Dive Brief:
- New research from Carnegie Mellon University finds online courses that rely on video lectures are less effective that those that combine interactive materials.
- The Chronicle of Higher Education reports students in the study chose between a course dominated by video and one that had interactive elements produced by the Carnegie Mellon Open Learning Initiative.
- Students who engaged in the interactive elements learned six times as much as their peers and, on average, scored six percentage points higher on a final exam, according to the study.
Dive Insight:
The first generation of massive open online courses often did not go much further than recording traditional lectures and making them available online. The latest versions of such courses often have much higher production values and have made improvements based on studies like Carnegie Mellon's that add more context to the field of online learning.
Interactive elements and limited module lengths that lessen a students chances to zone out, both help learning and retention.