Examination of Local Online Course Characteristics Compared with MOOCs – A Case Study

Abstract

During the past two years, we suggested to the college’s engineering students to diversify their general studies with MOOCs. This experiment was awarded scant interest. The college students were then given the opportunity to enroll in a new online course in Hebrew, as part of the college’s general studies. The current paper compares students' attitudes toward MOOC and the online college course. A qualitative method was used, including in-depth interviews, observations of the forum’s activities and a students' opinion questionnaire. The participants were 25 students studied the online course, eight students completed MOOCs (from an engineering college), and 229 students from two colleges who did not study the online course or the MOOCs answered an opinion questionnaire about online courses. The completion of 25 students of the online course in comparison with the eight students who completed the MOOCs indicates a significant preference by the students for the online course over the MOOCs. The main criterion of the students to participate in the MOOCs was their interest in the subject matter, while the online course participants considered their own convenience first. The MOOC students reported a heavy learning load while the online course students reported a reasonable load.