This presentation discusses the use of MOOCs at the University of Iceland. It provides background on early online education efforts in Iceland dating back to the 1990s. It also summarizes the results of a 2013 working group that recommended exploring MOOC integration. The presentation outlines a 2014 trial that linked courses in linguistics, statistics, education and distance education to MOOCs. It discusses challenges encountered and student feedback. Upcoming work on an Icelandic language MOOC and the European HOME project on MOOCs are also mentioned. The presentation concludes with recommendations around supporting MOOCs for small language communities and linking them to communities of practice.

1. (M)OOCs at the University of Iceland
Presentation at the Erasmus+ project BCSI - Building the Culture of Social
Innovation in Higher Education Reykjavík September 29 2016
Sólveig Jakobsdóttir, associate professor
University of Iceland – School of Education

2. This presentation
• Background, context
• University of Iceland (UI) workgroup 2013
– report & recommendations
• UI 2014-2016 Embedded MOOCs
• ICT for practicing teachers (Samspil+)
• European context
• Issues and thoughts

3. Iceland: from isolation to an
“online state”...
• Ísmennt: The Icelandic Educational
network – teachers@ismennt.is
• Ísmennt online courses on Internet use
from 1996?-1997+
• Internet "wonderworld”; Browsing the web
• Web "spinning", beginners, intermediate
• KHÍ - Iceland school of education, DE
online

4. Myself
• Project manager 1997
• Research on Internet use of teachers
• Lecturer ICT and DE from 1997
– Jakobsdóttir, S. (2004). Distributed research in distributed education: How to
combine research and teaching online Netla, 3(2).
http://netla.khi.is/greinar/2004/010/index.htm
– Jakobsdóttir, S., et al. (2010). Using the new information and communication
technologies for the continuing professional development of teachers through
open and distance learning. In P. A. Danaher og A. Umar (Eds.), Teacher
education through open and distance learning (pp. 105-120). Vancouver,
Canada: COL.

5. IUE + UI: Merging universities: no of
DE students in each, 2007-8
No and
% of
students
Kennaraháskóli Íslands
Iceland University of Education
University of
Iceland
Under-
grad.
Grad. Total Total
No of
students
1.703 679 2.382 9.783
No of DE
students
920 679 1599 267
% DE
students
54,0 100,0 67,1 2,7

6. Merging of two Icelandic-uni’s, 2008
Iceland University of
Education (IUE)
1908 (University level 1971)
University of Iceland (UI)
1911
Many different committees set up to ease the merging including a
DE policy group:
50 (67)% vs. 3% distance students
Recommendations that
UI opened up courses/programs for DL

7. University of Iceland
Icelandic as a second
language programme
Icelandic Online
The first Icelandic MOOC?
http://www.icelandiconline.is
From 2004
• Free, online course(materials)
• Can now sign up for course with a
tutor (with cost)
• Used in a blended mode to
prepare students who come to
study Icelandic in Iceland
• Recent analytics: 140,000 visitors,
43,000 actively participating

8. MOOCs
• MOOC = massive? open online learning
• The two main types
– cMOOCs - connectivism: networking, based
on sharing and participation
– xMOOCs - behaviorism, cognitivism: content-
test, individuals (+learning community)
– (tMOOCs)...

9. The first cMOOC
Siemens and Downes – University of Manitoba
Connectivism and Connective Knowledge (CCK08)
• 25 campus students paying, 2200+ from
anywhere for free
Icelanders participating e.g. promoters of
open source, OERs, open knowledge...
– Salvör Gissurardóttir, assistant professor at
University of Iceland – School of Education
– Sigurður Fjalar Jónsson, teacher, former head
of 3f - ICT in education teacher association

10. Work group at UI 2013
Report and recommendations:
• MOOCs internationally
• How s‘s and t‘s use those
• Issues and challenges:
including language
• UI-MOOCs – which fields?
• Opportunities in use of MOOCs at UI
Menntakvika 2014

11. Exploration – from mooc.ca
• Providers – 14-20 –different models – and
size (massive?), majority US-based,
English main teaching language, 7-92
courses per provider in most cases
• Challenges: finances, certification, testing,
drop-out, self-discipline, social issues,
course evaluation, language, higher
education development

12. Student survey
• All UI students – online questionnaire
spring 2013, 503 answered (60%
undergraduates, 74% women),
• 12% saide they had completed a MOOC
• 20% signed up/or examined a MOOC
without completing,
• 75% used online learning resources

13. Work group recommendations
• Exploration with 2-3 courses per UI-school
with MOOC integration
• Design of UI MOOCs (Icelandic,
history/middle ages, geology, health..)
• Project group to monitor/study
• Special funding
• Study teaching methods, ICT integration

