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Online Education
在线教育
Good morning, everybody.
大家早上好。
In today's lecture, we will talk about online education.
今天的讲座，我们要谈一谈在线教育。
You know, in some parts of the world, it is not that easy for people to receive education.
大家都知道，在有些地方，受教育仍然不是件容易的事。
And even in the United States where education is available, it might not be within reach.
即使在美国这样的教育大国，受教育可能也有困难。
Thus, online courses provided by those world-famous universities can bring the best quality education to as many people as we could around the world, and for free.
因此，世界知名大学提供的在线课程,就可以为世界上许许多多的人带来优质教育，而且是免费的。
First, let's talk a little bit about some of the components that go into online education.
首先，我们谈一下在线教育的几个特点。
The first component is that when you move away from the constraints of a physical classroom and design content for an online format, you can break away from, for example, the one-hour lecture format.
第一个特点就是在线教育打破了实体课堂的限制。设计在线课程内容的时候，教师可以抛开很多限制，比如一小时的课程时长。
You can break up the material, for example, into short, modular units of 8 to 12 minutes, and each of the short units introduces a coherent concept.
举个例子，你可以将授课材料分成8到12分钟的小单元，每个单元介绍一个完整的概念。
Students can deal with this material in different ways, depending on their backgrounds, their skills or their interests.
学生可以根据自身背景、技能和兴趣，以不同的方式学习材料。
So, for example, some students might benefit from a little bit of preparatory material that other students might already have.
比如，有些学生可能会从准备材料中学到东西，而这些材料其他同学早就有了。
Other students might be interested in a particular topic that they want to pursue individually.
其他同学可能会对他们自己喜欢探究的具体话题感兴趣。
So this format allows students to break away from the one-size-fits-all model of education, and allows students to follow a much more personalized curriculum.
所以，这种形式将学生从“一刀切”式的教育中解放出来，学生们得以学习个性化的课程。
Second and perhaps one of the biggest components of our online education is that when we need to have students who practice with the material in order to really understand it.
第二个，也是在线教育最大的一个特点，就是我们需要让学生有材料练习，这样才能确保他们真正理解了所学内容。
There's been a range of studies that demonstrate the importance of this.
许多研究显示了这一点的重要性。
A study in Science last year, for example, demonstrates that even simple retrieval practice, where students are just supposed to repeat what they've already learned, gives considerably improved results on various achievement tests.
比如，去年《科学》杂志的一项研究显示，就连只要求学生复述所学内容的简单检索训练，都提高了许多成绩测验中学生的成绩。
So, we need to build in much more meaningful practice questions.
所以，我们需要编制更有意义的练习题目。
Now, fortunately, technology has helped us to provide the students with feedback on those questions.
幸运的是，现在技术进步了，我们可以就问题向学生反馈。
We can now grade a range of interesting types of homework online.
现在还可以给许多有趣的在线家庭作业打分。
The third component is what is called collaborative learning.
第三点是合作学习。
Students could collaborate in different online courses in a variety of ways.
学生可以以各种方式在不同的在线课程中合作。
First of all, there was a question and answer forum, where students could pose questions, and other students could answer those questions.
首先，在线课程会有一个问答论坛，学生可以在论坛上提问题，其他学生回答。
And what is really amazing is that, because there were so many students, it means that even if a student posed a question at 3 o'clock in the morning, somewhere around the world there would be somebody who was awake and working on the same problem.
最奇妙的是，因为学生很多，即使有人凌晨三点提出问题，世界上另一个角落也会有还没睡的学生，一起解决这个问题。
And he might answer that question.
可能他就能回答那个问题。
And so, in many of the online courses, the median response time for a question on the question and answer forum was 22 minutes.
因此，许多在线课程中，问答论坛上问题的响应时间多数在22分钟。
So in a word, if we wanted to offer top quality education to everyone around the world for free, what would that affect us?
总而言之，如果为全人类免费提供高质量教育，将有哪些影响？
Three things.
我认为有以下三点。
First, it would establish education as a fundamental human right, where anyone around the world with the ability and the motivation could get the skills they need.
首先，在线教育将教育作为基本人权，全世界能够而且想要学技能的人都能学到所需技能。
Second, it would enable lifelong learning.
第二，在线教育使得终身学习成为可能。
It's a shame that for so many of us, learning stops when we finish high school or when we finish college.
我们当中很多人高中毕业或者大学毕业之后就不再学习了，真是令人汗颜。
By making this amazing content available, we would be able to learn something new every time we wanted, whether it's just to expand our minds or it's to change our lives.
有了在线教育这个奇妙的东西，我们想学新东西就可以学到，可以开阔视野，也可以改变人生。
And finally, this would make a wave of innovation possible, because amazing talent can be found everywhere.
最后，在线教育也鼓励了新一轮创新浪潮，因为杰出人才将随处可见。
To sum up today, we have talked about some features of online education and it's benefits.
今天的演讲，我们主要讨论了在线教育的许多特点和好处。
We are sure that online education will have a promising future.
在线教育一定前途光明。
In the next lecture, we're going to learn how online education has changed people around the world.
下次讲座我们会讲到在线教育是如何改变世人生活的。
