First open edX conference… a blast!

By Ramón Talavera Franco
@ratafra

http://con.openedx.org/

The first open edX conference brought together over 200 education specialist from all over the world to share ideas about the use of the edX open source platform. For two days, we examined possible solutions to issues addressed to the implementation of edX platform as well as pedagogical and best practice approaches—such as the importance of transforming the MOOC certification paradigm. Breakout sessions and keynote speakers were impactful. However, the best part of the conference was the opportunity to get to know the people who are “behind the scenes”. These are the people who came from different places of the world to share creativity, knowledge, problem-solving skills, and enthusiasm in order to make a better MOOC world.

Communities of Practice. Week 4 of MITx 11.132x Design and Development of Educational Technology MOOC

Ramón Talavera-Franco

@ratafra

To read week 1 post click here      To read week 2 post click here      To read week 3 post click here      To read weeks 5 & 6 click here

During the fourth week of this course, over 60 students met in an unhangout to share notes about our final project in particular, and about the course in general. Unhangout is an open source platform for running large scales conferences online. We all met in a “lobby” where we had the opportunity to exchange “hello” notes or ask questions about the unhangout. Clearly, unhangouts were a new tool for the most of us to use, so we didn’t know what to expect from it. Professor Kofler welcomed us via a stream life video and explained the mechanics of the unhangout. Then, we met in one of the 10 (or more?) breakout sessions for up to six people per room, and we received three questions to discuss among us. Answering the questions was not mandatory, but they certainly helped to break the ice and find a starting point for a conversation.

Active learning. Week 3 of MITx 11.132x Design and Development of Educational Technology MOOC

By Ramón Talavera Franco

@ratafra

To read week 1 click here      To read week 2 click here      To read week 4 click here      To read weeks 5 and 6 click here

So far we have explored some educational terminology along the course: constructivism, constructionism, deep learning, and active learning, and our assignments, course activities and intervention in the forums are designed to explore such terminology. To do so, this week we’ve had the opportunity to learn from diverse educational software such as Geniverse, StarLogo Nova, and other simulation platforms that either are included in the course by professor Klopfer or are being added by our peers in the course wikki organized by topics. So far, students have submitted over 30 simulation platforms links that open vast opportunities to practice the main topic of the week: active learning.