields where that course is taught as a weeder course (think General Biology I, or  Chemistry I).  If someone other than traditional F2F educators do take those over, then there needs to be an improvement in pedagogy, not just in cost.  Is the community college model of small classes the best model?  Is it the only model?  Or are we working our way towards a new model that does scale?  

StraighterLine has added new ways to include the professor with Professor Direct. More importantly, SL is looking at new ideas and new ways to add the Viola back in -- via the new models grouped under Professor Direct or via organized student study groups or simply thinking carefully about other possible changes in pedagogy. We need to fit analytics into this discussion though as well as instructional design theories, role of the faculty, etc.

If the goal of discussion is to increase learner's critical thinking skills then online has some major advantaged over the traditional classroom.  That said, there are still significant skills to leading a discussion whether it is online of face to face and not a lot of places to get training in those skills.

Watched a keynote of Tony Bates today - we've spent a lot of time thinking about online course design, what to put online and how to present it.  We need now to think about the classroom.  What goes there, why, etc.  Also what to put online should be thought about at the program level, not only at the course level.

Why Give Credit from Sources Outside the University?

Perhaps the actual question is "Do you believe learning takes place outside of the University?"  If your answer to that question is yes then we have to think about why an individual would need to be  credentialed for learning that took place outside of the university.  We also need to consider whether or not that learning was something that could or would have been learned during a traditional university education.  If it was and if the case can be made that learners do have knowledge and understanding of concepts that are a part of their degree program, but that that understanding came to them from outside of the university experience we will need to respond to that case.  As the university we are credentialing learners.  We are stating that we are confident they met the outcomes listed for our courses and programs.  But what if they met those outcomes prior to their university experience?  Is it appropriate to insist that learners take basic courses covering learning outcomes they have already met? 

Adult learners are asking these questions.  As a group they don't particularly want to spend time, effort, and money on content they already have.  How are you responding to them?

Summer Class Review

I taught in Canvas for the first time this past summer.  That was interesting and fun all by itself, but what I've been thinking about was how my class actually worked.  When I move a class to a new LMS I try to rethink the structure and assignments - far too much of what a class looks like is driven by the LMS rather than pedagogy. 

Canvas is very linear - or at least the default design in Canvas is very linear.  That's okay with me as I think most people are most comfortable in a linear class.  I used the modules to organize the class - there are 4 each with the same basic structure:  intro, my notes on the content, assignments, discussion, quiz. 

What worked:  the blogs.  I asked each student to set up a blog for the class.  Every chapter had one or two thought questions for them to answer after they completed the reading.  My goal was to help them actively read the text and think about what they understood or didn't understand after completing the reading.  I treated them like journals -- I had a grading rubric, but itwasn't about right or wrong, only about depth of thought.  Originally I was going to use the RSS feature to feed the blogs into the class, but I never managed that. I will try that this semester.  Student feedback on the blogs was very positive.

What sort of worked:  the Voice Thread Assignment.  I needed better directions to make this work without the frustration of technical difficulties.  Hopefully I have fixed that for this semester.  I still think a VT assignment is good for student authentication.  Student feedback was mixed though.

What sort of worked:  The quizzes.  I like short answer quizzes where I have the answers already keyed in.  That's a problem when students have technical problems.  I can add an attempt, but there doesn't seem to be a reset button.  If a student answers one question, then has a problem they have all of the answers.  Oops.

What sort of worked:  the last assignment.  It was a problem set.  The students loved it.  I think they are boring.  What to do....

What sort of worked:  Discussions.  I have too many and I didn't participate enough.  The staggered due dates helped.  (First post due 3 days before the end of the discussion period.  Second post due 1 day early.)

What really didn't work:  The peer review assignment.  The tool doesn't work like I expected it to.  I might have it figured out now, but the rubric part isn't right. 

Got a few compliments on the lecture notes - links to videos mostly. I need to add more short videos, especially where I know students get stuck. 

