[Ohiogift] Online learning via MOOCs

Thu Jun 5 15:27:09 EDT 2014

            Friends:

  The New York Times has an interesting story on free online learning via MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses), and this may be ideal for vacation-ready students and teachers alike. The story is linked below, and it includes links within it to download applications (apps) for Android and Apple iOS smartphones and tablets, to make for handy learning and a productive summer. The story is pasted below, too.

  Courses are linked to Coursera and Khan Academy, and tons of related videos on YouTube. All links to Coursera and Khan are below, including primary sites, YouTube sites and download sites for apps.

  Best wishes,
  Art Snyder

  Link to story site:

     http://x.co/4mCr8
 or:
 http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/05/technology/personaltech/Moocs-via-tablet-or-smartphone-are-gateway-to-free-education.html?emc=edit_tu_20140605&nl=technology&nlid=26666496&_r=0

 Links to Coursera:
 https://www.coursera.org/
 https://www.youtube.com/user/coursera
 https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/coursera/id736535961?mt=8
 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.coursera.android

 Links to Khan Academy:
 https://www.khanacademy.org/
 https://www.youtube.com/user/khanacademy
 https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/khan-academy/id469863705?mt=8
 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.khanacademy.videos&hl=en

  ==========================================================
  Via Tablet or Smartphone, Learning With MOOCs

  JUNE 4, 2014
  By KIT EATON

  MASSIVE Open Online Courses — or MOOCs — are a snowballing revolution in education.

  Thousands of courses from some of the world’s finest institutions are available free online, covering everything from astrophysics to the arts. For each course, students, sometimes numbering in the thousands, take part from home — where they view video lectures, take tests and submit essays through a Web interface. It’s a digital classroom with no actual “room,” and where you can study more or less when you like.

  Nowadays of course, your smartphone means you can also study when you’re on the move.

  Coursera’s free iOS and Android app is perhaps the very best way to take part in a MOOC through a phone or tablet — maybe during your commute to work or your lunch break. The app gives you limited access to Coursera’s list of available courses as well as any you have already signed up for.

  The app’s “Find Courses” section lists courses available by subject. Each subject has its own summary page with images showing off the individual courses along with their titles, the institutions providing them and their dates.

  Tapping a course brings up an introduction video that typically tries to interest you in the content, as well as detailed descriptions of what the course covers, workload requirements and which languages are available. If you like the look of a course, you can sign up ahead of time.

  When you’re already taking part in a course, you can view its lecture videos through Coursera’s app. These can be streamed or, if you plan ahead, downloaded in advance so that you don’t burn through your mobile data allowance while traveling. Because the app is connected to your account, the videos you’ve viewed will be marked as already seen when you log in later through your computer.

  The app is limited, though, and doesn’t let you take some of the multiple-choice tests or perform peer-review assignments. This functionality is something the company has hinted will arrive later, undoubtedly pleasing many users. However, I’m pretty certain I wouldn’t be able to focus on a quiz about quantum physics or the history of improvisational jazz while sitting on a rocking metro train.

  Coursera’s app is extremely clearly designed, which makes it easy and lovely to use, and it is free — so try it, and see if there’s anything you’d love to learn.

  The Khan Academy app, also free on iOS, takes a slightly different approach to MOOC-based learning. In subject matter, Khan Academy courses are a little more traditional than Coursera’s, so you’re more likely to be learning about statistics or economics than Hollywood filmmaking history.

  The app’s interface is simple but elegant. You can view a list of subjects, and drill down into each menu to find the course you’re interested in. Course videos then run on the screen with a neat rolling transcript shown beneath them so you can double-check, at a glance, that you heard something correctly.

  Like Coursera, watching these videos syncs with your Khan Academy account, so you get credit for watching them and you can download them ahead of time to watch when offline.

  Using the Khan Academy app to take part in a MOOC feels very different, much less formal perhaps, than using Coursera’s app. This might be something you like, but I prefer a more structured approach. There’s also no official Android app yet. However the free, unofficial Viewer For Khan Academy app for Android is pretty well designed, and gives you access to 4,000-plus videos.

  If you’re just starting out learning with MOOCs, the MOOCs4U app may be worth using. This free iOS and Android app lists the many thousands of different MOOCs available from providers like Coursera, Udacity, edX and more.

  It’s just a list of courses, though, not a portal to taking part in them. Also, I wish it let you choose the subject you were interested in before you had to choose a MOOC provider, because this would make searching easier.

  Juggling MOOC-based study with your daily work may be tricky, especially if you’re a keen student taking more than one course from different providers. To help with this, check out the GroupMOOC app, which helps you build timetable plans including study time and deadlines in a calendarlike format. It’s free on iOS.

  Omni Study is a more generic, but also more elegant, alternative on iOS, great for organizing your study schedule. It’s $1. On Android, the free app My Study Life is a similar study planner that’s good-looking and quite powerful.

  Lastly, if you’re watching a MOOC video on your computer, then why not try using an app like Write, $2 on iOS, to make notes on what you’re learning? That way you can browse your notes later when you’re out and about.

  Write is a minimalist-designed note-taking app that’s particularly good. If you’re on Android, try taking notes with SomNote instead; it’s great-looking and free.

  QUICK CALL

  The popular Sunrise calendar iOS app has just hit Android phones for the first time. It’s an extremely elegant-looking app that could lure you away from using Google’s own calendar solution. It’s free.

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