When Do Learners Rewatch Videos in MOOCs?

摘要

Mobile applications for MOOCs (Massive Open On-line Courses) offer the possibility to download learning material to enable network independent learning sessions. The management of downloaded content on mobile devices is a manual process for the learner, which has the potential for automation. This includes the deletion of learning material that is likely to be no longer consumed. In this paper, a metric was defined to quantify learners’ references to previous videos based on the order in which the videos were viewed. In an observational study involving three MOOCs in the field of computer science and IT systems engineering, learners referred to previous video content only a single time on average. Outliers made use of earlier content up to 44 times during a course. Referenced videos belonged in most cases to the current or previous course section. The learners referred more often to previous videos during the course period compared to when participating in self-paced mode, while learners who earned a record of achievement referred to previous videos significantly more frequently than those who did not.