I felt like those who stuck it out learned something -- my most frequent comment on my student survey was "I learned more than I expected to learn."  That might mean they set the bar very low....

Lisa

Student Retention and Success

Is it a perfect storm that could result in some actual movement toward great student retention and success? At least in my world, a number of technologies and delivery methods directed at doing just that appear to be converging. Data analytics, early alert systems, learning communities, mainstreaming, developmental education revisions--not new concepts, to be sure. Separately, these tools and techniques might make small improvements in the success of our students. Combined, these projects could help us make massive improvements in student success numbers. They just might.

Many of these changes, particularly what I'm seeing regarding developmental education courses, seem to me to be long overdue. I can't think of a single argument against anything that gets students successfully and more quickly through developmental coursework. I also can't find fault with the concept of contextualizing dev ed courses--or other core courses, for that matter.

Research on what puts students at risk for failure is growing, and the data we gather in our various projects will help us more specifically define what leads to success for our particular student populations--and maybe even help us define what "success" means!

So THIS time, will these projects come together to result in measurable improvement in student success? That remains to be seen. I can only hope, while trying to keep up with the many and varied projects!

Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (tDCS)

Interesting title, right? It's an interesting, if scary, concept, too!

Today's edition of the Chronicle asks if "electricity is the new smart drug." Apparently the concept of hooking people up to receive small doses (I'm not sure what "small" is), is gaining new attention as a method of improving learning and retention.

A research study (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21094258) that tested subjects' ability to recognize potential threats in the form of disguised roadside bombs, etc., indicated that those individuals receiving a "higher" dose of current learned to recognize threats faster than those receiving a lower dose of current--although both groups "performed better with current than without."

The reason WHY this treatment is effective is still somewhat mysterious, though the article notes, "It seems that the low-level current stimulates neurons, making them more likely to fire, thereby putting the brain in a state where it’s more likely to form connections." (Bartlett)

It appears that there are already YouTube videos as well as a web site where you can buy a kit to try this yourself. Hmmmm. Maybe the next time I am installing an electrical outlet, I'll leave the breaker on and THEN see if I can do math!

Bartlett, Tom. "Is Electricity the New Smart Drug?" - Blogs/Percolator. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 27 Apr. 2012. Web. 27 Apr. 2012. <http://chronicle.com/blogs/percolator/is-electricity-the-new-smart-drug/29067?sid=at>.

Dance Your Ph.D.

I'm not what you would call a scientific person. And I'm certainly not a great dancer, though a good two-step tune gets me moving. It certainly would never have occurred to me to combine the two--dancing and science. I now have an entirely different perspective on that combo, though. Search for "Dance Your Ph.D" or or visit this link for a TED talk from John Bohannon.

Assessing the Online Learner, Rena Palloff and Keith Pratt

Reading Assessing the Online Learner by Rena Palloff and Keith Pratt while continuing to think about my micro class.  I'm still obsessing about how to help students read the textbook carefully and retain something of what they read.  The textbook is nearly at the top of the learning pyramid presented in the book (page 19), with a mere 10% retention rate.  Tonight's thought is that I will assign a reflection exercise at the end of each chapter:  Most of us have thought about the economy and how it functions in the past.  What in this chapter made you think about an economic concept differently than your previous beliefs?  What new questions about the US economy arose from this chapter?


This would essentially be a journalling exercise for the first unit.  For unit 2 I think I could expand it and ask each student to write a test question based on the most interesting or important concept from the chapter.  I could then ask students to respond to one test question, then the original writer would need to respond to that post.  I'd need to post Bloom's taxonomy and require that questions be written to elicit a certain level of response, probably at least analysis.


Sort of on this same note, in my developmental math courses I am trying to write discussion questions that ask students to set up real life questions.  Right now we are working on area, so I asked how they would find the square feet of flooring needed for a kitchen with an island.  I'm trying not to give them the information, but have them think about what information they would need.


Lisa