MOOC OVER

Mooc over (see here-click on link)….the final  statistics were amazing. 21,000 people throughout the globe participated.  The total number of full time students at Dundee University, Scotland, this academic year  is 17,500.  For six weeks, ( the length of the course)  the mooc more than doubled the university’s student population.  What a triumph for Dundee University.  

Mooc questions and comments were totalled up, the final numbers being enviously fantastic.  The ‘Educators’ who are members of the departmental academic staff, including the professors, were very active in encouraging us in our tasks and answering queries. The live interaction was terrific.  Every week, at the end of the unit, there were mooc video seminars when our forensic queries were answered in more detail.  The facial reconstruction feature was brilliant; we students  got to do it.

The departmental staff have extraordinary busy and demanding working lives and they gave up a huge chunk of it from May this year, to develop the course and then to interact with their short term course intake. Rumour has it that the course, the forensic sciences in Identifying The Dead, will run again in 2016.

What is a mooc? It is a free of charge massive open online course. Participants can, if they choose, buy a certificate of attendance, at nominal cost, but not till they have completed a certain percentage of a course. If you want to, and you live where it might be possible, you can book for, and pay to take an examination.  While these courses do not count towards a higher qualification, they are accepted for continuous personal development, if what you learn is relevant to your profession. One of our local pharmacists is currently doing a relevant mooc, which, just happens to be with Dundee University too.  He is very impressed with the quality of his course.
 
I am dabbling with another mooc, which in contrast to the first one, is nowhere near as dynamic. But then, can criminology be as lively as the forensic study of identifying the dead?  I have not yet seen much Educator activity, though with week two starting,  you never know what might happen. The numbers of participants are not anywhere near comparable to those of the Dundee University mooc.  They are substantially lower.  As I have a few distractions coming up, I may have to bow out of this course about half way and maybe pick  up where I leave off, another time.   One helpful feature is, the courses are always there to continue on with, in silence, or, you can wait till a course is interactively offered again.

 Illustrations courtesy of 123RF

FORENSIC SCIENCE AND HUMAN IDENTIFICATION

I am doing a massive open online course, (mooc) with Dundee University in Scotland. It lasts for six weeks. When I first heard about it, ten thousand people had already signed up. Massive in name and massive in number.  I like to think I might have been number ten thousand and one.

 An event I went to at the Edinburgh Book Festival in August this year informed me about moocs and in particular, this one.  The course is called 'Identifying The Dead: Forensic Science and Human Identification'.  It may not be everyone's cup of tea, (if you drink tea).  I  was a week late starting and have now caught up.   We are now beginning week three and I intend to stay with the time line; you won't hear much from me while I am keeping up with it. This course has fired up the brain cells, (much needed) with new and interesting learning; a great combination!  The science of real forensic investigations is not like what we see on television programmes such as CSI, Lewis, or, Waking The Dead. It is educating me, and ten thousand others, about what the forensic science specialists actually do and how they collect and collate the provision of evidence.

At least decade ago, a director a forensic laboratory in Scotland, said that if he were seeking trainee forensic scientists, he would look for candidates who had studied a science subject, such as physics, or chemistry, in depth, because they would have the desired academic rigor.  The candidates can, he said, be trained in forensic investigation to accreditation standards once in situ. There were then, and are now,  many students taking forensic sciences courses, which the professor described as 'scientifically superficial',  and, which  are unlikely to take the students into the realms of the specialised scientific forensic work that the experts are expected to perform.  From what I have learned so far with the mooc, I can understand why that may be so. 

HOW DOES YOUR GARDEN GROW...

Whahey!!!....my sharp-eyed sister-in-law has worked out what I was growing  from seed in the fish-box, which has been turned into my cold-frame - see here http://myword1.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/bounty-from-kailyard-and-harvest-from.html  There were faded letters on the white plastic name sticks which I had not noticed.  I now know for certain I have radishes, there's more lettuce, over and above that which I planted outside the cold-frame.  The thin green spindly things that sprouted out in a loop, then straightened up, (after a fashion) have been put out to grow as I think they are spring onions.  S-I-L agrees with me about them.  That leaves me with at least four cucumber plants not yet ready to pot on.  When they are, they will live under the polythene cover of the frame. 

However, not all is resolved; I pricked out some slim pointed leaves into larger pots to give them more space to develop.  I have absolutely no idea what they will become.  Back to the drawing board then - check in the box in which the packets of seeds were and with any luck, (fingers crossed) I might find a part packet of seed with a name on it.  I cannot remember if I decided to try growing the beetroot. If I did, they should be yellow ones.