MOOCs and the Funnel of Participation

Doug Clow, Institute of Educational Technology, The Open University, UK

Third International Conference on Learning Analytics and Knowledge LAK13, April 2013, Leuven

dougclow.org/mooc-funnel

Overview

• MOOC dropout• This is not new• Here is some actual empirical data on a MOOC• Dangerous aim: To change the way you think

about MOOCs and dropout. With a funnel.Photo (cc) Nina Hale http://www.flickr.com/photos/94693506@N00/614751836/

Nuremberg funnel, 1902

Just say no!

to antediluvian, ineffective, unsophisticaed epistemologies of pedagogicalontology

“Fonske”

Fons sapientiae

Fountain of Knowledge

Photo (cc) Dogfael http://www.flickr.com/photos/dogfael/3143968066/

Photo (cc) Dogfael http://www.flickr.com/photos/dogfael/3143968066/

Cartoon (c) Oglaf http://oglaf.com/fountain-of-doubt/

• What’s a MOOC? xMOOC vs cMOOC• “Officially the buzzword of 2012”• Field moving very fast• Learning analytics on MOOCs is hard:

– Technical challenges– Theoretical challenges– Philosophical challenges– Resource challenges

Honeybees Apis melliferaPhoto (cc) David Goehring http://www.flickr.com/photos/carbonnyc/5041997785/

http://futurelearn.com/ideas-and-user-stories/

Main findings of MOOC research• People drop out• People drop out a lot• More research required• People really do drop out a lot

Photo (cc) jeroen bennink http://www.flickr.com/photos/jeroenbennink/2355768494/

CCK08 PLENK2010 MITx Circuits & Electronics

Coursera Software Engineering

Registered 2,200 1,641 150,000 50,000

Completed At least 16 40-60 ‘active’

7,157 3,500

Competion rate

Not definable

Not definable

7% 7%

State of the art in MOOC Completion Rates Nov 2012

Photo (cc) Seth Tisue http://www.flickr.com/photos/tisue/254308538/

http://www.katyjordan.com/MOOCproject.html

MOOC Completion Rates April 2013

Awareness

Interest

Desire

Purchase

the marketingfunnel

Awareness

Registration

Activity

Progress

the funnel of participation

steep drop off from one stage to the next

highly unequal participation pattern

funnel of participation = +

it’s not a power law

  iSpot Cloudworks openED

Visits 1,100,000 275,000 30,000

Unique visitors 390,000(35%)

165,000(60%)

15,500(52%)

Registrations 21,000(5%)

5,239(3%)

1,429(9%)

Contributors 9,000(43%)

1,750(33%)

198(14%)

Data from respective site launch to 7 November 2012

  iSpot Cloudworks openED

Visits 1,100,000 275,000 30,000

Unique visitors 390,000(35%)

165,000(60%)

15,500(52%)

Registrations 21,000(5%)

5,239(3%)

1,429(9%)

Contributors 9,000(43%)

1,750(33%)

198(14%)

Data from respective site launch to 7 November 2012

• http://www.open-ed.eu• Free, open, online, OER, CC BY-SA• Seven EU partners• Three presentations, 2009-2012• Joomla, email, IRC, Elluminate• Explored business models, found none

Log plot of the number of visits to openED per user, ranked by number of visits.

it’s not a power law

Log plot of the number of forum posts on openED per user, ranked by number of forum posts

it’s not a power law

Visits vs forum posts made by individual openED users R = 0.86, p < 0.0001

Elite university

Mass university

Distance / open / online

universityMOOCs

Representative completion rate

~ 90% ~ 60% ~ 35% < 10%

Photo (cc) Walt Hubis http://www.flickr.com/photos/walthubis/4346378552/

steep drop off from one stage to the next

highly unequal participation pattern

funnel of participation = +

Put your thinking funnel on• Think less about total dropout• Think more about why participation

reduces at each stage• Think about patterns of participation• Benchmark whether it’s a problem• Pour more in the top, or widen the funnel

Photo (cc) Tom Bayly http://www.flickr.com/photos/tombayly13/6006166585/

Thanks for support from:•James Aczel, Simon Cross,•openED partners and learners

• everyone who gave me data• European Commission funding for openED

project 505667-LLP-1-2009-1-PT-KA3-KA3MP

Photo (cc) wales_gibbons http://www.flickr.com/photos/9678460@N07/7462872188/

Doug Clow@dougclowdoug.clow@open.ac.ukdougclow.org/mooc-funnel

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License