Determinants of the Intention to Use MOOCs as a Complementary Tool: An Observational Study of Ecuadorian Teachers

New technological advances and globalization have undoubtedly given rise to new forms of learning. Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), which are a kind of evolution on e-learning, have the endorsement of prestigious universities around the world, and are transforming the traditional teaching–learning process. In Ecuador, these online courses are based on the Basic General Education system and are neither popular among students nor widely used by teachers in their teaching method, thus, this teaching system is not considered as an official qualification. The inclusion of this tool in the Ecuadorian educational system as a learning resource would expand access to equal opportunities to students and teachers from all over the country. Therefore, our proposal is to use the MOOCs as a source with all the instructional contents of the subject and as classwork based on the flipped-classroom method. In this way, such resources can be an aid to traditional high school classes, and the average grade achieved by students through this platform, as well as the student’s participation, may be part of the formal evaluation system in any institution. With the purpose of measuring the level of confidence in online education and the usage of MOOCs as a tool for teachers’ work, a descriptive and analytical approach has been taken in this study. A quantitative survey was administered to 696 Basic General Education teachers who took used this type of course. The results of this investigation show that 93.9% of the teachers trust the online education; 89% are ready to use MOOCs as a teaching–learning resource and 79% would use MOOCs as part of the final grade. These data prove that MOOCs could be a complementary tool for Basic General Education in Ecuador, so they could contribute to improve learning outcomes and the development of traditional education

Indicators for enhancing learners’ engagement in massive open online courses: A systematic review

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) have paved a new learning path for the 21st-century world. The potential to reach a massive geographically dispersed audience is one of the major advantages of MOOCs. Moreover, they can be offered on a self-paced and self-regulated basis and have become an integral part of lifelong learning, especially in workplaces. However, one persistent problem is the lack of learners’ engagement. A harmonisation of studies providing a holistic view into aggregating indicators for enhancing learners’ engagement in MOOCs is lacking. The coronavirus pandemic has accelerated MOOC adoption, and learners’ engagement in MOOCs has become even more essential for the success of this educational innovation. We examine the existing literature to derive indicators important for enhancing learners’ engagement in MOOC learning environments. Using a systematic approach, 83 empirical studies were examined, and 10 indicators were identified as important considerations for enhancing learners’ engagement while designing MOOCs—from initiatives for individual learners to platform and instructional design perspectives. We also present a table describing these indicators and offer a structured discussion on each one. We believe the results provide guidelines for MOOC designers and instructors, educational policymakers, higher education institutions, and MOOC engagement researchers.Peer reviewe

Predicting Paid Certification in Massive Open Online Courses

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) have been proliferating because of the free or low-cost offering of content for learners, attracting the attention of many stakeholders across the entire educational landscape. Since 2012, coined as “the Year of the MOOCs”, several platforms have gathered millions of learners in just a decade. Nevertheless, the certification rate of both free and paid courses has been low, and only about 4.5–13% and 1–3%, respectively, of the total number of enrolled learners obtain a certificate at the end of their courses. Still, most research concentrates on completion, ignoring the certification problem, and especially its financial aspects. Thus, the research described in the present thesis aimed to investigate paid certification in MOOCs, for the first time, in a comprehensive way, and as early as the first week of the course, by exploring its various levels. First, the latent correlation between learner activities and their paid certification decisions was examined by (1) statistically comparing the activities of non-paying learners with course purchasers and (2) predicting paid certification using different machine learning (ML) techniques. Our temporal (weekly) analysis showed statistical significance at various levels when comparing the activities of non-paying learners with those of the certificate purchasers across the five courses analysed. Furthermore, we used the learner’s activities (number of step accesses, attempts, correct and wrong answers, and time spent on learning steps) to build our paid certification predictor, which achieved promising balanced accuracies (BAs), ranging from 0.77 to 0.95. Having employed simple predictions based on a few clickstream variables, we then analysed more in-depth what other information can be extracted from MOOC interaction (namely discussion forums) for paid certification prediction. However, to better explore the learners’ discussion forums, we built, as an original contribution, MOOCSent, a cross- platform review-based sentiment classifier, using over 1.2 million MOOC sentiment-labelled reviews. MOOCSent addresses various limitations of the current sentiment classifiers including (1) using one single source of data (previous literature on sentiment classification in MOOCs was based on single platforms only, and hence less generalisable, with relatively low number of instances compared to our obtained dataset;) (2) lower model outputs, where most of the current models are based on 2-polar iii iv classifier (positive or negative only); (3) disregarding important sentiment indicators, such as emojis and emoticons, during text embedding; and (4) reporting average performance metrics only, preventing the evaluation of model performance at the level of class (sentiment). Finally, and with the help of MOOCSent, we used the learners’ discussion forums to predict paid certification after annotating learners’ comments and replies with the sentiment using MOOCSent. This multi-input model contains raw data (learner textual inputs), sentiment classification generated by MOOCSent, computed features (number of likes received for each textual input), and several features extracted from the texts (character counts, word counts, and part of speech (POS) tags for each textual instance). This experiment adopted various deep predictive approaches – specifically that allow multi-input architecture - to early (i.e., weekly) investigate if data obtained from MOOC learners’ interaction in discussion forums can predict learners’ purchase decisions (certification). Considering the staggeringly low rate of paid certification in MOOCs, this present thesis contributes to the knowledge and field of MOOC learner analytics with predicting paid certification, for the first time, at such a comprehensive (with data from over 200 thousand learners from 5 different discipline courses), actionable (analysing learners decision from the first week of the course) and longitudinal (with 23 runs from 2013 to 2017) scale. The present thesis contributes with (1) investigating various conventional and deep ML approaches for predicting paid certification in MOOCs using learner clickstreams (Chapter 5) and course discussion forums (Chapter 7), (2) building the largest MOOC sentiment classifier (MOOCSent) based on learners’ reviews of the courses from the leading MOOC platforms, namely Coursera, FutureLearn and Udemy, and handles emojis and emoticons using dedicated lexicons that contain over three thousand corresponding explanatory words/phrases, (3) proposing and developing, for the first time, multi-input model for predicting certification based on the data from discussion forums which synchronously processes the textual (comments and replies) and numerical (number of likes posted and received, sentiments) data from the forums, adapting the suitable classifier for each type of data as explained in detail in Chapter 7

