Learning Technology for Education in Cloud. MOOC and Big Data

Knowledge is not ‘a thing’ and not a mere pool of data which can be managed. Knowledge is the process of learning. So what really matters is the question of how the process of learning changes in context with Social Media and Social Network Technologies. Gregory Bateson’s definition of Learning III, the “learning about how to learn to learn” predicted very early what kind of learning culture is needed today to meet the requirements of a world which becomes more closely and quickly connected and dependent on networks in all aspects of work and private life. With their theory of Connectivism George Siemens and Stephen Downs offered not only a learning theory that fits those needs exactly, but also a tool: MOOCs. They surely are not the “digital Tsunami” many proclaim (and fear) but – consciously used - could open the door to a new culture of learning in the clouds.

This research explores user persistence in a massive open online course (MOOC) that was set up as an experiment before the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research launched in October 2013 the French Digital University initiative–a French platform for MOOCs. Persistence was looked into from the perspective of emotions. Digital trail data, demographic data and data from six scales were analysed. The scales were Positive Affect and Negative Affect Scales (PANAS) plus the Flow in Education scales (EduFlow). Results show that many registrants logged on, participated in activities and accessed resources seldom, while a few persisted and were active. Correlations between persistence and residence in Europe or Africa were found as well as patterns relating to negative affect and to well-being, again linked to geographic variables.

In this paper we focus on an approach to using cloud-based (Web 2.0) tools for MOOCs applying a new version of an innovative architecture for ‘cloud learning activities orchestration’ (CLAO). This works presents the CLAO, and examine its effectiveness for the use of learning activities in the cloud for MOOC experiences, presenting results and findings. Having performed learning analytics to examine the actual behavior of learners using the CLAO, we present results describing how learners evolved, after doing several learning activities, to a more elaborated and meaningful use of the cloud-based tools. These results contribute to a better understanding of the use of a cloud education environment in three MOOC courses with different topics (Medical Urgencies, Introduction to E-Learning and Cloud Tool for Learning Activities), and will enable further discussion and insights to improve methodological and orchestration strategies, and the use of innovative cloud-based tools in future MOOCs.

Despite the popularity of Massive Open Online Course (MOOC), recent studies have found that completion rates are low with some reported to be significantly lower than 10%. The low retention and completion rates are major concerns for educators and institutions. This paper investigates motivations for enrolling in a MOOC on the topic of ‘e-learning’ and discusses reasons for the attrition rates during the course. A survey of 134 students who had not completed the MOOC reveals that only 22% of the students had intended to complete the MOOC but was unable to due to various factors including academic and personal reasons. A big majority of the students indicated that changes in their job, insufficient time, difficulty with the subject matter and unchallenging activities are some of the reasons for the drop-out.

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are offered by many universities, with hundreds thousands of people worldwide having registered for one or more of the many available courses. Despite the potential that has been claimed for these courses to transform education, in practice the majority are deeply conservative in maintaining the educational status quo. Lacking innovative pedagogic foundation and with the need for approaches that scale, many courses rely heavily on very traditional methods such as mini-lectures and quizzes. In particular, learner support is proving to be insufficient for many participants. This paper reports initial results and experience from developing and presenting a MOOC which provides both “traditional” and supported modes. We present the motivation and objectives for the course, discuss initial results and reflect on lessons learned in the process.

The purpose of this paper is to outline a framework to reflect on the extent to which the coordinated use of several digital technologies offers learners diverse opportunities to construct mathematical knowledge. An example is used to argue that different technologies could provide distinct affordances for learners to represent, explore, and solve mathematical tasks. Thus, YouTube videos are used to foster problem formulation and communication, the use of GeoGebra becomes important to represent and analyse the task from visual, dynamic, and graphic approaches. In addition, online resources (WolframAlpha and Wikipedia) are used to deal with algebraic operations involved in the algebraic model of the task, and to introduce information needed to review or comprehend embedded concepts. Finally, in order for the tools to be instrumental for students, it is important to take into account information related to the learners’ tool appropriation in which they transform an artefact into a problem-solving tool.

This paper discusses the importance of strategy use in regulating cognitive processes, with a particular interest in co-regulation of the learning by peers in technology enhanced learning environments. Research on self-regulated learning has focused on cognitive, motivational and emotional regulation in relation to academic achievement. Co-regulation is an important facet of the regulatory processes taking place in communication-intensive learning environments that are geared towards peer interaction and social networking. This paper succinctly presents Self- and Co-Regulation (SCoR) general concepts and research and elaborates on why SCoR is particularly relevant to learning environments such as MOOCs that are designed with reference to connectivist learning theory. The paper discusses difficulties inherent to the field and stresses the need for commitment to designing environments that are effective for learners.

