Posted on 09/29/2014 6:45:08 AM PDT by Academiadotorg
The School Reform News, published by the Heartland Institute, found there are over 1,200 massive open online courses, or MOOCs, offered by over 200 universities and taken by an estimated ten million K-12 students. homeschooling
Florida is the nation’s leader in offering MOOCs, where students watch video lectures recorded online and participate in online discussion boards, which could reduce the cost of higher education for students and state taxpayers. Michael Horn, cofounder of the Clayton Christianson Institute, said, “People would be foolish to overlook it.” Florida state legislators are considering moving the state to MOOCs at the K-12 level, but note that MOOCs are free for the most part. One legislator, Manny Diaz (R-Hialeah), noted, “MOOCs are not for every student, but this is customized education, without taking up additional time and [resources].” Diaz added, “It’s another tool in the virtual world. It’s not going to replace the teacher.”
The state gave Broward College a grant to develop a MOOC, not as a purely academic class, but a preparation class for students to prepare before taking state college entrance exams. Those exams determine whether applicants can skip introductory-level classes or will need to take remedial classes.
The newsletter also posed an interesting question: Is online school like homeschooling?
In the meantime, online classes are giving homeschooling parents and their children more options, but parents have to be careful because not every online class is created equal (as the newsletter confirmed in a separate article). For example, Indiana Association of Home Educators director Debi Ketron said some online classes are a mere online extension of state public schools. She said homeschooling is “home-based and parent-directed and privately-funded,” whereas online classes run from public schools are not. She added, “When you take government money, there are always strings attached. We choose freedom because we can choose our own curriculum.”
Apparently, public school officials, when they learn parents are pulling their children out of school and want to homeschool them, call and tell these parents to sign up for one of their public school-run online classes. “That’s not homeschooling,” Ketron said. She and other parents worry that online schools are misleading families about what homeschooling is: Parent-driven curriculum that is not attached to public schools and government funding.
Whoever is “teaching” your children is also discipling them.
Remember that.
MOOCs have the power to destroy the present educational establishment. Khan Academy, for example. Unless and until particular MOOCs become mandated. But if one is free to choose which to participate in, competition exists and excellence (i.e. the bane of the public schools) will eventually emerge.
They are also often giving spiritual and moral guidance and it is often warped.
There is also a problem because there are a variety of online educational sites run by government entities.
One, for instance, run by a county school district and another run by the state itself....I am speaking for Florida in this case.
hslda.org is a good site for home schooling.
Another, at least for Florida residents, is fpea.com.
A good online course resource is the curriculum known as Monarch, published by Alpha Omega Press.
I was watching a news show a couple of weeks ago here in SoCal...they were talking about how a lot of high demand professors are now putting ‘lesser’ classes online so they would have more time to focus on important stuff.
Cut to a discussion amongst instructor aides, and all they could talk about is how this would reduce or eliminate their jobs. Absolutely no concern about better access and lower costs to students....just me me me.
Public education is not, or should not be a jobs program for public employees.
My point exactly - if you want to disciple your children, you must be the one teaching your children.
Just about all government jobs are not much more than this.
Definition:
MOOC - The sound a cow makes upon inhaling a bug.
hmm. and 15 % of students are enrolled in them...
I agree with you but I would like to expand the sentiment. Nothing in the public should be a jobs program. Indeed, for “public servants,” I even wonder if some of the positions should be unpaid, such as the President, and members of the House and Senate. Or maybe just nominally paid. Not sinecures.
If I’m sitting beside my kid watching and listening to his online lectures - and guiding him on his assignment completion, feedback and homework assignments and projects- it’s “homeschooling”
that is something you can’t do in a public school classroom on a regular basis
The headline “beware”, and accompanying comments, I would restate simply as beware that many MOOCs may just be more government indoctrination. Agreed. Be careful.
Age is a factor, in my opinion. When a child is younger they are more susceptible to indoctrination. Letting your young child use any training materials, online or otherwise that have content you are not aware of is a bad idea.
However, at some point (age), hopefully you have trained your child in critical thinking, and good foundations, so they can recognize indoctrination when the see it and reject falsehoods. That said, some material is inappropriate for any human to watch at any age, as it is just immoral.
It takes discipline to finish a course where there’s no one watching over you to yell at you if you don’t get the lead out. This is news how?
Took a couple of MOOCs myself lately and loved it...the instructors were fantastic, and while the courses had a few small issues to fix before the next run, I learned a lot and got what I came for.
well, I attended a couple and these are good as it enables students to compare different viewpoints, rather than in a classroom where there is only one - the (normally leftist) professor’s
well, what do you expect. I think it's a normal human reaction to worry about your job -- so would I if I was a leech :-P
But also, seriously, the instructor aides would lose their jobs and also it can be detrimental in the long run as teacher's aides sometimes grow up to being great professors
On the other hand, however, these MOOCs are great for students.
I would prefer if they were paid well, but treated like CEO's and managers -- quarterly and yearly appraisals and minimum level of achievement or out
Also, minimum qualification thresholds (no "community organizers with no other experience")
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