Influence of employer support for professional development on MOOCs enrolment and completion: Results from a cross-course survey

Although the potential of open education and MOOCs for professional development is usually recognized, it has not yet been explored extensively. How far employers support non-formal learning is still an open question. This paper presents the findings of a survey-based study which focuses on the influence of employer support for (general) professional development on employees’ use of MOOCs. Findings show that employers are usually unaware that their employees are participating in MOOCs. In addition, employer support for general professional development is positively associated with employees completing MOOCs and obtaining certificates for them. However, the relationship between employer support and MOOC enrollment is less clear: workers who have more support from their employers tend to enroll in either a low or a high number of MOOCs. Finally, the promotion of a minimum of ICT skills by employers is shown to be an effective way of encouraging employee participation in the open education ecosystem.JRC.J.3-Information Societ

Three perspectives on hybridising x and c MOOCs to create an online course on digital CVs

If massive open online courses (MOOCs) were considered as an educational revolution influencing the traditional model of Higher Education [1] then their discourse is formulated in terms of polarity, and this is no better depicted than in their characterization, as either c or x MOOCs. This typology is based on underlying pedagogical principles: the cm is designed using constructivist - connectivist theories, while the xm is premised on behaviourist principles. In both conceptualisations, however, educational principles predominate, while the MOOC’s purpose appears to be secondary. What is clear, though, is that very careful thought needs to be applied to their macro and micro design characteristics (Scagnoli, 2014; Richter, 2014). This paper will explore the attempts of the designers to hybridize the key strengths of both forms of architecture in order to create a construct that puts purpose first – the creation of a personalized, digital cv for real – world use. The focus, then, is on the creation of a micro - MOOC titled: 3DCV - a tool to support participants by combining elements from both pedagogical spectra: connectivist and behaviourist. This new form of cv is necessary because the traditional configuration of the two dimensional ‘print’ cv has given way to a continuum of ‘digital’, three dimensional cvs within which employers can exploit the potential of the digital medium to both deepen and broaden their understanding of the strengths of a particular candidate. In effect, we will examine two revolutionary digital concepts at the same time: the MOOC and the digital cv and, in doing so, we will explore the challenges from the perspectives of the three course creators, two of whom were RDP interns (a PhD graduate and an undergraduate student) and the third member, an experienced academic and project lead, in order to support colleagues who might be considering writing their own MOOCs. Our selected pedagogy to deliver the course was based on a hybrid of x and c MOOCs using the principles of: relationships; an informal tone; the use of ipsative comparison, and the use of ‘thematic’ feedback

Three perspectives on hybridising x and c MOOCs to create an online course on digital CVs