14. New work group – exploration
2014
• Advertised for interested faculty members
– willing to integrate MOOCs in courses
• 8 answered, 6 first meeting, 4 participated
• Linguistics
• Statistics – Health science
• School of Education: Online teaching and
learning; Distance Education

15. New work group – MOOC
integration spring semester 2014
Table 1: Overview of courses participating in a trial with MOOC integration
Course No. of
students
Linked MOOCs Providers
Computers and
language
12 Corpus Linguistics FutureLearn
Biostatistics I 5 (out of
70)
Statistical Reasoning for
Public Health
Coursera
Learning and teaching
on the Internet
12 K-12 Blended & Online
Learning (mainly)
Coursera
Distance education 17 Several1
Coursera;
University of
Alaska

16. Distance education spring 2014
• Mandatory, first project (25%)
• 17 students: 3 groups 1 individual
• Course choice f2f session 1, intro session 2
• Report: Group’s experience of MOOC’s, ideas
for use at the UI, in own professional
development or work.
• Some signed up for one course, some for
different courses.
Menntakvika 2014

17. Students: some conclusions
• Courses well organised, useful
• Cannot replace u-courses completely
(“parrot learning” in xMOOCs)
• Great for professional development, self-
study!
• Critical but alert to opportunties and highly
interested

18. Challenges
• Dropout, little or no communication with
the teacher, little support for students,
social aspects, language, the course too
much aligned with US culture.
• Question whether the same form of
learning was good for everyone.
Knowledge factory-production, “parrot”
learning?

19. MOOCs in DE spring 2016

20. Upcoming presentation and paper
• Jakobsdóttir, S. (2016). MOOCs as provisions in
graduate education for future professional development.
In Conference proceedings for the 8th Pan-
Commonwealth Forum on Open Learning (PCF8). Kuala
Lumpur: COL & Open University Malaysia.
• Jakobsdóttir, S. (2016). (M)OOCs in Iceland: Language
and learning communities. In D. Jansen & L. Konings
(Eds.), MOOCs in Europe: Overview of papers
representing a collective European response on MOOCs
as presented during the HOME conference in Rome
November 2015 (pp. 14-18). Maastricht, The
Netherlands: EADTU.

21. Education Plaza („torgs“): teachers‘
communities of practice+digital habitats
http://menntamidja.is

22. Icelandic style MOOC for teacher
professional development
• Spuni 2011 and 2012? LanguagePlaza
• Samspil 2015 EducationPlaza+
• Digital citizenship MOOC (in Icelandic) 2017 UI,
RANNUM, SAFT, EducationPlaza...?

23. The EU HOME project:
home.eadtu.eu

24. Europe - situation
Jansen, D. og Schuwer, R. (2015). Institutional MOOC strategies in Europe:
status report based on a mapping survey conducted in October-December 2014.
http://www.eadtu.eu/documents/Publications/OEenM/Institutional_MOOC_strategies_in_Europe.pdf

25. Porto declaration, Nov. 2014
• Europe must seize this moment to grab
the opportunities offered by MOOCs.
• Risks and threats, opportunities
• Embrace full openness
• Collective European response
• Strong support, government, EC
• University collaboration

26. Porto declaration, Nov. 2014
• Europe must seize this moment to grab
the opportunities offered by MOOCs.
• Risks and threats, opportunities
• Embrace full openness
• Collective European response
• Strong support, government, EC
• University collaboration

27. HOME policy brief,
recommendations
• Connect to local institutional objectives and focus on
specific target groups for MOOCs
• Disseminate incentives to institutions through continuing
networking activities and conferences
• Support institutions in identifying and explicating local
business models for MOOCs
• Broaden the domain and activities of OpenupEd
• Support special groups of institutions to coalesce in
MOOC development within different levels and models

28. Languages and cultures
From the BBC web:
• .. up to 7,000
languages spoken in
the world.
• 2-3%(150-200
languages with
1 million people+
• 90% used by less than
100,000 people.
English
image available in wikipedia (Jroehl, 2015)

29. Some issues and thoughts
• How open are MOOC‘s?
• How do we design/make use of MOOC‘s
in small language communities?
• Formal/informal/non-formal learning at
different school levels, learner groups
• Small open online courses – how will they
evolve? (P2P?)

30. Recommendations Iceland+
• Encourage (M)OOCs at the local and national level -
different language groups, include a global
outreach/for a distributed audience
• Consider value not just for individuals but more
wholistically for groups, communities, society
• Foster formation of learner groups/ communities
• Consider blended modes (optional)
• Involve and link to communities of practice