Introduction to OERs

What are…

Open Things…

• Open Access• Open Content• Open Course ware• Open Source Software• Open Education / e-Learning• Open Educational Resources

• …and many more things

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Change in philosophy towards an “Open Movement”Open Source Software

Open Access

Open Licences

Open Science

Open Society

Open Educational Resources

Open Data

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Affordances of the Internet

Title : File:Internet map 1024.jpg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaSource : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Internet_map_1024.jpglicense : Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported

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Available to other faculties, students and institutions.

Other educators can now discover and reuse.

Learning activity or resource

Creates

Designated as OER on web

Adapted from Conole, G., McAndrew, P. & Dimitriadis, Y., 2010

Shares with studentsand other faculty

Traditional sharing of teaching materials

Sharing educational resources as OER

Additional considerations:• Clearing of copyright issues• Formatting for web and accessibility for

reuse• Addition of descriptive metadata• Publishing in repository, referatory

or on the webEducator

…sharing beyond the classroom

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• Alternative copyright Licensing

• A range of financial models

• Affordances of the Internet

• Change in philosophy

Social Technical

LegalFinancial

What has enabled OER?

Beginning…

The term was first used at a UNESCO conference in 2002, although OERs were being produced and used before that time. For instance, the MIT OpenCourseWare project, which began in 2001, was one of the first major initiatives of the OER movement.

Lets see how it all started…

http://opencontent.org/blog/archives/247

• In 1994 Wayne Hodgins coined the term “learning object,” and this term quickly entered the vernacular of educators and instructional designers.

• One role of learning objects in the history of OER is its popularization of the idea that digital materials can be designed and produced in such a manner as to be reused easily in a variety of pedagogical situations.

• Along with its emphasis on reuse, the learning object movement spawned several standards efforts aimed at detailing metadata, content exchange, and other standards necessary for users to find and reuse digital educational content (ARIADNE, IMS, IEEE LTSC / LOM, SCORM, &c.).

Open Content

• In 1998 David Wiley coined the term “open content,” and while targeted at the educational community (and learning object creators specifically), the term quickly entered the vernacular of internet users.

Open Source…FOSS…

• One role of open content in the history of OER is its popularization of the idea that the principles of the open source / free software movements can be productively applied to content, and the creation of the first widely adopted open license for content (the Open Publication License).

Creative Commons…

• In 2001 Larry Lessig and others founded the Creative Commons and released a flexible set of licenses that were both a vast improvement on the Open Publication Licenses™ confusing license option structure and significantly stronger legal documents.

• One role of Creative Commons in the history of OER is the increase in credibility and confidence their legally superior, much easier to use licenses brought to the open content community.

2001 MIT announced its OpenCourseWare initiative

• to publish nearly every university course for free public access for noncommercial use. MIT OpenCourseWare has played many roles in the history of OER, including being an example of commitment at an institutional level, working actively to encourage similar projects, and lending the MIT brand to the movement.

2002: UNESCO

• As the number of institutions offering free or open courseware increased, UNESCO organized the 1st Global OER Forum in 2002 where the term Open Educational Resources (OER) was adopted.

2005: OER Community wiki

• With the support of the Hewlett Foundation, UNESCO created a global OER Community wiki in 2005 to share information and work collaboratively on issues surrounding the production and use of Open Educational Resources.

Feb 2006: WikiEducator domain name registered

2006 October: OpenLearn of UKOU

2006 November

• FLOSS4Edu launches for African OER

• 2008: OER Africa launched

Image source: http://www.bihardays.com/

What is an OER?

Open Educational Resources (OER) are ‘materials offered freely and openly to use and adapt for teaching, learning, development and research’.

- The Commonwealth of Learning (COL) http://www.col.org/resources/crsMaterials/Pages/OCW-OER.aspx

Open Educational Resources (OER) are teaching and learning materials that are freely available online for everyone to use, whether you are an instructor, student or self-learner. Examples of OER include: full courses, course modules, syllabi, lectures, homework assignments, quizzes, lab and classroom activities, pedagogical materials, games, simulations, and many more resources contained in digital media collections from around the world.

- OER Commons

http://www.oercommons.org/

OER are teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license that permits their free use and re-purposing by others. Open educational resources include full courses, course materials, modules, textbooks, streaming videos, tests, software, and any other tools, materials, or techniques used to support access to knowledge.

- The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation

Open Educational Resourcesfree and openly licensed educational materials that can be used for • teaching, • learning, • research, and • other purposes.

Image Source: http://wikieducator.org/Educators_care/Defining_OER

“Open” in Open Content

5Rs Framework• Reuse• Revise• Remix• Redistribute• Retain

"A door can be wide open, mostly open, cracked slightly open, or completely closed. So can your eyes, so can a window, etc.“ – David Wiley

http://opencontent.org/blog/archives/1123http://opencontent.org/blog/archives/1123[

Types of Open Educational Resources

• Courses• Course materials • Content modules • Learning objects • Collections, and • Journals

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Open Educational Resources

Shared

Shared freely and openly to

be…

Used

Improved

Redistributed

… used by anyone to … … adapt / repurpose/

improve under some type of license in order

to …

… redistribute and share

again.

Open Content / Open educational resources (OER) / Open Courseware are educational materials which are discoverable online and openly licensed that can be:

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Alternative copyright Licensing

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A range of financial models

• Donor funding – e.g. Hewlett Foundation• Marketing budget – e.g. Open University• Commission – e.g. MIT and Amazon• Endowment – e.g. Stanford Encyclopedia of

Philosophy• Membership – e.g. Sakai Consortium, OCWC• Government – e.g. NROER – Govt of India

funding

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Recap: What makes an OER?

• Educational curriculum, materials or mixed media

• Discoverable online as they are shared freely and openly

• Openly licensed (usually Creative Commons)• Can be legally used by anyone to repurpose/

improve and redistribute

Strategies…

Open Educational Practice (OEP)

A characteristic of Open Educational Practice, compared with conventional forms of professional practice, is that it changes the nature of relationships…

http://littlebylittlejohn.com/do-oer-funded-initiatives-impact-professional-practice/

- Allison Littlejohn, Lou McGill, Isobel Falconer, Jay Dempster

What this change is?

• Between academics and support staff (as people work in multi-disciplinary teams, sharing areas of expertise);

• Amongst academics (as teaching practice shifts from individual practice to cross-institutional and inter-institutional collaboration);

• Between academics and students (as teachers and learners (who may not be registered with a university) interact in new ways);

• Between academics and organisations {including the university where they are employed} (as university activities open up).

What further we can do?

Explore… find… search…

Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Educationhttp://www.iskme.org

Collaborate for content creation…

Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Educationhttp://www.iskme.org

Collaborate for content creation…

Author: Document, remix, license, and share OER

http://wikieducator.org/User:Kalpanagupte/My_Projects

Curate…Create a specific collection of OER for easy access and sharing

http://www.scoop.it/t/open-learning-newshttp://www.scoop.it/t/open-educational-resources-oer

Share…

http://wikieducator.org/User:Rashkath

JoinOER Foundation…

Beome a proud member of WikiEducator

http://wikieducator.org/Main_Page

WikiEducator - India

http://wikieducator.org/India

Free professional development opportunity from the OER Foundation

OER Project: Guide for newly enrolled distance learners

Thank You !