“Watch out for what you wish for,” the old Chinese proverb, comes to mind as we sort our way through our plans for our upcoming MOOC, “What’s Your Big Idea? [1]”
With close to 12,000 students registered so far and more than a month to go before launch, my co-teacher Holden Thorp and I are scratching our heads about something we never really planned or thought about: What to do with the presentations — three minute videos, PowerPoints or “Prezzis” — that learners can submit to earn a certificate of accomplishment in our course. Like almost everything else about MOOCs, we have more questions than answers.
But we are excited about the prospect of a deluge of ideas from all over the world.
How do we find ourselves in this predicament? A month ago, with the help of a team that knows much more about MOOC’s than we do, we decided to create two tracks for our class: an assessment-based path involving multiple choice quizzes at the end of every module; and an experiential track for students who actually have a “big idea” and are willing to submit a pitch describing it.
In a meeting about the course with colleagues at Google someone said, “Your big idea is the big idea,” and we hope that is correct.
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