Howard Rheingold shared a link via David Johnson.
Rob Reich, the author of this article, is a master teacher: "I believe MOOCs can do better, and that faculty should welcome innovations in different online learning platforms, and the experimentation by some professors in providing online learning experiences on these platforms. Creating a powerful online course is no simple undertaking, as any instructor who has experimented with MOOCs knows. But I believe that MOOCs, over the coming years, will do better than a large lecture class with little or no opportunity for discussion and for which student assessments are machine-graded exams or problem sets. It’s worth noting that such lecture courses constitute the norm for millions of students across all levels of higher education."
http://www.bostonreview.net/us/much-ado-about-moocs
Rob Reich is Associate Professor of Political Science at Stanford University and author of Bridging Liberalism and Multiculturalism in American Education, as well as co-editor of Occupy the Future.