From OER to OEP – enabling open educational practices via platform development and open course building exemplars. From Labspace to OpenLearn Create. Evolution of OU experimental OER platform to an open course platform for everyone.
1. Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
From OER to OEP – enabling open
educational practices via platform
development and open course
building exemplars
Anna Page (OEPS)
5 April 2017 for OER17
2. Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
About us
The Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
project facilitates best practice in Scottish open
education. We aim to enhance Scotland’s
reputation and capacity for developing publicly
available and licenced online materials, supported
by high quality pedagogy and learning
technology.
“”
3. Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
From Labspace to
OpenLearn Create
Evolution of OU experimental OER platform
to an open course platform for everyone
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
OU Labspace
http://www.olnet.org/content/openlearn-labspace
http://alexlittle.net/blog/2008/07/30/revise-this
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
OU Labspace projects
A number of OU partnership and research projects started to publish on
Labspace
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Limitations of OLW design
• Home page design restrictive and not mobile responsive
• Large proportion of home page taken up with twitter feed
• Featured projects on home page difficult to edit
• Top navigation didn’t help course creators or learners easily find what they
needed
• Search and Browse functions limited (no taxonomies)
• Guidance for course creation incomplete and confusing (step by step written
in 2015, still incomplete)
• Course pages view standard Moodle, enrol button not obvious to learners
• Not possible for course creators to create or manage their own project
category
• No access to authoring in OU structured content (using Oxygen) for non-OU
users, though could upload own XML files
• Only had course star ratings, no review facility until 2016
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
OpenLearn Create
• Existing OER platform hosted
by the OU – sister platform to
OpenLearn
• Free public space for people to run
their own open learning projects or
share OER – both
OU projects and external and
partnership projects
• Redesigned and developed for
improved navigation and usability
• Further redesign and functionality
improvement work ongoing
• Can host collections of courses
• www.open.edu/openlearncreate
10. Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
The create a course form has
been updated to include subject
and skill taxonomies, as well as
provider, level, licence chooser,
study hours, teaching language
and course collection (default is
OER).
The course enrol button can be
hidden if it is an OER which
doesn’t require enrolment
14. Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Google custom search of the
site content.
Also a Google custom
search for other OER sites so
that course creators can find
other OER they might reuse
or remix into their course.
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New form for creating
a collection allows
users to set up their
own collection
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Ongoing developments
• Make the site Mobile responsive
• Plan to use direct authoring tool which the OU is developing, not
available yet
• Course pages still being redesigned
• Moodle Stats and data dashboard being designed and developed
• Article functionality – create a standalone article in Moodle which
the system recognises as an article not a course
• Guide/handbook functionality – option for the creator to identify
that the OER being created is a guide or handbook rather than a
course
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Reasons for engaging with OER
• Purpose – may have material to share – their expertise and
knowledge of learner context
• Existing and potential audience – wider exposure and
uptake of their material
• Interested in using collaborative supportive networks but
need advice
• Want guidance on level and tone to suit their audience
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Working in partnership to change cultures
• Explore the Partner’s needs and what they know about the
learners
• Explain the different types of open courses/OER
• Learning through doing – participatory design
• Draw out their expertise, they draw on our education expertise
• Help them identify uncertainties, build expertise and revise their
content
• Build their confidence in course creation
• Challenge our thinking – for example is existing OER relevant for
their context?
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Development of new content and new practices
Practice based
knowledge
Practice based
knowledge
Technical
capability
Technical
capability
OEPS team Partner
Academic
knowledge
Academic
knowledge
Collaboration via adapted
course team methodology
Collaboration via adapted
course team methodology
Skills in
educational
design
Skills in
educational
design
Intellectual
property
Intellectual
property
Quality
processes for
production
Quality
processes for
production
LearnersLearners
NetworksNetworks
Contributions
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Single-authored (one organisation)
Understanding Parkinson’s
OEPS guided Parkinson’s UK through the process
of creating an open course. This included assisting with
adapting materials face-to-face materials and writing quizzes.
