MOOCs are on the minds of many educators and students today as the new open source trend opens many discussions on what learning will look like in the 21st century. Technology can bring a free college course taught by the best of the best professors from universities like Stanford and Harvard right to your living room. The popularity of MOOCs has people asking, why pay for a college education when you can get one for free online?
In his latest op-ed Thomas Friedman shares what he learned about the future of MOOCs at the recent conference “Online Learning and the Future of Residential Education.” The following are a few points I found most compelling:
- Friedman quotes historian Walter Russell Mead, writing higher education will move from a model of  “time served” to “stuff learned.”Â
- Blended learning will optimize learning in and out of the classroom. Today’s college students spend classroom-time getting lectured at and their time at home studying for a test. In the near future, at-home studying will be reserved for students to master basic skills at their own pace and time in the classroom will be spent applying their basic knowledge in labs and discussions.
