Using social media in mobile MOOC for teacher professional development

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.