Cognitivism or Connectivism

Since I'm already working in a MOOC platform, I try two relate everything I learn here to MOOC design. Fortunately, there are many examples of cognitive overload that can be found in MOOCs. From the LMS itself, to the videos, and the materials used. For this discussion, I will focus on the video content for CS50, one of the most popular MOOCs of all time.

Here is an example for one video lecture.

The course has one mandatory weekly video lecture which ranges from 1 to 2 hours. Along with the shorts, serves like sections, and the problem sets, the weekly assignments, there is a huge room for cognitive overload in this course. The course goes for 12 weeks, and each week explains a concept in computer science and builds on on in the next week.

1. Voice Principle: The instructor's voice is very conversational and friendly. It is hard to feel bored by listening to David's voice.
2. Multimedia Principle: The videos draws on Harvard's expertise in film-making. The lecture is recorded from different angles and offers breaks in the middle.
3. Signaling Principle: The videos uses transitions in the form of breaks in their media player.

What they did to reduce cognitive load was amazing:

• They created a video player and divided the lecture into smaller chunks (They call it chapters).
• They offered breaks between chunks.

One approach is having a study plan for each week, this will help learners review the concepts and follow the learning steps in a visual manner. I included an example of a study plan.