If massive open online courses (MOOCs) were considered as an educational revolution influencing the traditional model of Higher Education [1] then their discourse is formulated in terms of polarity, and this is no better depicted than in their characterization, as either c or x MOOCs. This typology is based on underlying pedagogical principles: the cm is designed using constructivist - connectivist theories, while the xm is premised on behaviourist principles. In both conceptualisations, however, educational principles predominate, while the MOOC’s purpose appears to be secondary. What is clear, though, is that very careful thought needs to be applied to their macro and micro design characteristics (Scagnoli, 2014; Richter, 2014). This paper will explore the attempts of the designers to hybridize the key strengths of both forms of architecture in order to create a construct that puts purpose first – the creation of a personalized, digital cv for real – world use. The focus, then, is on the creation of a micro - MOOC titled: 3DCV - a tool to support participants by combining elements from both pedagogical spectra: connectivist and behaviourist. This new form of cv is necessary because the traditional configuration of the two dimensional ‘print’ cv has given way to a continuum of ‘digital’, three dimensional cvs within which employers can exploit the potential of the digital medium to both deepen and broaden their understanding of the strengths of a particular candidate. In effect, we will examine two revolutionary digital concepts at the same time: the MOOC and the digital cv and, in doing so, we will explore the challenges from the perspectives of the three course creators, two of whom were RDP interns (a PhD graduate and an undergraduate student) and the third member, an experienced academic and project lead, in order to support colleagues who might be considering writing their own MOOCs. Our selected pedagogy to deliver the course was based on a hybrid of x and c MOOCs using the principles of: relationships; an informal tone; the use of ipsative comparison, and the use of ‘thematic’ feedback

Student Engagement in Aviation Moocs: Identifying Subgroups and Their Differences

The purpose of this study was to expand the current understanding of learner engagement in aviation-related Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) through cluster analysis. MOOCs, regarded for their low- or no-cost educational content, often attract thousands of students who are free to engage with the provided content to the extent of their choosing. As online training for pilots, flight attendants, mechanics, and small unmanned aerial system operators continues to expand, understanding how learners engage in optional aviation-focused, online course material may help inform course design and instruction in the aviation industry. In this study, Moore’s theory of transactional distance, which posits psychological or communicative distance can impede learning and success, was used as a descriptive framework for analysis. Archived learning analytics datasets from two 2018 iterations of the same small unmanned aerial systems MOOC were cluster-analyzed (N = 1,032 and N = 4,037). The enrolled students included individuals worldwide; some were affiliated with the host institution, but most were not. The data sets were cluster analyzed separately to categorize participants into common subpopulations based on discussion post pages viewed and posts written, video pages viewed, and quiz grades. Subgroup differences were examined in days of activity and record of completion. Pre- and postcourse survey data provided additional variables for analysis of subgroup differences in demographics (age, geographic location, education level, employment in the aviation industry) and learning goals. Analysis of engagement variables revealed three significantly different subgroups for each MOOC. Engagement patterns were similar between MOOCs for the most and least engaged groups, but differences were noted in the middle groups; MOOC 1’s middle group had a broader interest in optional content (both in discussions and videos); whereas MOOC 2’s middle group had a narrower interest in optional discussions. Mandatory items (Mandatory Discussion or Quizzes) were the best predictors in classifying subgroups for both MOOCs. Significant associations were found between subgroups and education levels, days of activity, and total quiz scores. This study addressed two known problems: a lack of information on student engagement in aviation-related MOOCs, and more broadly, a growing imperative to examine learners who utilize MOOCs but do not complete them. This study served as an important first step for course developers and instructors who aim to meet the diverse needs of the aviation-education community

Use of deep multi-target prediction to identify learning styles

It is possible to classify students according to the manner they recognize, process, and store information. This classification should be considered when developing adaptive e-learning systems. It also creates a comprehension of the different styles students demonstrate while in the process of learning, which can help adaptive e-learning systems offer advice and instructions to students, teachers, administrators, and parents in order to optimize students’ learning processes. Moreover, e-learning systems using computational and statistical algorithms to analyze students’ learning may offer the opportunity to complement traditional learning evaluation methods with new ones based on analytical intelligence. In this work, we propose a method based on deep multi-target prediction algorithm using Felder–Silverman learning styles model to improve students’ learning evaluation using feature selection, learning styles models, and multiple target classification. As a result, we present a set of features and a model based on an artificial neural network to investigate the possibility of improving the accuracy of automatic learning styles identification. The obtained results show that learning styles allow adaptive e-learning systems to improve the learning processes of students105Applied machine learnin

Exploring the experiences of instructors teaching massive open online courses in tourism and hospitality: a mixed methods approach

