Comments on: A Way To Think About Online Courses (By Apple, For Example) https://blogs.swarthmore.edu/burke/blog/2012/01/19/a-way-to-think-about-online-courses-by-apple-for-example/ Culture, Politics, Academia and Other Shiny Objects Fri, 20 Jan 2012 02:51:34 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.4.15 By: Timothy Burke https://blogs.swarthmore.edu/burke/blog/2012/01/19/a-way-to-think-about-online-courses-by-apple-for-example/comment-page-1/#comment-8644 Fri, 20 Jan 2012 02:51:34 +0000 https://blogs.swarthmore.edu/burke/?p=1867#comment-8644 Nope, an independent for-profit company called Global Education Network that Mark Taylor was involved with.

]]> By: W.P. McNeill https://blogs.swarthmore.edu/burke/blog/2012/01/19/a-way-to-think-about-online-courses-by-apple-for-example/comment-page-1/#comment-8643 Thu, 19 Jan 2012 23:17:05 +0000 https://blogs.swarthmore.edu/burke/?p=1867#comment-8643 Out of curiosity, was the system that was being pitched to Swarthmore back in the first dot-com boom Moodle-based?

]]> By: Jay Scott https://blogs.swarthmore.edu/burke/blog/2012/01/19/a-way-to-think-about-online-courses-by-apple-for-example/comment-page-1/#comment-8641 Thu, 19 Jan 2012 21:55:36 +0000 https://blogs.swarthmore.edu/burke/?p=1867#comment-8641 There are two lines of technical development is automating education. One is the distance learning push which is big now. It favors good materials and interactive arrangements for the students, both so the students can help each other learn and to give the feedback to the instructors that they need to make the materials good.

The other line is teaching by computer. Automated tutors are pretty good at teaching narrow technical domains like high school geometry or beginning programming. And uses of machine learning, like automated essay grading, are becoming more feasible. The automated essay grader that I played with was narrow-minded (I easily figured out how to write a good essay that it thought was bad), but acceptable for a restricted context. Over time, computer teaching will become useful in broader domains and broader contexts.

The two lines of development will eventually join.

How this will play out depends on the economics of education, which is much too complicated for me. But surely the price-sensitive segments of education, like public schooling, will aim to substitute capital for labor as much as they can.

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