Massive Open Online Courses

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Recommended: Distance learning verses conventional learning

MOOC is an acronym for “massive open online course”; these MOOCs have had a far-reaching influence on the way education is perceived today. For the moment, MOOCs are almost always free, as students pay no fees to register or take the course. Enrollment is high, ranging anywhere from thousands to hundreds of thousands. While enrollment, and perceived interests may be high, course completion rates are extremely low; frequently, no more than five or ten percent of students who register go on to finish the course. 1 The mission of MOOCs is to increase access to higher education globally, reduce costs and reinvigorate teaching and learning. 2 MOOCs have spread like a wildfire; the number of students taking at least one online class is now at 6.7 million. 3 Additionally, the proportion of all students taking at least one online course is at an all-time high of 32 percent. 3 Online higher education is rapidly increasing in importance and is now a central aspect of the western educational model for the future. On the surface, MOOCs and online higher education seem to be bona fide concepts to export to developing nations, but in reality, online higher education is a part of the veiled forced westernization of the third world.
Throughout history in various instances the western world imposed the western educational model on traditional cultures. This education interferes with the native culture and destroys the history of the people. The poster for Carol Black’s film, Schooling the World: The White Man’s Last Burden?, poses a question: “if you wanted to destroy a culture where would you start?” You would start with the children. 4 In Africa, Christian missionaries introduced the Western style educational system and even after the es...

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...l Computers for eLearning: Sri Lankan Experience." Journal of Education and Training Studies [Online], 1.2 (2013): 152-158.
15: eLearning Africa News. (Apr. 2013). Education in refugee camps. eLearning Africa News.
16: Enkiwe-Abayao, Leah. (Winter 2003). Ifugao Knowledge and Formal Education -Systems of Learning in the Philippines. 27.4. Indigenous Education and the Prospects for Cultural Survival.
17: Al-Harthi, A. S. (2010a). Learner Self-Regulation in Distance Education: A Cross-Cultural Study. The American Journal of Distance Education, 24 (3), 135-150.
18: Al-Harthi, A. S. (2010b) Cultural Differences in Transactional Distance Preference by Arab and American Distance Learner. The Quarterly Review of Distance Education Journal. 11(4), pp. 257-267.
19: Emanuel, EJ. Nature. (2013 Nov 21). Online education: MOOCs taken by educated few. University of Pennsylvania.

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