The MOOC effect, how mere chance could result in a new standard

Nicolas Balacheff
CNRS - Laboratoire d’Informatique de Grenoble
Nicolas.balacheff@imag.fr
The MOOC effect:
how mere chance could result in
a new standard
Free translation of the ppt « L’effet MOOC, ou comment le fruit du hasard pourrait devenir un standard »

From MOOC too mooc,
the acronym becomes commonplace
A little background:
In 2008, G. Siemens and S. Downes taught a course called
Connectivism and Connective Knowledge, with 25
students in class and more than 2200 attending remotely.
This “massive” participation was astounding.
The acronym MOOC is coined.
Massive Open Online Course / Dave Cornier /
In 2011, S. Thrun taught an online course, introduction to
A.I., taken by more than 160,000 students.
This amazing result led to the creation of Udacity in 2012,
followed by other companies. Major universities began to
offer MOOCs.
“MOOC” establishes itself in media.
Nicolas Balacheff, EJC 2014, Ottawa, October 3, 2014 2

From MOOC to mooc,
the acronym becomes commonplace
Be they based on connectivist principles or just designed for the
dissemination of traditional courses, the mass appeal of the
phenomenon grabbed attention and determined the name.
The MOOC effect: a serendipitous phenomena
Media discussion, public debate, and the emergence of a market (a
product, a service, a demand, a price) impose a new word in the
lexicon to name this new open, online educational tool.
Mooc, noun [C][muːk] online learning tool that fully
integrates social networks in a technological environment
capable of accommodating a very large number of users.
Acronym for Massive Open Online Course (
Dave’s Educational Blog, October 2008)
Proposed definition based on the style of the Macmillan dictionary or the Cambridge
Advanced Learner’s dictionary

Beyond “massive” to “social”
Defining “massive” attendance
>2000 is significant for a connectivist model involving the
learners
>160,000 is significant for an industrial model of interactive
dissemination of learning content to students
Shared aspects
 Open strategy: impact, visibility, cost-effectiveness
 Technological foundation: reliable, accessible, adaptive and adaptable
 Social dynamic: interpersonal interaction, community of practice including
cultural aspects, alliances and conflicts
The heart of the innovation is the use of
 Networking technologies and associated functions for information
sharing, expressing preferences, and multi-channel communication
 Tracing technologies for audience evaluation and recommendation
and guidance systems

As regards universities…
Moocs serve a wide range of purposes:
 Basic learning (e.g. statistics)
 Vocational training (e.g. digital manufacturing)
 Personal development(e.g. intro. to entrepreneurship)
The audience is potentially world-wide
Providers have no specific origin
The underlying models are based on
 An ideology inspired by Ivan Illich
 A liberal economic ideology
The university is challenged as a dominant institution
Examples taken from FUN Nicolas Balacheff, EJC 2014, Ottawa, October 3, 2014 5

As regards universities…
Shared missions
1. Disciplinary and multi-disciplinary scientific research
 The academic community is organized to foster the collective and
open advancement of knowledge, and to guarantee its validity
1. Dissemination of new knowledge
 Communicate the meaning of knowledge and related skills beyond
academic texts which expose it
 Be accountable for the quality and validity of learning
Today’s challenges
1. The “massification” of the student public
2. Economic and industrial development
Universities vs Higher education
1. Differentiation of the missions (research/training)
2. Differentiation of knowledge (scientific/professional)

Connectivism? Yes and no…
 Connectivism presents a model of learning that
acknowledges the tectonic shifts in society where
learning is no longer an internal, individualistic
activity. (Siemens 2004)
Yes: the family, the community, the village, the nation, the planet… the
social environment of learning has grown throughout history
 The starting point of connectivism is the
individual. Personal knowledge is comprised of a
network, which feeds into organizations and
institutions, which in turn feed back into the
network, and then continue to provide learning to
individual.
Yes: learning is a personal adventure related to and dependent upon the
community
Yes: the individual must be considered in the complexity of social
relationships with the added potential of social networks

Connectivism? Yes and no…
 Behaviorism, cognitivism, and constructivism are the three broad
learning theories most often utilized in the creation of
instructional environments. These theories, however, were
developed in a time when learning was not impacted through
technology.
No: psychological theories are not invalidated by technological development; they
help us understand its impact on learning and development. Connectivism is
not in opposition with existing theories, rather, it is (potentially)
complementary to them.
 Learning and knowledge rests in diversity of opinions
No: knowing, knowledge, opinion, and belief are distinct epistemic categories,
subject to different rules of operation and legitimacy, which nevertheless
interact in the subject’s development
 The pipe is more important than the content within the pipe. Our
ability to learn what we need for tomorrow is more important
than what we know today.
No: knowing is both a state and a process; the potential for growth depends on
the quality of the knowledge available

As regards knowledge…
Knowledge
property of a dynamic
system of interaction
subject/milieu under
proscriptive constraints of
viability
It is characterized by
the domain of validity (or
sphere of practice)
the means of the action (or
feedback)
the representations
(linguistic or non-linguistic)
the validation and control
systems
action
S M
feedback
constraints
Situation

Work is necessary to
make knowledge
 teachable
 learnable
Didactical distance
 transposition
Pedagogical distance
 the figure of the teacher
Reference knowledge
Didactical transposition
learning
a Content as stake

Learning is a process of
adaptation under the
combined constraints of
 the new knowledge
 the pedagogical
strategy

12
Mathematics
Physics
Construction trades
Surgery
Automation
Chemistry
Perceive
Decide
Act
Representation
Verification
Action/Feedback
Nicolas Balacheff, EJC 2014, Ottawa, October 3, 2014

Learning is a process of
adaptation under the
combined constraints of
 The new knowledge
 The pedagogical
strategy
 The concrete
characteristics
of situations

