Title: Using social media in mobile MOOC for teacher professional development

Authors: Jun Xiao; Esther Tan; Xuejiao Li; Mengying Cao; Marcus Specht

Addresses: Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Open Distance Education, Shanghai Open University, Shanghai, China ' Leiden-Delft-Erasmus Centre for Education and Learning (LDE-CEL), Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands ' Modern Education Technology Center, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai, China ' Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Open Distance Education, Shanghai Open University, Shanghai, China ' Leiden-Delft-Erasmus Centre for Education and Learning (LDE-CEL), Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands

Abstract: This paper presents a ubiquitous and mobile MOOC platform to foster lifelong learning. Harnessing the technological affordances of WeChat (a mobile social media app), learners accessed micro-learning activities and received personal learning analysis report on their mobile phones. Premised on activity theory, the mobile MOOC design model spans across five dimensions of intelligent distribution: learning objective analysis, learner persona analysis, platform improvement based on learning analytics, m-learn tool selection and m-learn interactive environment where the latter forms the core of individual and collaborative learning. To investigate learning effectiveness, we analysed the survey data of 117 Shanghai kindergarten, primary and secondary teachers in one mini-lecture. Findings showed that learning satisfaction and learning achievement are highly correlated with the learnability of the learning environment. The integration of a multidimensional activity and multi-scenario model showed great potential to successfully accommodate the complexity and diversity of mobile MOOC learning activities in a ubiquitous-learning environment.

Keywords: mobile MOOCs; mobile learning; ubiquitous learning; teacher training; lifelong learning.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMLO.2020.110785

International Journal of Mobile Learning and Organisation, 2020 Vol.14 No.4, pp.492 - 510

Received: 21 Mar 2019
Accepted: 15 Aug 2019

Published online: 29 Oct 2020 *

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