Massive Open Online Courses for professional development for teachers of higher education. An Indian perspective (eBook)

Academic Paper from the year 2021 in the subject Pedagogy - The Teacher, Educational Leadership, grade: A, , language: English, abstract: The main aim of the present paper is to explore the importance and contribution of MOOCs for the professional development of teachers in higher education institutes. MOOCs are online courses for anyone with internet access. A qualitative research has been conducted to find out the opinion of teachers. At present MOOCs are popular in higher education institutes particularly in engineering and management. In general, teachers’ attitude towards MOOCs is positive. MOOCs can be used for teachers who need: additional insights into topic of their choice, to update their skills, to expand their knowledge and to learn innovatory and current trends in teaching-learning.

MOOCs require some more momentum in the form of teachers’ awareness, credit recognition, etc. In the future, there will be high demand for MOOCS for professional development, since professionals can continue their services, apart from updating their skills. Thus, MOOCs can be incorporated gradually in a step-by-step manner to cope with the current trends of teachers’ professional development along with the updated rules and regulations.