Learning potentials and educational challenges of massive open online courses (MOOCs) in lifelong learning

The MOOC phenomenon contains the potential to draw a large and diverse audience with varying demands of learning possibilities. The characteristics of MOOCs are of interest from a lifelong learning perspective because they offer a possible solution to a rapid and increasing need for education worldwide.
The very first MOOCs were not originally referred to as such; they were only
labelled ‘‘massive open online courses’’ (MOOCs) in retrospect, in an attempt to
describe what was distinctive and new about the ones which had already been held (Cormier 2008). These new types of courses explored new ground in many ways. For instance, they explored how to handle a massively large number of participants in a learning environment; or how loose or open the structure of a course could be tostill be experienced as a course; or ways of orchestrating various degrees of coherence, connections, collaboration and interaction among participants of a course. These first MOOCs opened up new discussions of pedagogy and didactics and were potentially challenging formerly established ways of organising education and competence development.