From MOOCs to Magic: using digital tools to enhance on-campus learning

26.02.2024

On March 14, the Aula Magna of Palazzo del Bo (4 - 6 p.m) hosts the event From MOOCs to Magic: using digital tools to enhance on-campus learning with Krishna Rajagopal, William A. M. Burden Professor of Physics and former vice-rector for teaching and education at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Often the MIT teachers speak about the “Magic of MIT” and they are proud of the education they offer on their campus. Have you an analogous phrase? So much of the magic of the (MIT) on-campus university experience lies in the unscripted in-person engagement that happens among community members, whether it be students working together on problems or projects or students and instructors engaging in seminars, discussions, solving problems, lab classes, research, .... Why, then, have MIT faculty put so much energy into building MOOCs? Standard answers include reach — bringing MIT to the world — and reputation and impact, within a field or more broadly. But among the faculty who have developed MOOCs these motivations come second to using MOOCs to enhance the learning experience of on-campus students. Prof. Rajagopal will describe some of the ways in which physics instructors at MIT are using MOOCs — or elements thereof — to deliver some of the more scripted parts of their teaching so as to create more time and space for the active, engaging, interactive, components from which the magic originates.

After institutional greetings from Marco Ferrante, Vice Rector for Teaching and Education, Marina De Rossi, Delegate for Teacher Training and Innovative Teaching and Gianguido Dall’Agata, Director of the Scuola Galileiana di Studi Superiori, Professor Rajagopal's  speech From MOOCs to Magic: Using Digital Tools to Enhance the On-Campus Learning Experience, is followed by a panel discussion with Professor Carlo Mariconda, Advisor Digital Learning Unipd and Prof. Mauro Calise - Honorary President, Federica Weblearning.

To participate, registration is required.