By 1 March 2017: 527 enrolments and 144 badges issued
http://www.open.edu/openlearncreate/UnderstandingParkinsons
Now Parkinson’s are:
•Running their own survey of learner feedback
•Actively promoting the course to their known audience and online via social
media
•Monitoring learner progress
•Writing two new Parkinson’s courses with some advice from OEPS but taking
the lead on authoring and production based on their experiences of creating
the first course
•Building their own quizzes for the new courses
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Multi-authored
Introduction to Dyslexia and Inclusive Practice (Mar 2017)
• Shared online documents for content authoring and reviewing
• Quiz questions suggested and refined collaboratively between
partners
• Dyslexia Scotland are already writing two more courses as this is
the first of a set of 3 linked courses
http://www.open.edu/openlearncreate/becoming-open-educator
http://www.open.edu/openlearncreate/how-to-make-course
http://www.open.edu/openlearncreate/dyslexia-inclusive-practice
OEPS – Becoming an open educator (Sept 2016)
How to make an open online course (Nov 2016)
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Development of new content and new practices
Quiz co-
authoring
Quiz co-
authoring
Video editing
(use external
contractor)
Video editing
(use external
contractor)
OEPS team Partner
Advice and
guidance
Advice and
guidance
Current roles and responsibilitiesCurrent roles and responsibilities
Quiz co-
authoring
Quiz co-
authoring
Video filming
(external
contractor)
Video filming
(external
contractor)
Content
tagging,
rendering
Content
tagging,
rendering
Authoring,
identify assets
Authoring,
identify assets
Quiz testingQuiz testing
Critical
reading
Critical
reading
Critical
reading
Critical
reading
Quiz building
and testing
Quiz building
and testing
Draft Course
reviewing
Draft Course
reviewing
Badge set upBadge set up Badge designBadge design
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Development of new content and new practices
Quiz co-
authoring
Quiz co-
authoring
University Partner
Advice and
guidance (on
OEPS hub)
Advice and
guidance (on
OEPS hub)
Future roles and responsibilitiesFuture roles and responsibilities
Video filming
& editing
(external
contractor)
Video filming
& editing
(external
contractor)
Authoring,
identify assets
Authoring,
identify assets
Quiz building
and testing
Quiz building
and testing
Critical
reading
Critical
reading
Draft Course
reviewing
Draft Course
reviewing
Badge design
and set up
Badge design
and set up
Content
upload
Content
upload
What services
might be offered?
What services
might be offered?
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Open production checklist
Allow time for discussion to understand about OER, purpose of online course,
potential audience, open licenses, possible course structures and assessment
options, including badging
Allow time to adapt existing materials as they might not be suitable for online
learning – follow good practice guidelines for online learning
Agree roles and responsibilities for course management, authoring, asset
compiling and creating, quiz writing and building, badge design, set up of course
materials online, testing quiz, set up of badge, making course live
Use a sample schedule early in discussions to inform discussion, expectations, roles,
responsibilities and future planning leading to an actual production schedule
Compile an asset register as the course is written to keep track of all assets, their
Title, Author, Source and Licence (TASL)
Involve partner in every element of the process – enable them to take ownership
Use ‘How to make an open online course’ and
‘Becoming an open educator’ as good practice guidance
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
What are the implications for
Widening Participation?
If partners use OER to fill structural holes in individual
learning journeys, what are the implications for formal
learning providers with a remit for widening participation in
Higher Education?
Does this exclude formal providers from widening
participation?
Do formal providers partner with external organisations to
enhance the formal curriculum and fill these holes?
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Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
References
D’Antoni, S. (2013) ‘Open Educational Resources: Access to knowledge – A Personal Reflection’ in
McGreal, R., Kinuthia, W. and Marshall, S. (eds) (2013) Open Educational Resources: Innovation,
Research and Practice. Vancouver: The Commonwealth of Learning and Athabasca University
https://oerknowledgecloud.org/sites/oerknowledgecloud.org/files/pub_PS_OER-
IRP_web.pdf#page-153
Welsh Government (2014) “Open & online: Wales higher education and emerging modes of
learning”, Report of the Online Digital Learning Working Group
http://gove.wales/docs/dcells/publications/140402-online-digital-learning-working-group-
en.pdf
Becoming an open educator http://www.open.edu/openlearncreate/course/view.php?id=2274
(Opening Educational Practices in Scotland Project team, lead author Beck Pitt, 2016), CC BY
4.0
How to make an open online course http://www.open.edu/openlearncreate/course/view.php?
id=2221 (Free Learning team at The Open University, 2016), CC BY SA NC 4.0
OEPS hub of educational practices www.oeps.ac.uk (Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Project)
33. Opening Educational Practices in Scotland
Contact Us: Email:
OEPScotland@gmail.com
Social media:
@OEPScotland
www.oepscotland.org
www.oeps.ac.uk
Hinweis der Redaktion
The 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 a strong evidence base
Evaluation of various economic models of openness
One of the things the OEPS project has enabled is the further development of an existing OER platform where several OEPS courses are hosted.
Labspace was set up when OpenLearn was created, in October 2006.
Space for OU staff to experiment with creating OER.
