Critical Pedagogies at Scale: Designing MOOCs for Social Impact

• In Event: 81.025 - Innovating MOOC Pedagogies

Abstract

Objectives
This study presents a new pedagogical model used in the design of a series of online, discussion-driven learning events (entitled “Teach-Outs”), offered to the public between Spring 2017 and Summer 2018, on two MOOC platforms. The goal of the series was to use the powerful reach of MOOC platforms to connect with the public around timely issues, and give learners skills to become better advocates for the outcomes they envision (i.e., policy, personal, and community). Looking to the campus tradition of the “Teach-in” to inform their critical perspective, the design team saw an opportunity to create short, just-in-time, discussion-based learning events that respond to issues of current social interest, such as healthcare, media literacy, and free speech rights.

Theoretical framework
A design team identified a core set of frameworks to inform driving questions for each event in the series. Looking to Freire’s (1970) work in Critical Pedagogy, the team asked how they could design learning experiences that provide learners from diverse socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds with outcomes that enhance their sense of personal agency and social mobility. Looking to Garrison et al.’s Community of Inquiry framework (2000), they asked how they could foster social cohesion and community between geographically-dispersed learners from diverse cultural backgrounds, and how can they could provide a sense of authentic instructor presence at scale. Looking to Social Learning Theory (Bandura, 1977), the team asked how they could effectively model civil discourse around controversial or polarizing topics.

Methods and Modes of inquiry
This study uses an educational design research approach (McKenney & Reeves, 2012) to study how these theoretical perspectives could be best instantiated in the Teach-Out designs, using an iterative, systematic process of review to inform the design of subsequent events in the series.

Objects of Research
This study uses the enacted design of 18 online learning events (i.e., “Teach-Outs”) as objects of research. We also review documents produced throughout the design process, including course design visualizations that illustrate arrangements and sequences of course elements (Figure 2).

Results
The result of this study is the distillation of a set of eight design tenets that form the basis of a new model for discussion-based online instruction at scale, which the design team calls the Teach-Out model (see Table 3). In contrast to conventional assessment-driven MOOC designs (Reeves & Hedberg, 2014), these brief learning events feature 3-6 hours of didactic content, focus on discussion as the primary learner activity, and conclude with a “call to action” for learners.

Scholarly significance
The pedagogies employed in this series offer a stark contrast to those of most MOOCs, and demonstrate an experiment in constructivist pedagogy within massive learning environments that are increasingly corporatized and geared towards professional training and certification. These experiments suggest a possibility for using MOOC platforms for more equitable learning outcomes, particularly for those without access to formal higher education. This study is a rare opportunity to illustrate a new pedagogical approach to designing learning interventions on MOOC platforms across a wide range of disciplinary contexts.

Author

• Steve Welsh, Detroit Public Schools