In the past few years, the interest in MOOCs has surged. MOOCs or massive open online courses are being quoted for defining “reform” or “transformation” of traditional higher education.
So, why are MOOCs must for Higher Education?
MOOCs are convenient
You can take MOOCs at your own pace anywhere over the Internet. Most of MOOCs are free and many of them are available from the professors at well-known institutions across the globe or country.
MOOCs may also available in you native language.
Around 60 per cent of Coursera’s students are from outside US. To keep high, the venture is looking to increase its offerings. Coursera has also added courses in different language Italian, Spanish, German, Chinese and French. Udacity also offers subtitles in different languages, like French, Spanish, Chinese, and Portuguese.
MOOCs Make you Better Educator
Here are few reasons why MOOCs make you better teacher.
- You can see tech in education from the student’s point of view. It makes educator more aware to the fact how you can introduce it to your student and use it effectively for classroom purpose.
- Educators will see how other teachers teach and how their teaching style varies. With MOOCs, you can make your teaching style positive.
- And one obvious reason is you will learn new trends and information to stay abreast.
MOOCs for educators cover a lot of knowledgeable stuff, so do check out our monthly list. The course that’s best for you personally may not have made it on to our list but the idea is to let you know the right platforms to find the ones you would want to be a part of.
Let’s talk about an even bigger community of Open Educational Resources. Wikipedia says, “The development and promotion of open educational resources is often motivated by a desire to curb the commodification of knowledge and provide an alternate or enhanced educational paradigm.”
Like MOOCs, Open Educational Resources are also must for higher education because it:
Saves Costs
OER saves drastically cost of education. Students who cannot afford to purchase expensive course materials or textbooks, can enjoy and learn course using this affordable option available.
Gives Access to Quality Choices
Nowadays, there are around 700 free online courses open to public by well-known universities. Students having low-resource atmospheres can take advantage from the video tutorials and recorded lectures advanced by other institutions like:
- JHSPH OpenCourseWare (from the Johns Hopkins University)
- Open Yale courses (from Yale University)
- MIT OpenCourseWare (from MIT)
- Harvard Open Courses at Harvard Extension School (from Harvard University)
Some of the other benefits include:
- Permits for peer review.
- Fulfills social responsibility of offering education to all.
- Increases standard of educational resources.
- Improves a university’s status and that of the researcher or educators.
Read more about OER and its advantages in learning and teaching here.
