E-learn Weblog of Willem van Valkenburg

Tharindu Rekha Liyanagunawardena (University of Reading, UK) , Andrew Alexandar Adams (Meiji University, Japan), and Shirley Ann Williams (University of Reading, UK) performed a systematic study of the published literature on MOOCs between 2008 and 2012:

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) are a recent addition to the range of online learning options. Since 2008, MOOCs have been run by a variety of public and elite universities, especially in North America. Many academics have taken interest in MOOCs recognising the potential to deliver education around the globe on an unprecedented scale; some of these academics are taking a research-oriented perspective and academic papers describing their research are starting to appear in the traditional media of peer reviewed publications. This paper presents a systematic review of the published MOOC literature (2008-2012): Forty-five peer reviewed papers are identified through journals, database searches, searching the Web, and chaining from known sources to form the base for this review. We believe this is the first effort to systematically review literature relating to MOOCs, a fairly recent but massively popular phenomenon with a global reach. The review categorises the literature into eight different areas of interest, introductory, concept, case studies, educational theory, technology, participant focussed, provider focussed, and other, while also providing quantitative analysis of publications according to publication type, year of publication, and contributors. Future research directions guided by gaps in the literature are explored.

I agree with their conclusions that there is still limited peer-reviewed research on MOOCs. The papers that are published mostly focus on empirical evidendence from case studies. There hasn't been much research on the learner perspective.

They also mention that the available data is so massive that it limits most researchers. You have to create multi-disciplinary teams of researchers on big data, learning analytics and pedagogy to fully make use of the available data.

Via: Wilfred Rubens (Dutch)