Ten Simple Rules for Developing a MOOC

If you have not heard of the word MOOC, it refers to Massive Open Online Courses, and their appeal has raised the interest of most tertiary institutions. MOOCs have rapidly become “the new black” for online learning [1]. The first course emerged in 2008 from the University of Manitoba (http://cck11.mooc.ca/), and the term MOOC was coined at that time by Dave Cornier (http://davecormier.com/edblog/2008/10/02/the-cck08-mooc-connectivism-course-14-way/). An ever-increasing number of courses from major universities with a range of course providers is now established, and new ones are coming out on a weekly basis. At Monash University, we recently completed and delivered a MOOC (the “Science of Medicines”) through the FutureLearn platform (https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/thescience-of-medicines). The course has been very successful (total enrollment of 28,500 learners) and has run five times. To facilitate the development of MOOCs, we have put together a set of ten simple rules based on our experiences to give you tips on what to lookout for and what to avoid. It must be said, however, that this is not an exercise for the fainthearted, as MOOC development entails a considerable amount of work. Within the world of MOOCs, there are both introductory and intermediate level courses. Our rules primarily relate to the former and are aimed at academics; however, many of the principles are in common