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) have existed as a disruptive educational phenomenon for nine years. Grounded in the roots of distance education, open education, Open Educational Resources, and OpenCourseWare, MOOCs have now survived various critics and have continued growing globally. Reports about MOOCs in both the press and scholarly publications began to grow significantly in 2013 (Sánchez-Vera, Leon Urrutia, & Davis, 2015; Zancanaro & Domingues, 2017) and, since then, more and more researchers have joined the discussions, developing them to explore various new topics. To contribute to the literature of MOOC studies, this doctoral thesis begins with an in-depth analysis of the background, history, growth, and vision, and proposes a tentative definition of MOOCs. Meanwhile, by conducting bibliometric research to review MOOC studies conducted between 2015 and 2017, this thesis fills in the gap that has existed due to a lack of systematic reviews of MOOC literature since 2015. The results of the bibliometric research summarised the relevant MOOC research into nine categories, including learner focused, commentary and concepts, case reports or evaluations, pedagogy, curriculum and design, course object focused, provider focused, technology, systematic review of literature, and learning analytics and big data. They also suggested a limited amount of provider focused research, which became the research interest and focus of this thesis. In the centre of the Europe, Swiss universities have marched forward in the MOOC movement, together with other over 550 universities (Shah, 2016) around the world. Università della Svizzera italiana (USI; Lugano, Switzerland), a Swiss public university, became a MOOC provider in 2015 and offered the first MOOC in the topic of eTourism: eTourism: Communication Perspectives. This doctoral thesis is closely related to this university-level initiative, which was dedicated to producing the first pilot MOOC at USI. Therefore, the cases chosen by this thesis are positioned in the discipline of tourism and hospitality. The first MOOC with a large audience taught artificial intelligence in 2011 (Zancanaro & Domingues, 2017). Nowadays, MOOCs have broken the barrier of space and time to educate the masses in a wide range of subjects. However, the provision of MOOCs in the subject of tourism and hospitality did not appear until 2013, when two MOOCs from two American universities became available. In the past four years since these MOOCs were launched, the number of tourism and hospitality MOOCs available in the market has remained limited (Tracey, Murphy, & Horton-Tognazzini, 2016). This scarcity contradicts the fact that tourism and hospitality is the field that contributes the most to the employment of the global workforce. Pressing problems, such as high turnover, seasonality, and new global challenges have urged for solutions to quickly training people working in this area to become available (Cantoni, Kalbaska, & Inversini, 2009). A call for more studies about tourism and hospitality MOOCs has emerged. The combined reality of the lack of studies regarding MOOC providers, opportunities for first-hand experience of producing a tourism MOOC in a university, and the deficiency in both the research and practises of tourism and hospitality MOOCs has inspired the direction of this thesis in regard to exploring MOOC instructors’ experiences, using cases in the field of tourism and hospitality. It cumulates six studies, using a mixed methods approach, to tackle the two main research objectives: to investigate at large the tourism and hospitality MOOC provisions between 2008 and 2015 and to report the experiences of Università della Svizzera italiana (USI) when producing the eTourism MOOC. In order, the first two studies in Chapter 3 of this thesis focus on tourism and hospitality MOOCs in general and produce a big picture context for the other four studies in Chapter 4. The first study proposes a conceptual framework through which to describe and analyse the course design of a MOOC and applies it to 18 tourism and hospitality MOOCs produced between 2008 and 2015. The second study then continues to interview six tourism and hospitality MOOC instructors, to describe their experiences and perspectives of teaching MOOCs. After exploring a holistic view of the overall development of MOOCs in tourism and hospitality and gaining a deep understanding of the instructors behind these offerings, this thesis introduces the experiences of one single MOOC provider: Università della Svizzera italiana (USI) in Chapter 4. It first introduces its overall implementation process (Study 3), and further elaborates three phases of this process: how it selected a suitable MOOC platform at the beginning (Study 4); how it assessed learner engagement in the MOOC (Study 5); and, eventually, how it evaluated the performance of the MOOC (Study 6). This thesis was written mainly from the perspective of eLearning, with the intention of benefiting its community of scholars and practitioners. It has contributed to the literature by developing a framework with which to review MOOCs (in Study 1), the implementation process of producing MOOCs (in Study 2), practical review schema of MOOC platforms (in Study 4), the MOOC Learner Engagement Online Survey (in Study 5), and how to use the Kirkpatrick model to evaluate MOOCs (in Study 6). These conceptual frameworks and experiential tools can benefit future researchers and practitioners. Meanwhile, due to its intimate connection with the field of tourism and hospitality, by directly using its cases, the research outputs of the six studies can also benefit the tourism and hospitality education and training sector as a reference for further action