Learning Online

I successfully completed my very first MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) the other week, and with a 92% final grade too - which proves I've still retained some smarts despite everything!! For those of you who haven't encountered MOOCs before I shall quote the Wikipedia entry for you;

A Massive Open Online Course (MOOC; /muːk/) is an online course aimed at unlimited participation and open access via theweb. In addition to traditional course materials such as videos, readings, and problem sets, MOOCs provide interactive user forums that help build a community for students, professors, and teaching assistants (TAs). MOOCs are a recent development in distance education which began to emerge in 2012.

In simple terms, they are online "modules" in various topics that can be bundled together or taken individually. Most of the time you can do the course for free but if you want a certificate then you often have to pay a small fee for one. Typically the duration is 6-8 weeks with about 3-4 hours per week of work required (depending on your pre-existing knowledge and your ambitions).

There are several well established course providers online such as edX, Coursera and FutureLearn (an Open University initiative) and the list of Universities who offer courses through these providers is impressive, including such heavyweights as MIT, Harvard, Edinburgh and Warwick. I've found the range of courses available to be impressive too, there is definitely something for everyone.

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The one I recently completed was an 8 week course called Tropical Coastal Ecosystems run by the University of Queensland on the edX platform. This was one of those that actually gives you a nice shiny certificate for free, which was nice.

The course itself appears pretty typical of most of the MOOCs I've seen; weekly lectures and lecture questions which account for maybe 25% of the marks, homework each week which accounts for maybe 50% of the marks in total and a final exam/project for the remaining 25% ish.

This was a very enjoyable course from start to finish, it is a really nice balance of topics concerning both the science of these environments but also the challenges associated with maintaining and preserving. I didn't find it too challenging but definitely learnt loads and found it fascinating from start to finish. It does take a bit of work and you can't just breeze through it but it is definitely one worth having a pop at.

So go check out those websites, find something that interests you and treat yourself to a bit of intellectual stimulation. It is great fun and you never know what you might find out.

Till next time,
DT