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openED 2.0 Designing for participatory learning In open educational environments Start: November 2009 Duration: 33 month Supported by: LifelongLearningProgramme, European Commission Prepared by: Andreas Meiszner

OpenEd 2.0 Designing for participatory learning In open educational environments

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OpenEd 2.0 project introduction

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Page 1: OpenEd 2.0 Designing for participatory learning In open educational environments

openED 2.0

Designing for participatory learningIn open educational environments

Start: November 2009Duration: 33 month

Supported by: LifelongLearningProgramme, European CommissionPrepared by: Andreas Meiszner

Page 2: OpenEd 2.0 Designing for participatory learning In open educational environments

Objectives: 1) Develop experimental approaches for participatory learning and teaching within open educational environments

2) Implement and test those approaches by means of 3 consecutive pilots to promote continuity, community building and evolutionary growth

3) Develop a sustainability framework and revenue models, to be implemented and tested alongside the pilots, to assure financial self-sustainability for such scenarios

4) Analyze the results & benchmark them against initial assumptions

5) Evaluate the project, disseminate outcomes and take the results further to the wider community

ObjectivesObjectives

Page 3: OpenEd 2.0 Designing for participatory learning In open educational environments

✔ It is about finding new ways on how to organize collaborative learning, sharing and knowledge production within a participatory web 2.0 world using technology for the sake of its usefulness and bringing together the various stakeholders

✔ It is not about designing complex socio-technological systems for the sake of technology hoping that it would become a killer application to revolutionize education as we know it

✔ The idea is to start simple, to see what works out and what not, and to develop it further step by step based on the experiences gathered

What it is about and what it is not aboutWhat it is about and what it is not about

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Workplan, Milestones &

Deliverables

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WorkplanWorkplan

Page 6: OpenEd 2.0 Designing for participatory learning In open educational environments

Milestones

• WP 2 – Organizational framework in place March 2010

• WP 8 – Course Promotion & materials ready April 2010

• WP 3 – Course content in place June 2010

• WP 4 – Course environment in place June 2010

• WP 5 – Introduction training for course team June 2010

• WP 7 – Quality assurance strategy / assessment framework June 2010

• WP 9 – Sustainability framework & revenue models June 2010

• WP 6 – Pilots; 3 overlapping rounds July 2010 – Feb. 2012

• Review of 1st pilot round, evaluation & re-design ???

• Review of 2nd pilot round, evaluation & re-design ???

• Review of 3rd pilot round, evaluation & re-design March 2012

Note: Sustainability framework including revenue models (such as assessment & certification of free learners against fees) to be in place and piloted during the 3 pilot rounds.

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Deliverables, Lead partner & Deadlines

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Decissions to be taken during Kick-off meeting

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Agreement must be found on:

● What is the precise focus group of the course?● How will the course be organized in detail?● Which tools / environments will be used? ● Which contents will be used?● Link with original course or other educational provider?● Sustainability framework – legal clearance needed for ???● Internal collaboration spaces● Virtual project meetings & timing● Date for next meeting: forecast May/June 2010 in Athens, Greece● Else?

Page 10: OpenEd 2.0 Designing for participatory learning In open educational environments

Workpackages

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Objectives & Details

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WP1 – Project Management (SPI)

Aims

● Effective management of the project warranting a good and active communication between all the partners and stakeholders in order to meet the project objectives; ● Establish adequate mechanisms to coordinate tasks, partners and stakeholders; ● Collaboration with and consideration of stakeholders’ feedback; ● Project coordination from a technical, pedagogical and administrative-financial point of view;● Coordination during all the phases of negotiation, preparation, analysis, research, development of products, reports, or local workshops, to guarantee that all partners will have a clear idea of the tasks needed to be done during the relevant period of time and the effects that they need to produce; ● Controlling and monitoring project’s activities and performance

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WP2 - openEd organizational framework (SPI)

Activities

●The framework will build on the structure of the current course in place. ● It will identify and outline needs for adjustments and changes to be given as a free/open course within cross cultural and multilingual settings. ●This includes ways of interaction, collaboration or interplay scenarios between the various stakeholders, between humans and technology, the integration of open access content sources as well as available free and open web based tools and spaces, or external and well established online communities.●The framework will be revised and adapted after each pilot round to meet actual user expectations and draw on the lessons learnt.

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WP2 - openEd organizational framework (SPI)

Rationale ●This WP builds upon three key resources: the partners’ experience in educational provision; results of prior pilots, and previous research on such type of novel learning environments. ●The framework will introduce a hybrid approach that builds upon the way learning and knowledge creation at the participatory web takes place, in particular within the Open Source communities. ●This is to say that on the hand the openEd course environment will be open for participation of any individual interested at the subject (inviting in), and on the other hand it will make use of well established online communities and spaces at which students will engage as part of their project work (sending out). ●This combination of ‘inviting in’ and ‘sending out’ is what we like to call a hybrid approach. ●One objective of the hybrid approach is to provide the foundation required for an evolutionary growing learning ecosystem (to establish continuity) where learning processes and outcomes have the potential to become learning resources for future students and therefore connecting content to discourse; providing all stakeholders with a central meeting and collaboration point, yet promoting engagement within the wider virtual world.

