MOOC - democratised education (mostly)
originally written Monday 9th October 2017
edited Wednesday 28th October 2020
edited Wednesday 28th October 2020
Finding the time to continue with your own education, within the context of work - which includes the time spent at work, the time spent working at home and the time spent thinking about work - can be challenging. Particularly when there are so many interests to pursue. A passion for: making beautiful and nutritious food; working on the five illustration projects; making experimental music; tending the vegetable garden; finishing the renovations; collaborating with fellow artists in a variety of projects...can feel like there is not enough time for study.
I think a great deal about things I would like to study, if I had the luxury of time. But of course learning comes in so many forms and much of what I do on a daily basis has some element of learning embedded. This informal daily learning spans the diversity of the material I choose to read, the interactions and collaborations I have with students, colleagues and others, the things I notice, and reflect on and the improvements in my own practice, through persistence and reflection.
A new discovery has been the massive open online course or MOOC. The precursor, pre-internet, was the correspondence course.
I loved the idea of studying something by correspondence when I was younger because it made learning seem possible, in multiple contexts, for anyone who was willing. Which is really interesting given from as young as thirteen I was beginning to seriously disengage with school. Just the course titles alone were enough to open my mind to what was possible. I never did sign up for one, but knowing that I could, knowing they existed, lit a spark in me that hadn't been lit by my formal education at school to that point. I imagine it was that spark that led me back to formal education - Art School the first time round - at the age of 20, having walked, (or perhaps better described as bolted) away from High School at 15.
The MOOC list - https://www.mooc-list.com - is filled with practical, theoretical, historical, esoteric, contemporary, technical, knowledge expanding and idea stimulating possibilities, mostly, for free.
Inspiration for this website, art educate collaborate, came from the course The Place of Music in 21st Century Education from Sydney University. Starting from a requirement of the course to set up an online portfolio, I decided to take the idea seriously and present the multiple aspects of my creative professional self, online. Setting up this website has been a great learning opportunity, never having done anything like this before: learning how to use the technology - understanding how to build a web page; learning about SEO; learning how to populate these pages with meaningful thoughts and ideas; having to consider what I believe is important and vital in education - and figuring out how to articulate that learning continues.
The final piece in this puzzle is to work out how do we meet the needs of the most disadvantaged people, who live in this digital world without affordable access to the technology - a computer and an internet connection - to fully participate and benefit from the world of the MOOC (not to mention all the there amazing stuff the internet has to offer in terms of continuous learning)?
And then, once they have the device, and the connection, how do we entice them away from the latest first person shooter game to explore more of the world. Reflecting on my own journeys in education, I have still to figure out what made me able and brave enough to return to education. Perhaps when I have figured that out I will have some more answers.
Truly democratised learning, authentic preparation for the demands of this new century, require us all to take seriously these challenges. What should we do in the space to ensure access for all? Who's responsibility is it? And where do we start?
Dani Burbrook ©
I think a great deal about things I would like to study, if I had the luxury of time. But of course learning comes in so many forms and much of what I do on a daily basis has some element of learning embedded. This informal daily learning spans the diversity of the material I choose to read, the interactions and collaborations I have with students, colleagues and others, the things I notice, and reflect on and the improvements in my own practice, through persistence and reflection.
A new discovery has been the massive open online course or MOOC. The precursor, pre-internet, was the correspondence course.
I loved the idea of studying something by correspondence when I was younger because it made learning seem possible, in multiple contexts, for anyone who was willing. Which is really interesting given from as young as thirteen I was beginning to seriously disengage with school. Just the course titles alone were enough to open my mind to what was possible. I never did sign up for one, but knowing that I could, knowing they existed, lit a spark in me that hadn't been lit by my formal education at school to that point. I imagine it was that spark that led me back to formal education - Art School the first time round - at the age of 20, having walked, (or perhaps better described as bolted) away from High School at 15.
The MOOC list - https://www.mooc-list.com - is filled with practical, theoretical, historical, esoteric, contemporary, technical, knowledge expanding and idea stimulating possibilities, mostly, for free.
Inspiration for this website, art educate collaborate, came from the course The Place of Music in 21st Century Education from Sydney University. Starting from a requirement of the course to set up an online portfolio, I decided to take the idea seriously and present the multiple aspects of my creative professional self, online. Setting up this website has been a great learning opportunity, never having done anything like this before: learning how to use the technology - understanding how to build a web page; learning about SEO; learning how to populate these pages with meaningful thoughts and ideas; having to consider what I believe is important and vital in education - and figuring out how to articulate that learning continues.
The final piece in this puzzle is to work out how do we meet the needs of the most disadvantaged people, who live in this digital world without affordable access to the technology - a computer and an internet connection - to fully participate and benefit from the world of the MOOC (not to mention all the there amazing stuff the internet has to offer in terms of continuous learning)?
And then, once they have the device, and the connection, how do we entice them away from the latest first person shooter game to explore more of the world. Reflecting on my own journeys in education, I have still to figure out what made me able and brave enough to return to education. Perhaps when I have figured that out I will have some more answers.
Truly democratised learning, authentic preparation for the demands of this new century, require us all to take seriously these challenges. What should we do in the space to ensure access for all? Who's responsibility is it? And where do we start?
Dani Burbrook ©