If there’s anyone in the world still subscribed to this blog, you’ll have noticed that I haven’t been keeping it up really at all. In fact, the last post I made here was over a year ago now. In that last post, I mentioned that I was writing a book about metadata. Well, that book is now out from MIT Press. The title, cleverly, is Metadata. It’s part of the.. Read More
In which Your Humble Narrator finds the first known use of the word “metadata” in print
As you may know, I’m currently writing a book about metadata for the MIT Press, which will be part of their Essential Knowledge series. The current plan is that the book will be on in the Press’ Fall 2015 catalog. Just in case you want to, you know, buy a copy. So I’ve been thinking about metadata a lot, and doing a lot of metadata-related research. One of the things.. Read More
Data about the Metadata MOOC round 2
The second iteration of the Metadata MOOC recently ended, and Statements of Accomplishment have gone out. So now I can share some data from round 2. Recall that back before round 2 launched, I made some predictions about how student engagement in the course would play out over the course of the course. Well, it turns out that I lowballed myself… over the 8-week span, the number of active students.. Read More
Predictions about the Metadata MOOC round 2
The second iteration of the Metadata MOOC launches tomorrow! You may recall that I wrote several posts after the first iteration wrapped up, presenting some descriptive stats from the course. I plan to do the same with the second iteration, of course, because I’m a geek and I love almost nothing more than a big dataset. But that’s 8 weeks away. So to keep myself entertained in the meantime, I.. Read More
Gearing up for round 2 of the Metadata MOOC
I mentioned in a previous post that we’re relaunching the Metadata MOOC. The official launch date is Monday July 14, & like last time it will run for 8 weeks. Which means it will wrap up on September 5 (or that following weekend). Which hopefully means that it will end just in time for the start of the semester… which of course is only an issue for MOOC students who.. Read More
The Metadata MOOC takes over the world!
I continue to futz around with the data from the Metadata MOOC. About 2 weeks ago, I was interviewed for this story in the UNC University Gazette. (It’s a good story, you should read it. And not because I’m quoted… honestly, Don Hornstein said much more intelligent things than I did.) Anyway, one of the questions the reporter asked me was: What was the breakdown of countries the students were.. Read More
Students take MOOCs out of general interest. In other news, water is wet.
In my last post, I posed the question: Why do students engage in a course, when they began intending to lurk? So I thought I’d do some more fishing, to see if I could identify students who, at the end of the course, were motivated to do it again for a Statement. Because if we could identify these students before the course, maybe we could get them to engage more.. Read More
More analysis of the Metadata MOOC: Statement of Accomplishment earners
It’s been a long time since I’ve posted any data analysis of my Metadata MOOC… so to the 5 of you who were looking forward to hearing more about it, I apologize. But I’ve started thinking about this again. For one thing, I’m collaborating with colleagues on 2 projects making use of data from the MOOC. I’ll report on those projects, when there’s something to report. For another thing, I’m.. Read More
MOOC in the Classroom
Ithaka S+R recently produced a report titled MOOCs in the Classroom? Which is well worth a read, and I recommend it. I’ve dedicated the past several posts to analyzing data from my Metadata MOOC. But what I haven’t mentioned is that this semester I’m also teaching the Metadata course (INLS 720) for my School, the School of Information and Library Science, at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill… Read More
Data about the Metadata MOOC, Part 4: Completion
I’ll be honest, I’m getting a little tired of just delivering descriptive statistics about my Metadata MOOC. I’d like to delve a little deeper, do some hypothesis testing (for example, students in the developing world are more likely to complete the course than students in the first world), or do some comparison across courses. But for the moment, descriptive stats are what I have for you. My old stats professor.. Read More