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MIT OCW is very cool, and they were front runners. What's next? Putting more course materials on the net isn't really it. What should be next is much more chal

by dwc 16y ago

MIT OCW is very cool, and they were front runners. What's next? Putting more course materials on the net isn't really it. What should be next is much more challenging, but has immense payoffs... something like Khan Academy is doing with personalized learning. How awesome would it be if MIT did something like that, incorporating some of their incredible material?

rick_2047 16y ago
People need to understand OCW and Khan Academy serve two very different purposes. OCW was made to make the awesome materials generated by MIT profs to the general public, while Khan Academy was made specifically for the purpose of giving personalised learning. In my view both of them are noble causes and non of them should be abandoned, you can teach very less material in 10 mins after you cross the K 12 level. For covering one lesson in at the undergraduate level you definitely need at least half an hour.
filiwickers 16y ago
Their first intent when creating OCW was actually for professors to connect: "We set out to create a resource other faculty could draw on to improve their classes..." It seems independent learners were an after-thought. There is immense amount of free educational content out there right now. The next step from here may be challenging. All of the what is available is great for independent learning. But the tools for engaging and collaborating with other students or professors is lacking. We need something to connect teachers, students, independent learners together with the library of free material. Provide simple tools for collaboration inside documents like notes, bookmarks, etc. Add more extensive tools for authoring documents together. The Khan Academy is great. But imagine giving the professor the ability to weave those videos and exercises into a textbook built from a library of other creative commons books. That would be exciting stuff.
- Mizza 16y ago
  There are companies working on this! I wish I had a link, but there was a talk about this at the 2010 Students for Free Culture conference in DC.

by dwc 16y ago

rick_2047 16y ago

People need to understand OCW and Khan Academy serve two very different purposes. OCW was made to make the awesome materials generated by MIT profs to the general public, while Khan Academy was made specifically for the purpose of giving personalised learning. In my view both of them are noble causes and non of them should be abandoned, you can teach very less material in 10 mins after you cross the K 12 level. For covering one lesson in at the undergraduate level you definitely need at least half an hour.

filiwickers 16y ago

Their first intent when creating OCW was actually for professors to connect: "We set out to create a resource other faculty could draw on to improve their classes..." It seems independent learners were an after-thought. There is immense amount of free educational content out there right now. The next step from here may be challenging. All of the what is available is great for independent learning. But the tools for engaging and collaborating with other students or professors is lacking. We need something to connect teachers, students, independent learners together with the library of free material. Provide simple tools for collaboration inside documents like notes, bookmarks, etc. Add more extensive tools for authoring documents together. The Khan Academy is great. But imagine giving the professor the ability to weave those videos and exercises into a textbook built from a library of other creative commons books. That would be exciting stuff.

Mizza 16y ago
There are companies working on this! I wish I had a link, but there was a talk about this at the 2010 Students for Free Culture conference in DC.