The objective of this research is to analyze the relation between Group Awareness (GA) and participation from the introduction of a visualization tool that permits to evaluate different dimensions of the proper interaction of a collaborative process that is carried out in Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) environments. The study considers that Group Awareness can contribute considerably to the processes of interaction in CSCL environments. Along this research line there are increasing numbers of reports that consider GA as a crucial factor for the success of collaboration, since it allows the activities and intentions of other members that collaborate in a virtual learning environment to be perceived and understood. In the present study we analyze group awareness with a quasi-experimental methodology, in which a group of participants have a computer tool that allows them to declare group awareness. Half of the students had an extended version of a tool that permitted them to evaluate and visualize assigned results in pairs, while the other half could evaluate but not visualize the assessments of other group members. The results show that there is better group awareness in groups with greater participation. Nevertheless, the use of a GA tool would not have a direct impact on students’ participation. The results point out the GA can be considered as a product of participation, and not exactly a by-product of a GAW tool.

Google Apps, as one of cloud computing applications, is gaining popularity and can be effectively used in education for communication between academic staff and their students. This paper reports on the use of Google Apps services for higher education. It investigates the use of Google Apps services (Mail, Docs/Drive, Calendar, and Sites) as a package among information department staff themselves and the use of Google Apps services package between academic staff and their students at ABC academic institution. The research aims to find out whether there was a significant difference in the use of Google Apps services by the IT staff and their students. The finding reveals that despite the frequent use of Google Apps services package by IT staff, the usage of the same group with their students was less than normal. The results also show that the differences were significant. Analysis of results shows that there are factors that contribute to the differences.

In web 2.0 social network services also provided many attached tools for help social communication, for example, photo sharing and comment mechanism. According to above mentioned, Web 2.0 facilitated web-based information sharing, even knowledge sharing. However, less study examined that knowledge sharing about online users. In this paper, we aim to examine the users’ content and social value in knowledge platform impact on knowledge sharing and use. Finally, the study develops a KMO 2.0 success model. In the model, we have proposed 13 hypotheses for testing. From the results, the hypotheses H1, H3, H5, H6, H7, H8, H9, H10, H11, H12, and H13 have been supported.

The Web 2.0 has provided a significant increase in the use of online social networks. In this scenario, Twitter has being used for collaborating, communicating and to exchange ideas between users who share common interests. Consequently, it can be observed an increasing adoption of social networks as a resource to support learning outside the classroom. They can provide mechanisms for sharing ideas and discussions about the studing subjects. However, as far as we know, there is no consensus in the literature whether users indeed efficiently employ these resources for such purpose. An important question is: can the online social networks be used as an efficient learning tool? Helping us to find the answer, this paper presents empirical results of an experiment performed to evaluate the effectiveness of Twitter for supporting learning and also to identify the common behavior of its users.

The vast majority of universities in the western world have integrated an online learning platform in their campus, to help teachers and to go with the times, the most used technology is a learning management system (LMS by the acronym in English learning management system), being Moodle the most used LMS platform in the world, because, compared with other web applications is more effective and feasible for educational use, besides is an open source platform that is mostly free.

Thus, the objective of this article is to analyze and compare the perceptions of students, teachers and find out the advances in one particular case. For this, we used a survey design with a sample of 178 students and 87 teachers of different majors at the Universidad de Santiago de Chile. The results highlight the importance giving to the use of Moodle for both, the university teaching to display the organization of courses material, and the use to exchange information. Students show a high degree of satisfaction with the technology but recognize very little use of the tools. The migration of the site version represented a setback in the use of the platform.

Knowledge sharing is fundamental to learning among students. Learning and innovation occur when students are collaborating and able to share knowledge. Therefore students must be encouraged and be willing to share knowledge with one another. Although there are many benefits to knowledge sharing among students, in practice it is not easy to achieve. Communities of practice (COP) are an ideal platform for students to collaborate and share knowledge as they learn. However, creating and implementing an effective COP is not trivial. This paper describes our experience of using COP to promote knowledge sharing among undergraduate students working in a multicultural setting, analyses COP using activity theory, and outlines a design proposal for a COP using social objects.

Today, we are preparing students to learn throughout their lives. Dental students must have problem solving, critical thinking and independent learning skills to meet the challenges of becoming effective clinicians. Dental students, however, find diagnostic and treatment planning challenges difficult to manage as many do not have the cognitive framework to solve them. The practice of dentistry is experiential. It contains a large body of tacit knowledge. To help students to become effective learners and acquire lifelong learning skills, they need to be taught to problem solve, think critically, and to communicate and learn independently. Most of the continuous professional development (CPD), post graduation, is independently assimilated and delivered in a didactic style; so these new learning skills will also equip the new graduate with the critical thinking and problem solving tools they will need to self review, to reflect upon and to process new insights throughout their professional careers.

Problem-Based Learning (PBL) is an instructional method that challenges students to ‘learn to learn’, through working co-operatively in groups to seek solutions to real world problems. It prepares students to think critically and analytically, and to find and use appropriate learning resources. However, the implementation of PBL is both time consuming and resource intensive. It is our belief that the learning of metacognitive skills can also be facilitated through task knowledge structures (TKS). This paper argues how the use of TKSs can help dental students to learn the metacognitive skills that they should have in order to prepare them for lifelong learning.

