What is in Kelvin's Head?

Listen up! Moocs are the future

17/12/2013
OK listen up. Moocs are the future.

Now before we go any further, let’s get the usual responses out of the way. The usual responses are twofold:
1. What’s a mooc? (Most people)
2. *rolls eyeballs* (lots of academics, including quite a few in my congregation)
Firstly, a mooc is a term used for a new form of education that you engage in online. It stands for Massively Open Online Course. Such things have been around for the last couple of years and there’s a good wikipedia page on the concept.

The basic idea is that you do a course online along with many thousands of other people all at once (massive) which you have easy/free (open) online (online!) access to. It is a way for someone to teach many people. Many, many people. I’ve just finished doing a mooc where a team of three people were attempting to teach 13000 students all around the world.

But why the eyeball-rolling from clever people?

Well, any teacher worth their salt is going to say, “Ah, but wait a minute? Hang on there… what do you mean…. that’s not a learning experience that is equivalent to what I can do in a classroom.”

And you know what? It isn’t.

However, it is here, it is now and it is going to develop in the future all the same.

Now, are you thinking you’ve heard all this before – are you thinking this is just a glorified correspondence course? Sure you are. But this is a bit more than that. Typically in a mooc, you get video lectures or other content to download, maybe on a weekly basis. You work through that stuff and you get online quizzes and exercises that you do along the way. If the course is well designed, you get instant feedback on how you are doing and can go back and review any of the bits that you didn’t understand.

But here’s the thing – it isn’t just you. It is social. There’s a whole bunch of people out there doing the same course as you. And you can get to interact with them on the forums. Indeed, some of the ways that the mooc is assessed may include interaction on the forums. (Cue eyeball rolling from academics who can’t work out that this is the equivalent of giving a mark for interaction in class discussions, which is a relatively common practise in some institutions).

Then, when all is done, you may well have a final piece of work to submit and this will be marked. But hey, how do you mark 13000 pieces of work? Well, if it is not machine markable material (multiple-guess questions) then the mooc method is to get students to peer review. In the mooc I’ve just participated in, we were encouraged to produce a final video and to pass the course you had to, not only submit your own video, but assess three (or more) others.

Then you get your certificate and there is much rejoicing.

Now, here’s where the Eyeball Rollers have started to harumph loudly. “What use is a certificate when no-one qualified has seen the work? Isn’t this the dumb assessing the dumber?”

Well, the truth is, such a certificate is worth precisely nothing in terms of the educative processes that we have been used to.

But get this, moocs are not really about what the certificate is worth. The satisfaction comes from having learned something new. Getting the certificate is just icing on the beans. Yet getting that certificate is oddly fulfilling – it is part of the gamification of learning. You get a certificate, you want another. You unlock a level badge, you go back to try to accomplish the next level.

Anyway at the end of this post is my certificate from the mooc I recently completed. I don’t care what you think about its value – for me it represents a whole bunch of skills that I just learned. It is for a course that was really for school teachers on Blended Learning – that’s about how to mix learning that takes place in an online setting with more traditional face-to-face teaching. I took the course because I want to be able to offer some online courses at St Mary’s as well doing what we already do. It seemed sensible to do the course and also learn from completing the mooc itself.

What does this mean for the church at large – well it means that education needs to get slicker. In the same way that new technology has meant that we need to up our game in religious circles in the way we communicate with people, so we need to do the same with how we teach. That scrappy stapled-together church magazine is a great means of communicating but it does so on two levels. On one level, it communicates to those who have always received it that things are carrying on just the same as ever and even lets them know whether they are on the coffee rota on Sunday. To the more casual reader, however, it probably communicates that you are not terribly professional, have low expectations which will carry forward into worship and that you are desperate for someone to join the coffee rota to try to replace the people who are dying off.

It is the same with education. Sitting around a flipchart with half a dozen people is something that I continue to do. However, increasingly as I do it, I’m aware that the ways in which people learn are changing. Gamification (rewards – yes, sometimes silly little rewards) is here to stay. Blending of online and offline worlds is how people are doing everything from shopping to looking after their health so why shouldn’t that affect how we learn about Things That Matter in church circles? And yes, self directed learning is here to stay.

There’s new technology on offer here. Who knows what we’re going to do with it?

And here’s my certificate, which I’m terribly proud of, can you tell?
blended learning, church, education, mooc, self directed learning

10 responses to “Response from the College of Bishops”

Father Ron Smith

12/01/2015

Thank you, Fr, Kelvin, for making the contents of the SEC Bishops’ Response to the Letter from 50 people concerned about their attitude towards the openness of the Church to the prospect of its eirenic treatment of clergy and Church members – desirous of solemnising Same-Sex monogamous relationships in the context of Marriage.

It seems to me – an outsider, but a member of the New Zealand Anglican Church – that the Letter has challenged your Bishops to positive action on behalf of Christians – and others – who consider faithful Gay relationships to be equally acceptable to God as those of heterosexuals. The Church, surely, must act to affirm faithful monogamous relationships on both sides of the spectrum.

Let’s hope your General Synod will move ahead to affirm such relationships, so that the Church may get on with other aspects of its mission; knowing that human justice for ALL people is paramount in the propagation of the Gospel. If SEC is pro-active in this important matter, it can only encourage churches like my own – in ACANZP – to follow suit.

Reply
1. Kelvin
  
  12/01/2015
  
  The General Synod is, to some degree, inhibited from sorting this out until the bishops themselves decide to back a proposal which would allow all to flourish in the church.
  
  The synod contains the bishops and they have an effective veto on canonical legislation.
  
