Learning transfer: Does It Take Place in MOOCs? An Investigation into the Uptake of Functional Programming in Practice

Guanliang Chen; D.J. Davis; Claudia Hauff; Geert Jan Houben

doi:10.1145/2876034.2876035

Learning transfer: Does It Take Place in MOOCs? An Investigation into the Uptake of Functional Programming in Practice

Guanliang Chen, D.J. Davis, Claudia Hauff, Geert Jan Houben

Web Information Systems

Research output: Chapter in Book/Conference proceedings/Edited volume › Conference contribution › Scientific › peer-review

16 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

The rising number of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) enable people to advance their knowledge and competencies in a wide range of fields. Learning though is only the first step, the transfer of the taught concepts into practice is equally important and often neglected in the investigation of MOOCs. In this paper, we consider the specific case of FP101x (a functional programming MOOC on edX) and the extent to which learners alter their programming behaviour after having taken the course. We are able to link about one third of all FP101x learners to GitHub, the most popular social coding platform to date and contribute a first exploratory analysis of learner behaviour beyond the MOOC platform. A detailed longitudinal analysis of GitHub log traces reveals that (i) more than 8% of engaged learners transfer, and that (ii) most existing transfer learning findings from the classroom setting are indeed applicable in the MOOC setting as well.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	L@S 2016
Subtitle of host publication	Proceedings of the 3rd 2016 ACM Conference on Learning @ Scale
Place of Publication	New York, NY
Publisher	Association for Computing Machinery (ACM)
Pages	409-418
Number of pages	10
ISBN (Electronic)	978-1-4503-3726-7
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1145/2876034.2876035
Publication status	Published - 25 Apr 2016
Event	3rd Annual ACM Conference on Learning at Scale, L@S 2016 - Edinburgh, United Kingdom Duration: 25 Apr 2016 → 26 Apr 2016

Conference

Conference	3rd Annual ACM Conference on Learning at Scale, L@S 2016
Country/Territory	United Kingdom
City	Edinburgh
Period	25/04/16 → 26/04/16

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10.1145/2876034.2876035

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title = "Learning transfer: Does It Take Place in MOOCs? An Investigation into the Uptake of Functional Programming in Practice",

abstract = "The rising number of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) enable people to advance their knowledge and competencies in a wide range of fields. Learning though is only the first step, the transfer of the taught concepts into practice is equally important and often neglected in the investigation of MOOCs. In this paper, we consider the specific case of FP101x (a functional programming MOOC on edX) and the extent to which learners alter their programming behaviour after having taken the course. We are able to link about one third of all FP101x learners to GitHub, the most popular social coding platform to date and contribute a first exploratory analysis of learner behaviour beyond the MOOC platform. A detailed longitudinal analysis of GitHub log traces reveals that (i) more than 8% of engaged learners transfer, and that (ii) most existing transfer learning findings from the classroom setting are indeed applicable in the MOOC setting as well.",

author = "Guanliang Chen and D.J. Davis and Claudia Hauff and Houben, {Geert Jan}",

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Chen, G, Davis, DJ, Hauff, C & Houben, GJ 2016, Learning transfer: Does It Take Place in MOOCs? An Investigation into the Uptake of Functional Programming in Practice. in L@S 2016: Proceedings of the 3rd 2016 ACM Conference on Learning @ Scale. Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), New York, NY, pp. 409-418, 3rd Annual ACM Conference on Learning at Scale, L@S 2016, Edinburgh, United Kingdom, 25/04/16. https://doi.org/10.1145/2876034.2876035

Learning transfer: Does It Take Place in MOOCs? An Investigation into the Uptake of Functional Programming in Practice. / Chen, Guanliang; Davis, D.J.; Hauff, Claudia et al.
L@S 2016: Proceedings of the 3rd 2016 ACM Conference on Learning @ Scale. New York, NY: Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), 2016. p. 409-418.

Research output: Chapter in Book/Conference proceedings/Edited volume › Conference contribution › Scientific › peer-review

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Learning transfer: Does It Take Place in MOOCs? An Investigation into the Uptake of Functional Programming in Practice

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