This paper presents some applications based on free software that allow some steps related to knowledge management, these can be implemented in organizations own servers or new hosting services in the cloud as a Nixiweb for creating various scrip free and without advertising becoming an excellent starting point for communities that wish to implement practical inexpensive tools and great popular acceptance. For each KM activity some GNU free tools are discussed while additional ones are referred to in the existing manuals. At several points views in this paper links with other contributions from the Asian Productivity Organization APO, as is also done the other way round. It is concluded that there is already a comprehensive set of tools available on the web, but for some peculiar aspects of knowledge assets there are not still development yet.

Technology changed the way of learning and teaching during the last twenty years to today a great deal. The change started in the 70’s with the increasing use of technology in education and spread out at the beginning of the 90’s with the upcoming Internet, was followed by the development of Learning Management Systems and nowadays the new and easy to use possibilities of Web 2.0. All these technologies could lead to new forms of learning, teaching, information gathering and managing, communicating, collaborating, and networking. It seems natural to adapt the new technologies to higher education, especially to distance education, as there a many known problems: E. g. in Germany no study fees are allowed. How to finance highly interactive, small classes? Another problem are the professional restrictions of distance students, their time budget is limited. The consequence is that normally students have very limited contact to their peers and their tutors until the final examinations. The drop-out rates are extremely high (more than 80%) and a lot of students study more than six years to reach a degree.

The deployment of virtual teaching improved the situation substantially, but not enough. Web 2.0 could open up new possibilities to improve this situation.

In Germany a nation-wide study examined the impact of Web 2.0 on the studying process. Unfortunately, only on-campus students were included in this survey. However, research and experience in the field of e-learning clearly show that technology based learning is especially interesting and useful for distance students. The University of Hagen, the only public distance teaching university in the German speaking countries with about 80.000 students, is the perfect test-bed for new forms of technology-supported learning. Therefore we did a research survey about the effect of Web 2.0, especially community usage, on distance students to find out the students’ current preferences and needs. The results of this study revealed important insights into the use of new technology and particularly into the wishes and needs of distance students. These insights lead to a new understanding of essential aspects of e-learning not only in distance education. An interesting example is the low value students attribute to traditional learning management systems. This paper will give a short review from the beginning to today and then compare the outcome of the two studies in relevant areas and gives suggestions for Web 2.0 usage in e-learning environments.

This paper focuses on the needed physical space for group or individual learners when using blended learning. Virtual environment designers and Campus developers need to understand the role of the physical space in learning. The study shows that the students often prefer to study at the university even when there is possibility to study at home. In the case universities there are not enough spaces for self-study or group work at the university. In addition, the learners have difficulties to recognize the possibilities to use spaces like lobbies and restaurants for learning. The campus developers want to increase the efficient use of spaces by creating possibilities to use a space for different purposes.

Business simulation game (BSG) has been widely studied worldwide. However, only a limited number of BSG studies had been conducted in Asian countries such as Taiwan. With the rapidly increasing cross-strait cultural and educational exchanges, no study that would help understand subcultural differences in using educational technologies between Taiwan and China had been reported. This investigation on sub-cultural differences is particularly important because BSG has been widely adopted in both Taiwan and China, and many students from China had become exchange students in Taiwanese classrooms in the recent years. Numerous cross-strait studies had been conducted since the 1980s, especially those related to subcultural differences. However, none has been found to be related to BSG. Hence, this study aims to understand the general status of cross-strait comparative research and BSG studies conducted in Taiwan. Two research directions have been proposed, with the collaborative effort of scholars from Taiwan and China. One immediate research goal is to initiate a collaborative examination between Taiwan and China, which has been established by the authors in the Business School of Nanjing University. Therefore, a prominent BSG cross-strait comparative research may be obtained by the conduct of this study.

The learning environment under discussion is free from deadlines or any other restriction of formal systems (no regular actions, including lectures). Instead, a student has access to a web-based learning environment where the basic element is a task which is connected to a set of low-level competences. Learning itself means activation of competences, automatically or manually, at lower or higher level and automatic processing of student’s answers. It is expected that reaction from the system is instant and so the student has discussion with a partner who is smart enough to motivate the learner. Such an environment produces quite different behavior from learners and new effects and problems appear.

The aim of this study was to explore the relationship between blended learning courses (i.e., food and beverage preparation) and Behavioral Intentions (BIs) by using the Technology Acceptance Model. The participants were students enrolled in food and beverage preparation courses that were elective at China University of Technology. Comprehensive investigations were conducted. Statistical Product and Service Solutions software was employed for item analysis, reliability analysis, Pearson correlation analysis, and regression analysis. The study results indicated that the ease of use and usefulness of blended learning were positively correlated; the ease of use and attitude of blended learning were positively correlated; the usefulness of blended learning and learning attitude were positively correlated; the usefulness of blended learning and BIs were positively correlated; and the attitudes and BIs toward blended learning were positively correlated.