  I’m baffled at the moment as to why they have not rallied around a position which allows all of us, both those in favour and those against, to act according to our consciences in this area. I think that this is a position which would re-unite the church again. I know those who disagree with me on the substantive question about lesbian and gay relationships who are as mystified and as frustrated as I am that we are taking so long to deal with this and who, like me, want to get on with the business of letting Scotland’s people know that God loves them.
  
  Everyone I know says they want to come to a resolution which does not de-church other Episcopalians. The position that the bishops have taken comes very close to de-churching some of us and I remain greatly concerned for the Province as a whole.
  
  Reply
2. Christine McIntosh
  
  13/01/2015
  
  Amen.
  
  Reply
Pam

12/01/2015

From my reading, it’s a carefully worded document that attempts not to pre-empt what may happen at Synod. Talking to each other face-to-face is always better than written communication, in my opinion. This issue does need a resolution and I’m sure that people on both sides of the debate, in good faith, would want to honour each other. Bishops have a tough job but so do the people who don’t get the opportunity to attend Synod, for whatever reason.

Reply
Chris Hansen

12/01/2015

I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of being talked about by people who would rather not talk to me. This “listening process” that the C of E is going through is bull. They’ve been doing variations on that for years. Nothing comes out of it except more conversations. No progress is made thereby.

The trick is to push the bishops to take a stand and do some prophetic leading.

Reply
1. Kelvin
  
  12/01/2015
  
  The current process in the Church of England is related to the Cascade Process that we’ve had in Scotland.
  
  Some people have benefitted from the process here. There’s no getting away from that. It has been a good thing for some but by no means all.
  
  Some have felt very disappointed and upset that the bishops themselves now appear not to have been working in accord with the principles of the process itself.
  
  And some, like me who have been working for change in this area for years, were excluded from the design of the process and from its major set piece provincial event.
  
  Reply
FakePete

13/01/2015

I feel very angry reading that.

Reply
Steven

13/01/2015

Dear Kelvin

Interesting developments. Not much in that letter really.

What would you do if you were Primus?

The reality is the SEC has always (at least in my mind) been open to a more progressive stance on this kind of issue and yet does contain those for whom this would be (very?) difficult.

Would you seek to maintain unity by some kind of compromise (CoE and women Bishops) or would you forge on ahead with prophetic change leaving those who didn’t like it to make their own choices (like the Episcopal Church)…?

The New Testament Christians didn’t seem to care much for unity at the expense of integrity and justice.

For my own part I think it is better for churches not to try and fudge this issue (look at the terrible mess in the Church of Scotland) but to agree a position and then firmly pursue same, come what may. People would not tolerate an institution that allowed a minority of people to adopt racist positions and so it should not really be any different for those who want to maintain positions that discriminate against same-sex couples.

All this is – of course – easy for me to say.

Steven

Reply
1. Kelvin
  
  13/01/2015
  
  What would I do if I were the Primus? Well that’s a good question.
  
  The first thing I’d remember is that the Primus is simply the spokesperson for the College of Bishops and doesn’t have the authority that, for example, an archbishop might think he possesses.
  
  I would however as a bishop argue in a favour of a solution which allowed people to act according to their conscience in this area. I don’t agree that people should be forced to “firmly pursue” a particular stance over this issue. It isn’t who we are. In fact I think the problem at the moment is that people are being forced to pursue a position that they don’t agree with and that situation is unsustainable.
  
  The reasons for not forcing people to marry gay couples are these:
  
  1 – No gay couple wants to be married by someone who has been forced to do so but who would really prefer not to.
  
  2 – It would be illegal anyway and our canon law determines that we will abide by Scots Law.
  
  3 – We already have a precedent with divorce – no-one is forced to marry anyone who is divorced, they can chose whether or not to do so. I think that is a reasonable compromise and it has served the church well.
  
  4 – I don’t think anyone should be compelled to marry anyone and that is the situation that we currently have.
  
  However there are some positive things that a Scottish bishop could do at the moment. Although I agree that same-sex marriages cannot take place in churches or be done by SEC priests until there is a decision made by General Synod I don’t agree that it is the case that someone cannot affirm allegiance to the canons of the church because they happen to be in a same-sex marriage.
  
  I think de-coupling those two issues is urgent.
  
  I would argue in favour of an equal opportunities policy for the church.
  
  I would try to seek a way of bringing forward a synodical resolution which would allow same-sex marriage, allow those who don’t want to be party to it not to have to be and I’d argue in favour of that as a godly compromise that would allow us to get on with our gospel business of sharing the good news.
  
  If I were the Primus I would probably be encouraging the College of Bishops to allow me to say publicly that we regretted that some people had been excluded from the Cascade Process and I’d seek to commit the College to a more consultative leadership style. In particular I’d want to say that there should never be a process about people that did not include them in the design of the structures of the conversation. I’d want to say that we would never construct a conversation about the ministry of women without women being involved, we would never construct a conversation about ethnic minorities in the church without appropriate consultation with people who belong to ethnic minorities and I’d commit the church never to make the mistake that has been repeatedly made of constructing a conversation about LGBT people without their involvement.
  
  If I were wise, I’d be learning a lot more about the experience of trans people because I’d realise that trans issues are inevitably coming our way.
  
  Does that answer the question?
  
  Reply
  1. Steven
    
    13/01/2015
    
    Yes, it does rather. Thanks.
    
    For the avoidance of doubt I would not advocate forcing anyone to marry anyone. When I said it is better to adopt a position and then pursue that I meant in terms of whether or not to permit equal marriage in the SEC (which is not the same as saying that all priests would therefore be compelled to marry gay folk).
    
    We have just filed an equal marriage petition in Belfast, so thoughts and prayers all welcome!
    
    Steven
    
    Reply