
Ask HN: Books on the future of online education? - 35mm
I&#x27;m interested in learning new philosophies or ideas about the current state of online education, as well as where it may be heading.<p>One thing I&#x27;m curious about is the thinking behind why Stanford, MIT, etc. decided to release MOOCs<p>Can you recommend any books for this?
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csa
I don't have any books for you, but I can give you my opinion on this idea
(based on personal and observed experiences):

> why Stanford, MIT, etc. decided to release MOOCs

1\. It's an interesting problem space for both learning and technology.

2\. They aren't really giving much up. The value of their brick-and-mortar
programs are as much or more about what happens away from the classroom as
what happens in them. Many people do not understand this critical aspect of
elite schools.

3\. This article ([http://news.mit.edu/2012/mit-harvard-edx-
announcement-050212](http://news.mit.edu/2012/mit-harvard-edx-
announcement-050212)) is a blurb about edx when it started. The comments are
mostly PR.

4\. Courses like these are good for advertising and developing the recruiting
funnel if used correctly.

On a personal level, I hope that the vast majority of the education system in
the US gets forceably reset through some sort of crisis (student loans?) so
that we can start from scratch. The current system is largely run by the
administrators for the benefit of the administrators all the way from K-12 to
grad school. We can definitely do better, and online education may be a
compelling part of a new path.

------
vineet
Not on Online Education - but I have done a fair amount of work in the
industry and this is one of the more referenced books:
[https://www.amazon.com/Smartest-Kids-World-They-
That/dp/1451...](https://www.amazon.com/Smartest-Kids-World-They-
That/dp/145165443X)

This is a good blog on the state of online education:
[http://mfeldstein.com/](http://mfeldstein.com/)

And a really good article: [https://www.fastcompany.com/3062958/how-google-is-
schooling-...](https://www.fastcompany.com/3062958/how-google-is-schooling-
apple-and-microsoft-in-the-battle-for-americas-classrooms)

To answer why top Universities bet on MOOCs: this is partly an attempt to get
around Education's Iron Triangle (ref:
[http://www.adaptivelearningworld.com/?p=110](http://www.adaptivelearningworld.com/?p=110))

------
tianshuo
Although not a book, I blatantly self-recommend my personal blog(in Chinese,
could use Google translate) on Online Education
here([http://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/flippedclassroom](http://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/flippedclassroom)).
I'm an investor focused on online education and for multiple years worked as a
product manager, helped create multiple online learning apps that have 10m+
users in China, top 50 in Chinese app store. My blog has a few thousand
subscribers including CEOs, product managers, and VCs. If there is an
audience, I could write English articles too.

To answer your question about MOOCs, actually, MOOCs aren't a good example of
online learning at all. Somehow most universities did not think thoroughly
enough how online learning should be revolutionalized and redesigned, so they
just thought videos+quizes+forums would just work. The best kind of online
learning I am seeing is a funnel like this:

1\. Fragmented Knowledge: Provide users with bite-sized knowledge, before
letting them dedicate their time to online courses. Gives users motivation to
start learning. 2\. Systematic Online Learning: Provide users with interactive
learning content, which should be both engaging and filled with theory and
practice. Gives users a basic knowledge of the topic, does not ensure the
users' internalization of knowledge. 3\. Blended Learning: Provide users with
coaching service, mostly in 1v1 or small classes. Gives users motivation,
mentoring and monitoring, this ensures the internalization of knowledge.

Online learning should be social, should be gamified, should be adaptive,
should be practical. Most MOOCs barely are like that, when we are talking
about online education, many startups in China are ahead of Silicon Valley.
Chinese parents are more interested in their children's education than most
other parents in the world, the enormous housing bubble is mostly encouraged
by "school district housings"(学区房), where parents buy 10 square meter
apartments in Haidian, Xicheng, Dongcheng district in Beijing just to let
their children go to some famous public school.

~~~
tianshuo
It seems that google translate doesn't work good enough for Chinese, I'll take
some time to translate my blog into English and post it to medium.

------
cvigoe
More of a motivational book than anything else, but Salman Khan's "One World
Schoolhouse" was a very enjoyable book on the future of education (on and
offline). It's more of a pop-sci book but it does give encouraging accounts of
the success of the mastery learning philosophy for middle school math as well
as Sal's vision for the future of education where institutions embrace MOOCs
into their pedagogy.

[https://www.amazon.com/One-World-Schoolhouse-Education-
Reima...](https://www.amazon.com/One-World-Schoolhouse-Education-
Reimagined/dp/B01L98YRNM)

------
macarthy12
This must be a joke.

Recommend a book, as to why online is the future?

~~~
brudgers
The question is about a similarly worded but distinctly different topic.

