CourseKit: The Social LMS
January 4, 2012 in collaborative learning, Creativity, education, education theory, global learning, Higher Learning, lifelong learning by TMWillingham
Big Think reports this week on CourseKit, the brainchild of three University of Pennsylvania students, Joe Cohen, Dan Getelman, and Jim Grandpreunhappy with current Learning Management System (LMS) and inspired to build their own. Infused with a $5 million funding round, and billed as “the simple, social course site,” CourseKit seeks to” turn courses into communities online.”
CourseKit is free for students and instructors to use, with plans to add e-commerce functions like textbooks and other education related products as use builds. With its heavy emphasis on the social aspects of learning, CourseKit is an easier sell to students than instructors – whom CourseKit developers are focusing on over administrators – who are, as Big Think points out, more accustomed to working with the “more enterprise-centric software approach of Blackboard,” and possibly less comfortable with the idea of socializing with their students at random hours.
LI4E will be keeping an eye on CourseKit, and quite probably giving it a try! We’re excited about these new online learning spaces and looking forward to seeing where they lead and how they evolve.
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