The Ideas Lab – Digital Learning Dispatches

The next meeting of the FutureLearn Academic Network (FLAN) takes place in Dublin City University (DCU) on Friday the 5th April 2019, from 10am to 4pm.

The theme of the meeting will be ‘Transforming and Transformational MOOC Research’, and will include presentations and group discussions on the priority areas for future MOOC research and development. We have a great line up of sessions including practitioners, course developers, leading researchers and PhD students working in the area.

If you have not been involved in FLAN before, the organisation was established in 2013 to connect staff and students based at FutureLearn partner institutions to share research and explore shared research opportunities. These include joint research bids and publications, comparative studies using shared FutureLearn data, course designs, and methods to analyse and evaluate courses. FLAN also hosts a closed Facebook Group to exchange ideas and propose themes. Contact rebecca.ferguson@open.ac.uk to join the Facebook group.

Irish 101 Attendance at FLAN events is free for those from FutureLearn partner institutions and our regular meetings provide an excellent opportunity to catch up with research into MOOCs, and open and online learning more generally, and to talk informally with colleagues from other FutureLearn partner organisations. On Friday we will be sharing and seeking valuable feedback on some of the research DCU is undertaking on new online models of teaching and learning.

The event will be live streamed and a recording posted on the FutureLearn Partner Site together with any slides/papers etc. for those who can not make it. You can also follow the event on Twitter (#DublinFLAN). If you would like to learn more about FLAN then please email flan@futurelearn.com. The Dublin event has been organised by the Professor Mairead Nic Giollamhichil and the team in the NIDL Ideas Lab. We look forward to welcoming participants to Dublin.

Le dea-ghuí

Many people believe that online learning can be a lonely journey for a learner and the experience of learning online is often described in disconnected terms. However, many credible studies into learning online demonstrate that learners experience a wide range of emotions as they engage in the online environment. Elaine Beirne, a researcher in The Ideas Lab at the National Institute of Digital Learning in DCU, and inaugural OLC Emerging Scholar, is researching the emotions of beginner language learners in Irish language MOOCs.

N18019

Irish 101 Her findings to date have been quite revealing. Research into traditional language learning settings has identified anxiety or foreign language anxiety as one of the main emotions experienced by learners.

Elaine’s research in the Irish 101: Introduction to Irish Language and Culture course hosted on the FutureLearn platform, however, identifies curiosity, excitement and pride as the top three emotions reported by learners. Learners completed a number of short surveys following some of the course’s learning activities. This baseline study is now being extended to a further iteration of the Irish 101 course, due to commence in May of this year.

Elaine is currently recruiting participants who would be interested in undertaking the MOOC and reporting their emotions in the short surveys as they progress through the course. Elaine explains more about the study* in the short video above and if you are interested in participating and helping the Fáilte ar Líne project to improve course design for language learners register here. The Fáilte ar Líne project is co-funded by the Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht under the Twenty Year Strategy for the Irish Language with support from the National Lottery and it is is a joint project of the NIDL and Fiontar & Scoil na Gaeilge.

A world without emotions would be cold and colourless.

(Williams, Mercer, Ryan, 2015: 81)

maoinitheoirí_2018.JPG