1. Ernestine Du Pont
201223028
Professional Studies 3A
MASSIVE OPEN ONLINE COURSES
(MOOCS)

2. Welcome to my presentation on MOOCs.
This is my own interpretation on what MOOCs are
all about.

3. Content
 What is a MOOC?
 Purpose of a MOOC
 Characteristics of a MOOC
 Brief history of MOOCs
 Types of MOOCs
 Field of interest
 MY MOOC

4. MOOCs
Massive- Using the WEB to keep in touch with others
globally
Open- It’s free of charge for students
Online- To learn together digitally
Course- A MOOC covers a single topic

5. How a MOOC is described
A Massive Open Online Course (MOOC ) is an
online course that allows unlimited participation
and open access via the web. It builds a
community for students, professors and teaching
assistants through the use of interactive course
materials.

6. Purpose of MOOCs
 Networked learning allows room to share ideas, the exchange of
knowledge and working collaboratively with others.
 For better and effective learning people need to interact, pose questions,
do research and discuss ideas on what they have learned.
 Working collaboratively means that students are also preparing for the real
world of work.
 Diversity allows for fresh experience for learners from different
backgrounds.
 Being independent in their learning would mean that students will be
encouraged towards being responsible for their own knowledge.

7. What characterizes a MOOC
 Free access to students
 Unlimited participation
 No formal entry requirement
 Can be a form of practice
 Chaos in the form of high drop out rate
 Different forms of new social media and online tools are used
 It is learner centered:
 self-direction and improved student partaking
 the environment is created not the way of learning

8. Brief History of MOOCs
 Open Education Movement: Open content and
knowledge.
 Connectivism: Learning is successful if we connect and
build relevant networks.
 CCK08: Connectivism and Connective Knowledge
Course run in 2008.
 Standards MOOCs (2012): Artificial Intelligence,
Machine Learning, Databases.

9. Brief History continued…
MOOCs started multiplying on the web creating many discussions about their
structure, effectiveness and openness. Everyone from student, teachers, e-
learning specialists, academics and the media has their own opinion. The
evolution of technology and of new learning experience have always been
closely related. As distance learning specialists affirm, the field of distance
learning had three main generations:
1. Correspondence study
2. Multimedia
3. Computer mediated

10. Brief History continued…
 Sebastian Thrun's 2011 MOOC on artificial intelligence has been thought to
be the first MOOC, but in reality the first MOOC was likely offered in 2008 at
the University of Manitoba.
 The first MOOCs emerged from the Open Educational Resources (OER)
Movement.
 The term MOOC was coined in 2008 by Dave Cormier and senior research
fellow Bryan Alexander
 Connectivism and Connective Knowledge ( known as CCK08) was led by
George Siemens and Stephen Downes where students interect with a
variety of social media tools.

11. Types of MOOCs/ Platforms
 Udacity
 Coursera
 edX
 MITx
 Udemy
 Future Learn
 OER University

12. Field of interest
My interests are Primarily Business management, but others would be
psychology and it would fall under the Education category.
I have explored topics in business first hand, but came across a topic
that interested me more.
It is reality based and I hope I can learn a lot from it in order to teach
others and also practice it in my daily live.

13. MY MOOC
 I was undecided with which course to go, as I mentioned that I would be
interested in business or psychology.
 I decided not to do the business course but rather a course based on
psychology in a way.
 My course that I will be doing for 6 weeks is coined “understanding drugs and
addiction”
 It is more based on the study at a psychiatric institute, and examines the
effects of drugs on the brain.
 Moreover how drug use can be prevented and how to overcome the
addiction of drugs.
 The platform I am using is ‘future learn’.

14. References:
 http://oertools.weebly.com/types-of-moocs.html accessed 19 February
2014
 http://www.slideshare.net/oerafrica/the-rise-of-moocs accessed 20
February 2014
 http://www.slideshare.net/LynGoodnight/multmedia-presentation-
goodnight accessed 20 February 2014