Open Course studies is very interesting because well known educational institutions are making their fundamental courses available to all to learn. Scholars believe that knowledge is there to be shared. Therefore, well renowned colleges are making courses available to all using open courseware.
Open Yale has an easy to use website which includes information about itself. The About page includes basic question and answers as to the reasons course are offered online, who is supporting this endeavor which includes the hosting grant, technology, and professor, as well as, how and if content can be shared.
Open Yale offers a variety of course. In reviewing their website and courses, I chose to explore the course content for HIST 119: The Civil War and Reconstruction Era, 1845-1877 so that I could better understand how the course presents content.
Entering this course, there is a simple list of links to the left to guide the learner to a brief course introduction, list of lessons or sessions, syllabus, downloads and a survey. There are 27 sessions contained in this course. Each session includes an html (website), audio or video of the session presentation. In essence, these are the actual content of the professor’s lecture. In addition, many of the sessions include a reading assignment.
Upon review of Yale’s course, the courses appear to be neither synchronous or asynchronous but more a pure independent learning experience with no interaction with the faculty or students. Therefore, it is more information or content sharing with no process for the student to show an assimilation of understanding of the content.
From an instructional design perspective, the Open Yale courses include some good foundational concepts:
• Easy to navigate
• Provides a content introduction
• Reading assignments
• Overview of course and each lesson
• Variety of delivery methods
However, from a pure instructional design perspective, these courses are missing course objectives. Therefore, it is providing a broad experience for content but no objective for the learner to define if they have achieved the outcomes expected after completing the course.
From a distance learning perspective, these courses are considered distant learning because there is a separation of learner and instructor. The course is organized well and does provide some basic variety of presentation so it can appeal to different learning styles. View a sample of a video lecture for this specific course. However, there is quite a great deal lacking in these courses in order for them to be considered a good or great distant learning experience.
In order for distance learning to be successful, there needs to be some key components which include the following:
• Key players include faculty. ” The success of any distance education effort rests squarely on the shoulders of the faculty.” (University of Idaho)
• Delivery media – using a variety of methods engages different learning styles and preferences.
• Internet technology is used to provide a communication link among the instructor and students (Florida Gulf Coast University).
• Learner centered approach versus teacher centered
• Encourages individuals to become their own knowledge navigators, taking control of their education (Uribe, p.4)
• Knowledge-centered (Shea, Li, & Pickett 2006 p.176)
• Assessment-centered (Shea, Li, & Pickett 2006 p.176)
• Community-centered (Shea, Li, & Pickett 2006 p.176)
As you review this list, you can see that Yale does meet some of these criteria; however, many of these components are lacking in an Open Course environment and specifically at Yale. Yale uses a more teacher centered approach and delivers the content using a variety of media so learners can adapt it to their learning style.
The largest component missing at Yale is the community centered approach which would allow for interaction between the student and the professor. Due to this lack of interaction, there are quite a few other criteria lacking in this Open Course curriculum. There is not collaboration built into it so the student is purely on their own, navigating content, reading but lacking any component to assimilate the information to demonstrate understanding or to challenge or seek further understanding of the content. Additionally, there is no assessment component so the learner’s ability to assess their understanding is also missing.
Therefore, Open Course at Yale is great resource for content but after that it lacks many of the components needed to be a successful and effective distance learning experience.
References:
Florida Gulf Coast University. (2006). Principles of online design. http://www.fgcu.edu/onlinedesign/intro.html
Shea, P. Li, C., & Pickett, A. (2006). A study of teaching presence and student sense of learning community in fully online and web-enhanced college courses. Internet and Higher Education, 9(3), p. 175-190. (EJ800673)
Snyder, M. (2009). Instructional-Design theory to guide the creation of online learning communities for adults. Tech Trends, 53(1), p. 48-56. http://dx.doi.org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/10.1007/s11528-009-0237-2
University of Idaho. Distance education at a glance. http://www.uiweb.uidaho.edu/eo/dist1.html. Based on Willis, B. (1993). Distance education: A practical guide. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Educational Technology Publications.
Uribe, E. Learner centered principles in distance education. http://itec.sfsu.edu/wp/860wp/F05_860_uribe.pdf
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