Open Education and Widening Participation

Opening Educational Practices in Scotland

Open education and widening participation

Pete Cannell 07 December 2015

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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland

Open Educational Resources

“Open Educational Resources (OERs) are any type of educational materials that are in the public domain or introduced with an open

license. The nature of these open materials means that anyone can legally and freely copy, use, adapt and re-share them. OERs range from

textbooks to curricula, syllabi, lecture notes, assignments, tests, projects, audio, video and

animation.” (UNESCO definition)

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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland

OER: the 5Rs• Retain – the right to make, own, and control copies of the

content;• Reuse – the right to use the content in a wide range of ways

(e.g., in a class, in a study group, on a website, in a video);• Revise – the right to adapt, adjust, modify, or alter the

content itself (e.g., translate the content into another language);

• Remix – the right to combine the original or revised content with other open content to create something new (e.g., incorporate the content into a mashup);

• Redistribute – the right to share copies of the original content, your revisions, or your remixes with others (e.g., give a copy of the content to a friend).” (David Wiley, 5 March 2014)

Source: http://opencontent.org/blog/archives/3221

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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland

The Promise• The promise of Open Education is that

traditional boundaries and barriers to engagement with higher education can be broken down (OECD, 2007; D’Antoni, 2014)

• The current reality in Scotland and in Europe (recent OECD report, Falconer 2013) is that Open Education in general and OER in particular is having a relatively limited impact on widening participation and lifelong learning

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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland

The Project• Opening Educational

Practices in Scotland is a three year project led by the Open University in Scotland but involving all of the higher education sector.

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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland

Project objectivesThe project encompasses a number of activities over a three year period (2014-2017):• Analysis of current open educational practices• Events programme across Scotland to raise awareness of OEP• Development of an online hub to encourage and share best practice in

open education• Development of a small number of high quality OERs of particular benefit

to Scotland• Badging of informal learning• Learning design for widening participation• Research and evaluation building strong evidence base• Evaluation of various economic models of openness

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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland

Origins• Strong focus and

incentive to work in partnership to widen participation in Scottish Higher Education

• Availability of OER resources (OpenLearn …) and high level of expertise within the Open University

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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland

OER developed in partnership

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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland

Open Educational Practice

Cape Town Declaration - 2007

• The declaration stresses that developing the potential of open education requires practices that enable educators to share approaches and ideas and promote development in pedagogy.

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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland

Extending how we think of OEP• The evidence that OEPS is building on suggests that it

may be useful to think of practice as including:• Learning design and pedagogy• Opportunities for co-creation• Social Context• Collective and peer supported learning• Networks

Project activities• Discussion with partners and potential partners – approx 50• WorkshopsoLearning Design aimed at developing practiceo ‘Open Learning Champions’oA range of open practice topics

• Presentations at conferences and seminars• Advisory forums

• Developing exemplar OER and associated practice• Supporting development and piloting of badges in WP

contexts• Developing hub for open educational practice• Embedded evaluation and research• Reports and papers

Emerging Themes• Partnership• High levels of interest outside the formal education sector• Extending learning design and practice to include the use of

materials in social settings – importance of peer support• Value of working with partners who are embedded in their own

well established networks• The opportunities that are created by working with partners

where individuals play intermediary or facilitating roles with fellow workers, clients …

• Value of co-creation and collaborative design• OER ladder – from use through to remixing• Sharing and developing knowledge• The online hub is being designed to support learning

communities – not another repository

Contact Us:Email:OEPScotland@open.ac.uk

Twitter: @OEPScotlandBlog: www.oepscotland.orgCommunity hub: www.oeps.ac.uk

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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland

Barriers to use – case study

• Working with Scottish Union Learning to develop Open Learning Champions

• 18 unions• Around 100 ULRs• Building a community on

www.oeps.ac.uk

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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland

What we’ve found• Barriers familiar in the WP literature – socio-economic,

attitudinal, confidence …• But these overlap and interact with specific

characteristics of the online environmentScale and complexity of the offer – ‘looks like a university’The idea that online means individualisedNegative experience (e.g. tick box, top down)Where to start – lack of structure Digital skills, digital literacyLack of good collective models