eLearning and Digital Cultures MOOC #edcmooc

OK, after all the fuss and blog posts written about MOOCs and how they’ll take over HE I’ve decided to take one, and the eLearning and Digital Cultures MOOC provided by University of Edinburgh and Coursera looks a good start (it’s also a January ’13 start date so I’ve time to prepare!).

“E-learning and Digital Cultures is aimed at teachers, learning technologists, and people with a general interest in education who want to deepen their understanding of what it means to teach and learn in the digital age. The course is about how digital cultures intersect with learning cultures online, and how our ideas about online education are shaped through “narratives”, or big stories, about the relationship between people and technology. We’ll explore some of the most engaging perspectives on digital culture in its popular and academic forms, and we’ll consider how our practices as teachers and learners are informed by the difference of the digital. We’ll look at how learning and literacy is represented in popular digital-, (or cyber-) culture. For example, how is ‘learning’ represented in the film The Matrix, and how does this representation influence our understanding of the nature of e-learning? “

As a student I’ll be “invited to think critically and creatively about e-learning, to try out new ideas in a supportive environment, and to gain fresh perspectives on your own experiences of teaching and learning.” Starting with a “film festival” (i.e. YouTube) to review how the clips might relate to themes that emerge from the course materials, and then progressing to the “consideration of multimodal literacies and digital media, and you’ll be encouraged you to think about visual methods for presenting knowledge and conveying understanding.”

YouTube: E-learning and Digital Cultures

As with most MOOCs at the moment you don’t get any formal qualification or commendation from completion of the MOOC but ‘successful’ candidates do get a certificate.

For me this is as much about the topic (eLearning and Digital Culture) as attending a ‘profesisonal’ MOOC, to find out more about both areas. What about you – will you, have you, did you .. ??

PS. only three of the team are on Twitter, and I cannot see a hashtag for it yet.

I’ll also use this as evidence of CMALT application, if I still haven’t finished it by then. But if i have, then it can be used as evidence of continued development … there’s a thought!

Update: (yes, an update before I’ve even published the post!) I’ve just heard about this MOOC – the ‘Monstrous Open Online Courses‘ that is the MOOC about MOOCs … “beginning on August 12 [2012]. Over the course of one week, MOOC MOOC will explore the pedagogical approach, the sustainability of the form, and alternatives to MOOCs. “