Imagine Magazine - Johns Hopkins - January/February 2015 - (Page 32)

The Wonderful World of by Diana Voronin W hen I was in middle school, the only courses available to me were the standard curriculum: math, science, literacy, social studies, a world language, and related arts including art, music, wood shop, and home economics. When I got to high school, I had more choices, but I still found myself wanting to go beyond what was offered at school. That's when my dad suggested Massive Open Online Courses, or MOOCs. An Online Experiment Taking MOOCs started out as a family endeavor. My dad thought it would be a fun family project for him, my brother, and me to take a course together. We looked at Udacity, edX, and Coursera and quickly took a liking to Coursera's user interface and wide variety of course offerings. We each created an account and then browsed the course catalog, watching introductory videos and reading syllabi in order to choose a course. We decided to take Design: The Creation of Artifacts in Society, taught by Professor Karl Ulrich from the University of Pennsylvania, which involved developing a product that filled a gap in the participant's everyday life. We love to do things with our hands, so the hands-on aspect of the course especially appealed to us. Participants would also maintain a blog detailing their assignments and progress on their projects. The course ran for eight weeks, with each week leading us through the stages of design with the aid of various lectures and assignments. The first step was to come up with "gaps," or problems that needed solving, in our everyday lives. Then we chose one problem that we wanted to focus on solving for the duration of the course. From there we came up with and sketched as many possible solutions to the problem as we could think of. My project was a comfortable and fashionable hat with an adjustable drawstring hole in the back for my ponytail. Before I knew it, I had leapt into the prototyping process. All along, I documented the process on my own website and sought feedback from other 32 imagine Jan/Feb 2015

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Imagine Magazine - Johns Hopkins - January/February 2015

Big Picture
In My Own Words
Land & Sea
Going Full Circle with Ocean Conservation
At Home in the Water
Diving into Marine Science
Ocean Views
Becoming a Steward of the Seas
Engineering for Ocean Health
Selected Opportunities and Resources
The Wonderful World of MOOCs
Super
Off the Shelf
Word Wise
Exploring Career Options
One Step Ahead
Planning Ahead for College
Students Review: UC San Diego
Creative Minds Imagine
Mark Your Calendar
Knossos Games

Imagine Magazine - Johns Hopkins - January/February 2015