Entirely Moodle
OL = Drupal / Moodle combination
Remixing and reversioning tools were gradually developed
http://alexlittle.net/blog/2008/07/30/revise-this
http://michaelpaskevicius.com/2009/04/remixing-oer-content-with-the-open-universitys-labspace/
It was possible to download the material in various formats including:
Moodle backup, Plain Zip, Content Package, Common Cartridge 1.0, Print this Unit, OU XML Package, Unit Content XML
2014 OU Labspace became OLW, with a new design, some functionality was withdrawn and all existing OER migrated over to new site.
For example, the facility for a direct copy of whole courses from OL to Labspace was discontinued as Labspace was filling up with duplicate courses which people abandoned or struggled to edit because they were created using OU XML and they didn’t have the Oxygen skills to edit the content.
Course / project owners were informed of the change, many did not visit their earlier experiments after the changeover.
TESSA project started using OLW
OEPS project started requirements gathering to improve the platform for all users
In 2016 we did an audit of all the content on OLW, contacted owners where they could be identified and deleted some of the abandoned courses ahead of the redesign launch.
OpenLearn Create design set up to serve both the needs of course creators and of learners studying the courses hosted on the platform
On OLW the top navigation included a link to Get started. The Get started page was standard Moodle layout with a variety of links to various information, but not well organised or written to show the extent of what could be done with the platform.
Get started has been completely redesigned to show a step by step procedure to creating and editing a course.
Each of these headings expands to reveal guidance, good practice and issues to consider (e.g. licencing).
Create a course form revisions
The browse page layout was rudimentary and there was no browse by subject because there were no taxonomies
The search function used a standard OU search, which wasn’t effective, a Google custom OLW site search was adopted in 2015
The Free courses page replaces the old browse page and uses the new taxonomies
The filter system on the Free courses page uses the new taxonomies
This makes it much easier to find a course on a particular subject or skill
The existing Google custom search was joined by another Google custom search of OER sites. We had already used a similar search on the OEPS hub site.
Project spaces on OLW tended to be a course acting as a home page for the courses in the project (you cannot have a course within a course), because the standard category page for grouping courses together wasn’t editable by anyone other than site managers and could not have a banner image.
Collections associated with OEPS
This is the OEPS collection on OLC
It is now possible for any course creator to set up a collection of courses
There is simple guidance on creating a collection
The existing add category form has been amended to accommodate users creating their own collection – previously this could only be done by platform managers. General users cannot create a category in anything other than the Collections category in the system, while OLC managers have access to all the categories (including the taxonomies).
OLC also supports open badges, the first badged open courses were launched in 2014 – they are OEPS badges
Subsequently other projects using the platform have adopted badges too, including the Social Partnerships Network courses and the DIY Learn modules.
OEPS continues to help partners create courses with or without badges.
Over 60 organisations and groups have engaged with OEPS since the project started in 2014
Advice on reusing and remixing resources, coproduction of courses, exploring open practice, sharing knowledge on evidence of good practice, advice on supported portal redesign for open learning, co-presenting a conference
Some impact case studies will follow shortly
15 partnerships are currently live
External organisations new to open learning may have some material to share
They may already use traditional methods of teaching/training
Seek to get wider exposure and uptake of their material – OER is one way of doing this
Keen to harness collaborative working through supportive networks but not sure how to start
OEPS works with partners to explore what openness and the power of their existing networks might do which they might not have been able to do before
Aim to embed open practices within networks or organisations
This partnership approach is important to OEPS – we’re using it both with HE and organisations outside the academy. The range of organisations who are interested in and starting to engage in open educational practices goes beyond the traditional formal learning routes of FE and HE.
Partner might have published workbooks to accompany f2f workshops
Cannot just assume “built it and they will come” – work with them to identify users, needs, behaviours and methods which would work best for their context
OEPS has treated partnership as a design process – build on an understanding of the partner’s needs and what they know about their learners.
Both the partner and OEPS learn through the doing as we participate in designing an open course, it has not just been a ‘transmit our expertise’ exercise as we have learned an enormous amount in the process from their questions and while using and updating existing OU systems
Partners may not want to expose the initial discussions about their plans to explore ‘open’ – they may want to understand the options and possible routes to sharing materials before committing to share assets openly – it is brave to do open
How ‘open’ – public scrutiny at course development stage or later at community review stage? - Even after committing to share assets, partners may want to work only with OEPS team to develop the assets for online use rather than expose the development of their online courses or resources to public scrutiny as they are built, even if there are advantages with public scrutiny
OEPS works with them to identify where uncertainties exist and where expertise is needed to complement and strengthen what the partner is proposing to share openly
In future, after developing one course and gaining confidence, partner might be more willing to develop course in the open from the start
During discussions with partners, OEPS explains about the different types of online courses and resources
OER which don’t require enrolment
MOOCs (start/end dates)
BOCs (perpetually open or series of cohorts)
Supported or unsupported (teacher/tutor or standalone)
Assessment for informal learning? Methods (quiz, reflective learning) Rewards (badge, statement of participation/certificate)
OEPS working with partners is illustrated by this diagram showing what each partner contributes.
