Exploring New Ways to Increase Engagement in Full-Path MOOC Programs

• Published in: Learning and Collaboration Technologies. Learning and Teaching Vol. 10925; pp. 16 - 25
• Main Authors: Hernández Rizzardini, Rocael, Amado-Salvatierra, Hector R.
• Format: Book Chapter
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland Springer International Publishing AG 2018; Springer International Publishing
• Series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science
• Subjects: Engagement; Interaction analysis; Learning ecosystem; MOOCs
• ISBN: 9783319911519; 3319911511
• ISSN: 0302-9743; 1611-3349
• DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-91152-6_2

This work presents an innovative framework with the aim to elicit engagement and motivation from learners on massive open online learning environments. Specifically the idea is to propitiate a learning ecosystem for a strong academic motivation and engagement. The proposed framework relies on the importance of creating engaging experiences before, during and after the finish of a course to increase learners’ participation and reduce drop-out rates. This work presents a compelling idea in the universe of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) and it is particularly relevant within full-path MOOC programs, where the perseverance and consistency from the student is quite important to finish a series of courses. The proposal intends to expand the efforts of the learning design team to achieve pre and post-course engagement, where engagement take the form of an ongoing community of learners, high value content and personalized follow-up. This work presents the first experience with interesting results. Authors are starting to identify positive experiences and it is hope that in the future more programs will start opening some of their contents as an open community outside the MOOC to create a long-lasting sense of belonging from the learners and new ways of promoting the courses to potential learners.