The Australian National University's second edX free online coruse (MOOC) "Engaging India" (ANU-INDIA1x) has just commenced. This ios calimed to be the first edX course in two languages (English and Hindi). For the web content the English is followed by the Hindi. For the PDF downloads, there are separate English and Hindi documents. I noticed that the course outline is 175 kbytes for the English version, but 3.2 Mbytes for the Hindi, about eighteen time the size. This is presumably because the fonts for English are built into PDF, but those for Hindi are being included in the PDF file.
Unlike other ANU online courses, this is being conducted using UTC, rather than Canberra time, as suits the international location of the students.
Showing posts with label ANUx. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ANUx. Show all posts
Tuesday, April 29, 2014
Wednesday, March 26, 2014
Greatest Unsolved Mysteries of the Universe MOOC: Part 2
Having found my edX password I was able to enter the course website for the Australian National University’s first Massive Open Online Course (MOOCs): "Greatest Unsolved Mysteries of the Universe" (ANUx: ANU-ASTRO1x). Provided is a video (which I can't access due to my limited bandwidth at home). Also there is a five page course outline, provided as a PDF download. At 6.1MBytes, the course outline taxed my low bandwidth wireless link and is about ten times as large as it need be. The outline provides a good overview of what the course is about and the assesment.
Assessment for the course is :
The course is run using Universal Time (UTC). Recently I had difficulty with time-zones for a course and the use of UTC s a sensible choice for an international course.
The course-ware (course notes) appear to have been divided into chunks of 120 to 180 words of text. Interestingly this is about the amount which fits on a TV screen and also the amount a typical student would write in a forum posting.
The course-ware included short videos, which I can't access. There is an option for downloading transcripts of the videos, but that does not seem to work either. Alongside the video window is some text (about 500 words) which might be the transcript. On the next page is a multiple choice question, which is presumably about whatever the video was supposed to tell me.
Without being able to access the videos, it does not appear this course will be usable. Even without the videos, the interface is so sluggish as to not be usable.
Assessment for the course is :
- Lesson Questions: 10% multiple choice
- Homework: 50%. Mathematical questions.
- Final Examination: 40%.
The course is run using Universal Time (UTC). Recently I had difficulty with time-zones for a course and the use of UTC s a sensible choice for an international course.
The course-ware (course notes) appear to have been divided into chunks of 120 to 180 words of text. Interestingly this is about the amount which fits on a TV screen and also the amount a typical student would write in a forum posting.
The course-ware included short videos, which I can't access. There is an option for downloading transcripts of the videos, but that does not seem to work either. Alongside the video window is some text (about 500 words) which might be the transcript. On the next page is a multiple choice question, which is presumably about whatever the video was supposed to tell me.
Without being able to access the videos, it does not appear this course will be usable. Even without the videos, the interface is so sluggish as to not be usable.
Tuesday, March 25, 2014
Greatest Unsolved Mysteries of the Universe MOOC
The first of the Australian National University’s edX Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), started today "Greatest Unsolved Mysteries of the Universe" (ANUx: ANU-ASTRO1x). I signed up for this and "Engaging India" (ANU-INDIA1x: ), which starts 29 April 2014. Previously I have tried MOOCs and have not found them a very satisfying experience, as a student. So I thought I would try two newer ones, from a leading Australian university, to see how the state of the art had improved.
The astrophysics course started with a welcome message to the students, inviting use to watch a video. Unfortunately my home bandwidth is limited, so I clicked on the link in the email which took me to the course website to read the introduction. However, under the headings "Course Updates & News" and "Course Handouts" I couldn't find any content. It seemed odd that neither the welcome video, nor a text alternative (as required under Australian anti-discrimination law) was provided.
So I then went to the "courseware" page, which asked me for a user-id and password. It is some months since I signed up and could not remember the password, so I requested this be reset. So far the reset email has not arrived. So the only Great Unsolved Mystery so far with this course is "where is the content?". ;-)
The astrophysics course started with a welcome message to the students, inviting use to watch a video. Unfortunately my home bandwidth is limited, so I clicked on the link in the email which took me to the course website to read the introduction. However, under the headings "Course Updates & News" and "Course Handouts" I couldn't find any content. It seemed odd that neither the welcome video, nor a text alternative (as required under Australian anti-discrimination law) was provided.
So I then went to the "courseware" page, which asked me for a user-id and password. It is some months since I signed up and could not remember the password, so I requested this be reset. So far the reset email has not arrived. So the only Great Unsolved Mystery so far with this course is "where is the content?". ;-)
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