Mini MOOCs

INTRO. Distance learning tools are here to stay. The course will introduce students to make their own mini MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses), considering many of them will be involved in academia after finishing their studies. 

TEAM-WORK. Throughout the semester, students will group in three small production teams. Roles within these teams may include research, creative direction, script-writing, modeling, animation, programming, voice acting, sound engineering, and/or musicalization. 

MODULE. Instead of a full MOOC with many parts, each group will develop only one module. The subject of each module will be a particular building during the entire academic term, with the main objective of making this project interesting for both us architects and to a broader public outside of our field. 

CASE STUDY. This semester, we will focus on the single-family houses built during the 1970s by Japanese architect Kazunari Sakamoto (1943—). Apparently banal yet full of references and contradictions, these hermetic structures in opposition to the city may teach us how to live and design for today’s confinement. 

EXPERIMENTS. An important thesis of the course in making MOOCs more accessible is to test new ways to display content and evaluations, beyond the video+quiz format which is standard in platforms such as edX or Coursera. We will look outside our field for examples in animation (in both Asia and the West), videogame design and music which could be appropriated and tested in architecture MOOCs.

COURSE FORMAT. Each week, sessions will be divided into two parts. The first part will be a live interview with protagonists in the field of MOOC production, animation, videogames, film, and music, with a new guest every time. After a 20-minute break, we will review the weekly development of each Mini-MOOC. Two midterm sessions are also considered.

EVALUATION. Mini-MOOC development will be graded every week, starting in the first session. Each weekly evaluation has the same percent value, including two midterms and final review, and will be accumulated in a final grade. Attendance to live-interviews or weekly reviews is not compulsory nor evaluated.

Note: the instructor will offer live course presentations on 08/31, and/or 09/01. To access the detailed schedule and Zoom links, please visit the Live Course Presentations Website.

Due to no classes being offered on Labor Day and course selections being due on Wednesday, September 9, this class has scheduled a first irregular meeting on Monday, August 31, 4.35-7.30 pm EDT. Please make sure to check the Canvas site of the course for the meeting Zoom links.