Collaborative partnership – bringing together expertise to create an open course
Valuing all contributions and using an adapted course team methodology to create a good quality open online course
Course in 5 sections with ungraded practice quizzes at the end of first 4 sections and a graded end of course quiz at the end of section 5.
To receive badge users need to look through all materials and complete the quizzes, passing the last quiz.
Course being used by Health and Social care workers though can also be used by general users interested in knowing more about Parkinson’s and how it is treated and managed
Published April 2016
By 1 March 2017: 527 enrolments and 144 badges issued
Cultural change at Parkinson’s UK as they use their new OER creation knowledge to build further courses
Subtle differences with how authoring and quiz question writing was handled but similar principles
BAOE:
Published September 2016
By 1 March 2017: 66 enrolments and12 badges issued
Honourable mention 2017 @OEConsortium awards
How to make an open online course:
Published November 2016
By 1 March 2017: 21 enrolments, 3 badges issued
Dyslexia: Published on 27 March 2017
Roles and responsibilities – what each partner did in the course production process for the first collaboratively built courses
Future roles and responsibilities after OEPS project – what each partner would do in the course production process
OEPS project comes to an end in July 2017. It leaves learning and principles about how to work in partnership to build open courses which could be adopted by any university offering their expertise to potential partners.
What service to offer?
In our experience the design aspect is key to getting it right.
Depending on balance of work we might also offer production support or even do the production for the partner.
Existing OU system of production for formal learning is not flexible enough or cost effective for one off bespoke short courses with partners, though its OpenLearn course production system for short courses is evolving and improving on this model.
For example a series of PDFs of workbooks which are used in a f2f workshop may not transfer into an guided online learning experience particularly well
Sometimes a series of LD discussions are needed to familiarise the partner with open learning concepts and practices – this needs to be built into the timescale for the project with the partner
A production schedule can help expose all the steps that might need to be taken depending on what the OER is likely to include
SCHEDULE: A sample production schedule is a crucial tool in early meetings as it helps inform discussion, expectations, roles, responsibilities and future planning leading to an actual production schedule
Encouraging a partner to compile an asset register helps them re-evaluate the content they want to share
Compiling the asset register reminds the partner to seek copyright information about the assets they wish to use and to confirm that they can share them openly. For example some video they might previously have used in f2f sessions might not have the relevant permission from participants for sharing on the open web so may need to be re-filmed or placed online behind a password.
Taking care of the actual production on behalf of a partner can risk preventing them from learning how to do it themselves, so keeping the partner involved in every step and decision is importantIt is very tempting to take complete control as it might seem quicker but the whole purpose is to embed unfamiliar practices by learning together – empowering them to do it for themselves another time
- Partner with subject expertise redrafts their existing material with OEPS team providing guidance on appropriate pedagogy- Ideal if the partner has someone to do the content upload otherwise OEPS arranges this activity
Production issues with OU and external partner model
Roles and responsibilities need to be agreed in the early production stages to avoid misunderstandings and delays
Authoring – who is writing it and what impact on their time?
Assessment – who writes quiz questions?
If badged, who is designing the badge?
Who sets up and tests the materials?
Internal OU production methods are geared to OU materials for students or OpenLearn, for example video production
Some OU systems not ‘open’ to external users – a direct authoring tool for OpenLearn Create is coming, but is several months away
Getting things done in time depends partly on who is leading/driving the work – is OEPS driving it or is the partner driving it? Who is authoring the content, what is their motivation and is it done on the fringes of their time or have they been specifically contracted to author the course?
Internal processes for video production resulted in long delays and frustration – in future we advise contracting external video production expertise if using OU platform for hosting the course
Direct authoring – OU platform OpenLearn Create is Moodle and supports OU structured content. Moodle is open for anyone to edit, but OU SC is OU staff only. Other platforms may be easier for the partner to use instead, though may not have all the features of OU open platform.
Does increase in external organisations using OER squeeze out formal providers? Or can they work together?
OU is successfully using OER as a bridge to formal learning
Learners can be provided with qualifications relating to career and lifelong learning