View source for Mooc's as the Lego Bricks of Education



=Discussion=

Excerpted from '''Margaux Pelen''':

"LEGO bricks are standardized pieces that can be combined and now enriched : crazy creations will help you design a 3D printer or a color-based brick separator. Those legendary plastic bricks are a good reflection of what MOOCs can help you build: you can play with knowledge courses (bricks) and assemble your own education (LEGO construction). Let’s see how far we can go with this.


'''Build your very own knowledge construction, mostly for free.'''

Today, MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) are as equally accessible ressources as LEGOs. From Coursera, edX, Udacity and Iversity, the internet offers packaged classes with a specific syllabus sanctionned by the best (connected) universities in the world. They are designed to be more interactive than traditional classes and ‘gamified’ so users can find them sticky and finish the courses.

Once completed, MOOCs stand as knowledge bricks: discovering one course will lead a student to an interest in another. Students enrolled in different MOOCs will therefore ‘lock’ concept together the way they might lock different colored LEGO blocks. Acting so, they build their very custom-made knowledge & skills wall & structure. This ‘block’ also fits in with one’s prior experiences, as seen when you add your MOOC certificate (here Coursera’s) to your Linkedin profile.

Nevertheless, there is no system of credit recognition between different MOOC platforms the way we know it for instance when you’re on an exchange program with a foreign university. So far on the ‘LEGO knowledge’ wall, each brick colour is a different educational content provider. Such a system would enable students to bring their educational structures to the next level. Here’s a simple example to illustrate it.

Duolingo will let you obtain a Portuguese certificate and Brazilian Vedua platform will give you a certificate for one of its course. However, if you want to show your proficiency in Portuguese-speaking business environment, no cross service will today validate a track of both platform (from different platforms Duolingo & Vedua). This synergy would nevertheless make a lot of sense as those two courses totally reinforce each other — their content “lock” as LEGO bricks!


'''The case for a curated low-cost education.'''

Massive content digitalization fully reorganizes the way education is distributed and its market structured. Since the margin cost of each extra user is null (if one million people use the video, your watching cost as an extra user is zero), those competing platforms mainly end up free for users. Low-cost education is then enabled and pushes us to create on top of it.

What this trend reinforces is the need for a curation system of MOOCs to guide students through this vast online education offer. In the same way that LEGO bricks were copied, fake and low quality MOOCs will probably emerge, hence the necessity to bring transparency on what adds value to your education structure and what doesn’t. The labellisation of transplatform ‘paths’ should be a dynamic way to highlight which MOOCs mix well for specific jobs — both changing & yet-to-be-invented ones. Education is more a flow that you update with a relevant mix of new tools than a stock that you have for all your life.

As LEGO ZOOM hacks the LEGO bricks into education tools, what would be the magic service to turn MOOCs into updatable skills you (will) need?"
(https://medium.com/p/7d1792a19f5f/)

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