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WP3 – openEd learning resource framework (The OU)

Aim ●To provide instructional and learning materials that are freely available and of good quality. This will include the adaptation of currently used (instructional) materials and identification of new ones suitable for this course.

Objective ●To adapt the course H809 to fit with the needs of the academic and enterprise partners and networks involved in the project. ●To localize content where appropriate (including freely available resources, or translations)

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WP3 – openEd learning resource framework (The OU)

Activities ●Adapt instructional materials and translate them where appropriate ●Identify available content sources and integrate them into the openEd course environment in a pedagogically sound manner ● Develop supportive structures for existing learning resources and user generated content ●Adjust and restructure the content at the end of each pilot round so it corresponds to the organizational structure and development stage of the openEd environment and collaborative learning activities.

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WP3 – openEd learning resource framework (The OU)

Rationale

The web is rich in good quality sources, including open access journals and open educational resources. The objective is to identify and integrate an initial set of those sources into the course, which then would be enriched over time by further sources that learners bring into the course environment as part of their learning activities. Furthermore, learners’ discourse associated with the course resources and the outcomes of the learning activities have themselves the potential to become learning resources for future learners. Another common characteristic of the web is that language barriers are often overcome by individuals acting as knowledge brokers taking content across language domains. The openEd project aims to build on those characteristic and leverage them to an educational setting.

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WP4 – openEd technical (support) framework (AUTH)

Aim ●To provide a comprehensive technical framework that supports a seamless interplay of the different involved virtual environments: the openEd course environment and the external learning resource and collaboration spaces.

• The objective is not to develop a comprehensive all including technological solution, but to carefully consider adjustments of existing ones to facilitate the learning experience, yet being open to changes and enhancements to allow a 'best of breed'.

Activities ●Mapping of existing environments and approaches ●Set up of course main environment ●Identification and implementation of bridge functions to external spaces ●Provision of (technical) user support during the three pilot rounds ●Review of the technical support framework at the end of each pilot round and adaptation / modification as identified

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WP4 – openEd technical (support) framework (AUTH)

Rationale

Since one of the objectives of the openEd hybrid approach (see WP2) is to allow a ‘best of breed’ it is not intended to establish a single unified static course environment, but to optimize and assure an interplay of the course main space and the external ones involved in order to provide learners with a certain structure and guidance to support them within their learning process and to allow them getting familiar with the diversity of the web and to become capable to use the web autonomously in the future for their personal learning needs. The web provides a myriad of well established spaces with new ones emerging each day. The course environment must take this into consideration and must be open to changes and to take advantage of outside spaces and communities. The project will make use of a wide range of free and open available tools and environments, focusing on pedagogical approaches and the identified principles that proved to work out for learning at the web and in open source settings in particular (e.g. self-studying, project/problem/case/inquiry-based learning, collaborative learning, reflective practice or social learning).

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WP5 – openEd learner support framework (IBM)

Aim ●To provide a comprehensive learner support framework for the different type of learner such as students, practitioner, free learners outside of formal education.

Activities ●To develop a virtual support framework (through e.g. forums, chats, VOIP sessions), including some type of mentoring or tutoring, within the involved languages domains●To provide an initial training for learning facilitators ●To design and implement a community based support system

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WP5 – openEd learner support framework (IBM)

Rationale

Drawing on the case of open source communities one can learn that almost all projects suffer the one of the two challenges: either too few or too high participation rates. Most projects probably face too low participation rates. This is because a project / product does not attract enough volunteering participants to create a critical mass. Prior experiences with the course H809 such as enrolment numbers, types of students (ranging from undergraduates to adults), and their diverse geographic origin suggest that demand exists across countries and professions to attract participants beyond the partners’ own regular learner population. Too high participation rates on the other hand can’t neither be predicted nor avoided within such an open educational scenario. In the worst case this might have an impact on the quality of. e.g. provided support. For example, the first ever global open course (D. Wiley, 2007 – US) had app. 60 participants, meanwhile the second ever global open course (G. Siemens & S. Downes, 2008 – CA) already counted app. 1.600 participants – this indicates the potential reach and growth open courses might have and implications on learner support provision.

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WP6 – openEd course pilots (The OU)

Aim ●To run 3 consecutive pilot course rounds within the openEd environment implementing and testing a hybrid approach.

Objectives ●To evaluate the applicability of such approaches to support free/open learning provision within cross-cultural and multilingual settings. Particular attention is to be paid to factors such as: the evolution of content and communities; the speed of innovation; the quality of learning provision and learning outcomes ●To build on earlier experiences (e.g. Wiley & Siemens/Downes - see WP5) and to go one step further towards an open participatory learning ecosystem that provides the potential for evolutionary growth of learning resources, communities and learning spaces.