3D distance education
Didactical distance
Physical distance
Any action in one of
these dimensions
involves the other
two.
Projet Baghera, late 1990’s

At the CHU Grenoble in the
1990’s
-Ensure the continuity of
schooling for students in
extended care
-Teach geometry (articulating
observation and reasoning)
-Share an action space
-Preserve the continuity of
learning in spite of the diversity
of the people involved
-Create the fiction of presence
and the persistence of memory

Important lessons:
Learning is a constraint on
technology and on the
pedagogical scenario
The users are the learners and
the human or artificial teaching
agents (hybrid environment)
Teaching is the product of a
network of interactions
(emergence)
Becoming familiar with the
environment displaces needs and
expectations and modifies
behaviors (complexity)

Didactical distance
 transposition of reference knowledge
 characterization of meaningful situations
 criteria of acceptability for what will be learned
 devolution of the learning situation
 maintain and support the learning process
 incarnate the reference (the “figure” of the professor)
 ensure quality, reliability, and confidence
Physical distance
 presence, distance, telepresence, fiction of presence
 synchrony, asynchrony, memory
 channels and modes of communication
 accessibility, adaptiveness, adaptability, personalization

PACES in Grenoble (1)
PACES : Première Année Commune des Études de Santé
[First Year of General Health Care Studies]
Medicine – Pharmacology – Midwifery – Dentistry
One year of study leading to a highly competitive exam
Before 2005, courses were held in an amphitheater, as per university tradition.
- Very large class sizes – 811 students in 2000, 1598 students in 2014
- Competition and rivalries created an “electric” atmosphere
Since 2005, courses have been recorded and made available online and on
DVD
 Independent learning
 Questions submitted and selected
online (vote)
 In-person answers, limited group size
(120 students)
 In-person instruction, small groups
(30 students et 2 instructors) ,
multiple-choice evaluation,
double feedback (correction and ranking)
[Source]

 Instructional class (online or on VD)
 FLQ online questions, (vote)
 SEPI in-person answer (120 students)
 In-person instruction (30 students, 2 instructors) quiz
[Source] Week 1 W2 W3 W4

Validation
Success in the competition
(in 2014, 1598 students
competed for 324
positions, 172 of which in
medicine)
Contract
The course content is the
only material used to write
the multiple-choice
questions
First attempts:
7,5/20 in the first group and for all undergraduate honors = no
admissions
7,5/20 in the first group with B or TB undergraduate honors =
85% admissions
Repeat attempts:
10/20 in the first group et 6/20 in the competition = 90% of
admissions
Nicolas Balacheff, EJC 2014, Ottawa, 3 octobre 2014 20

 Less distance from the teacher, but a residual mass
effect: focus on the most common questions
 Space reserved for study, the competition maintains
the motivation
 Satisfied, motivated students
 Prevalence of former undergraduate success over social
backgrounds
 “More than 30% of the courses each year were modified or
totally rewritten for the next year.”
 Private satellite companies offer exam-preparation support;
educational reform places the university in clear competition.

ocTEL, a personal adventure (1)
A mooc for learning how to use educational technology to teach,
learn, and evaluate
 Ten one-week modules following an introduction to become
familiar with the environment
 A module comprises five hours of learning, including a one-hour
webinar and a variety of different activities
 Materials are provided, available online, or independently
produced and proposed. Students must build their own portfolio
 Emphasis is placed on collaborative learning, but tutors available
A mooc that conforms to several principles of connectivism
The actual content is the product of the interactions between
and contributions of all the participants
[find out more]

[find out more]

 The environment integrates webinars, chat, messaging,
blogs, and other resources
 traditional and user-friendly, rich in resources and potential
 Many exchanges and events—it is difficult for an isolated
person to make connections
 Socialization is a significant part of learning
 Not truly a course, but very fertile brainstorming based
on sharing resources, information, and avenues of
inquiry
 Participants create their own “knowledge” (convictions)
[find out more]

Evaluation and certification (1)
Any teaching must guarantee the quality and
validity of the knowledge it seeks to impart
All students have a right to the recognition of
their acquired knowledge or skills
 Institutionalisation – to allow one to identify what
was at stake in the learning situation
 Evaluation – to provide means to judge and
measure learning
 Certification – to take responsibility for validating
the nature and quality of what has been learned

Evaluation and certification (2)
The added value of universities
Barrier to distance education
 Guarantee the quality and validity of the knowledge
 Recognize its acquisition
Explicitly or implicitly, accepted or denied
 Teaching is constrained by methods for evaluating the
learning outcomes
 The goal of acquiring knowledge coexists with
strategies for formal success
 The mission of universal dissemination of knowledge
is in a delicate relationship with the goal of selection

Conclusion (1)
The development of hybrid environments involving
 digital physical spaces (blended)
 Controlled social organizations (e.g. the classroom)
open social organizations (e.g. communities of
learning )
 human artificial agents
Distance education fades away behind
learning spaces
Moocs are distinguished by
 start and end dates tied to the availability of
instructors
 their potential scope of reach

Conclusion (2)
Moocs have the potential to become a
standard form of course
 Short video covering a topic
 Stimulation of attentive listening (multiple-choice
questions)
 Learners’ support by social networks
in conjunction to other pedagogical organizations
Standards will emerge from
 the needs of moocs industrialization
 the need for stable interfaces and procedures
 requirements for assessing certification

Postscript
No pedagogical or technological revolution
But moocs impose a fourth dimension on
distance education:
economic distance
Academic sheepskin, a product on the market
Teaching is a means, the “value” lies in the
badge, the credit, the certificate, the diploma…
The economy may impose standards…
Another title, for another presentation:
Moocs—the great fear of acadustry

The MOOC effect, how mere chance could result in a new standard

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