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WP6 – openEd course pilots (The OU)

Rationale

Students will be provided with an initial instruction on what is expected from them and the general time frame to reach these objectives, but will be free to select a concrete focus area, to establish teams and to draft their own day to day roadmap and to organize group meetings, chats, etc. Students are further expected to present their project results at a public virtual space (e.g. slideshare, scribt) and will be given the chance to explain and defend those results to a virtual audience (e.g. chats or video-meetings). Besides a focus on the course subject the openEd pilots aim to: • create a culture of collective inquiry • encourage learners to take an active role in their own learning process • embed learning in collaborative activities • support learning using innovative educational technologies • establish the routine recording of discussions and decisions • create the expectations that these records become artifacts that help future students in their learning process • foster a spirit of continuous improvement and building upon the work of others

Note: the second pilot round coincides with the lecturing time of the original H809 course. The project therefore will consider and evaluate cross-over scenarios.

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WP7 – Quality Assurance (AUTH / The OU)

Given the openness of the pilot course, it is not totally clear - at this point in time - how and in which directions this course will develop once it is started. It is therefore of utmost importance that there is a continuous and very close monitoring of how the project develops. Problems and directions that could endanger the success of the project must be identified early enough to counter or compensate them.

To ensure that the project meets its objectives, produces high quality output and achieves an impact on public and policy, monitoring is defined within this Workpackage. In collaboration with the leaders of the other WPs, a project performance assessment will take place at critical milestones, coinciding with the completion of each pilot round.

Subjects of these evaluations are the requirements specifications, the framework of learning resources, the technical (support) framework, the learner support framework, the sustainability framework, the development and outcome of the 3 pilots, the dissemination and the exploitation of the project.

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WP7 – Quality Assurance (AUTH / The OU)

Main criteria for the performance assessment are usage and user- feedback, expert feedback (e.g. from associated networks), identified problems, lessons learnt, the monitoring of learning community dynamics (e.g. if the community starts to organise itself, people take on responsibility, and the like), publications and workshops / conferences where openEd is presented or mentioned, the adoption of openEd principles through third parties, or the feasibility to further operate the course after the project period ends.

The pilots will be assessed regarding user feedback, technology use and community dynamics, including a survey at the end of each pilot round on participants' feedback on their learning experiences, processes, and outcomes.

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WP8 - Dissemination (SPI)

Tasks involved include:

T1: Dissemination Strategy

• Identification of stakeholders

• Identification of events in which partners will participate

• Timetable of events

T2: General Dissemination Tools such as:

• Project Brochure & 'Catalogue of benefits'

• Press releases/newsletters: at different stages in the project,

• Targeted mailings to key stakeholders that can be addressed through the partners existing network

• Publications of results through e.g. journals, conferences, etc.

• On-line promotion:

T3: Project / Course Website

T4: Support actions for piloting

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WP9 - openEd sustainability framework (SPI)

Aim ●To develop a sustainability framework that would allow the provision of free/open courses, such as the one piloted, in a self-sustainable manner - including underlying revenue and funding models.

Activities ●To develop a sustainability framework●To implement and test new revenue or funding models

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WP9 - openEd sustainability framework (SPI)

Rationale

The openEd approach offers – potentially – a number of benefits such as

(1) providing formally enrolled students with a broader range of educational artifacts and real life learning and collaboration opportunities, or to gain key and soft skills ‘on the fly’,

(2) students and free learners outside of formal education equally benefit from such a rich and inclusive learning opportunity,

(3) the opportunity to develop service based revenue models around such types of free/open learning provision, or

(4) reduction of in-house training cost for businesses that make use of such educational provision and the opportunity to identify new employees through their participation (e.g. students or free learners).

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WP9 - openEd sustainability framework (SPI)

Rationale

Based on those scenarios – and analogue to the open source business model – the project will: ●Develop and test a sustainability framework. ●Service based revenue models might include for fee assessment and certification of free learners outside of formal education, tailored sessions for enterprises against fees, 'in kind' contributions of partnering institutions benefiting from synergies (e.g. support provision, infrastructure or learning resources), or sponsoring and partnership models analogue to e.g. Google's Summer of Code. ●Ideally the developed sustainability framework would be in place by the end of the 3rd pilot round to allow a seamless continuity of learning provision. This would depend however on the lessons learnt from the 3 pilot rounds and conclusions drawn from it.

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WP10 - Exploitation (SPI)

Aim

The project will elaborate an exploitation plan that will give clear indications who will use which of the project's results for which purpose, and how such free / open courses might be self-sustainable maintained at the project's end.

Exploitation will include, but not be limited to:

(1) targeted mailings to key stakeholders that can be addressed through the partners existing network for pilots and results addressing the different target groups

(2) the development and testing of a sustainability framework (see WP9)

(3) collaboration with stakeholders from associated networks, such as OLnet, the NESSI ETP or European Learning Industry Group to analyze ways to take the outcomes and results of this project further or to mainstream them.

(4) Publications of results through e.g. journals or conferences and associated networks

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Thanks for your attention!

Andreas Meiszner [email protected]