This document discusses open educational resources (OER) and open educational practices (OEP). It defines OER as teaching, learning and research materials that are free to use, adapt and redistribute. The document outlines why OER are used, including reducing textbook costs for students, increasing equity and access to education, and allowing for customization of resources. It also discusses OEP, such as using and revising OER, openly sharing teaching practices, and involving students in contributing to OER and curriculum development through open pedagogy. Both OER and OEP aim to increase access, agency and public contribution to knowledge. Some risks of open practices, such as privacy and harassment, are also acknowledged.
It's Not Just About the Money: Open Educational Resources and Practices
1. It's not only about the money: Open
educational resources and practices
Christina Hendricks, UBC
Professor of Teaching
Academic Director, Centre for Teaching, Learning & Technology
Open Art Histories, Langara College, January 31, 2020
Except for elements licensed otherwise, these slides are licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
3. Open Edu & You
◉ Can explain OER in 5 seconds or less to someone
entirely new to it
◉ Have used OER in teaching and learning
◉ Have created or revised OER
◉ Can explain Open Edu Practices (OEP) / Open
Pedagogy (OP) in 5 seconds or less
◉ Engage in OEP/OP
5. Open as in Free of Cost
Open as in cost Libros Libres, by
Alan Levine, licensed
CC BY 2.0, Flickr
6. Open like a museum
Open like a museum
A Day at the
Museum 2, by
Robert Couse-Baker,
licensed CC BY 2.0,
Flickr
7. 5 R’s of open
content
◉ Reuse
◉ Revise
◉ Remix
◉ Redistribute
◉ Retain
Open Content Definition by David Wiley; Creative Commons Logo from CC Downloads
8. Open Edu Resources
OER logo by Markus Büsges,
licensed CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia
Commons
“Open Educational Resources (OER) are
teaching, learning and research materials in
any medium – digital or otherwise – that
reside in the public domain or have been
released under an open license that permits
no-cost access, use, adaptation and
redistribution by others with no or limited
restrictions.” (UNESCO)
9. Open how?
Adapted from Hodgkinson-Williams (2014)
Cost License Technical Inclusive/
Accessible
Pedagogical
Free of
cost (or
low cost
for print)
Allow
revision,
reuse
Open
formats;
technical skills
needed to
use/adapt;
availability,
discovery
Diverse topics,
perspectives, ways
of knowing;
digital accessibility,
Universal Design
Collaborative,
connecting to
wider
community;
student
contribution to
knowledge, not
just consumption
12. Rising cost of textbooks
Source: US Bureau of Labor
Statistics
Textbook costs
College tuition
& fees
Housing at
school
13. BC students
UBC
(2019)
71% Have gone w/o require texts in a course b/c of
cost (rarely, sometimes, often or frequently;
35%: often or frequently)
JIBC LESD
(2019)
60% Didn’t buy a required textbook because of cost
BC
(2015)
54% Didn’t purchase a required textbook at least
once in the past 12 months because of cost
UBC: AMS Undergraduate Experience Survey 2018; JIBC: Daddey & Korpa, 2019; BC: Jhangiani & Jhangiani (2017)
14. Equity
◉ Increased access to education
& resources
○ including assessment tools
◉ Student retention (Fischer et al. 2015;
Wiley et al. 2016)
◉ Equal or better learning
outcomes (Hilton 2019)
15. Customizability
Ability for faculty, staff, and
students to adapt:
◉ Customize to context
◉ Make more inclusive &
accessible
○ E.g., OER Accessibility Toolkit
17. Some views of OEP
“the creation, use, and reuse of open educational resources
(OER) as well as open pedagogies and open sharing of
teaching practices” -- Catherine Cronin (2017).
Making “the process and products of education more
transparent, understandable, and available to all the people
involved” -- Tom Woodward, in Grush (2014).
18. OER logo in public domain; open access logo from PLoS,
licensed CC BY-SA 3.0; both on Wikimedia Commons
Some OEP examples
◉ Use, revision & creation of
OER
◉ Open reflection & sharing of
teaching practices, processes
◉ Open enrollment courses
◉ Open scholarship
-- Open Practices Briefing Paper
(Beetham et al., 2012)
19. Open Edu
Practices
Open
Pedagogy
OEP & open
pedagogy (OP)
“… open pedagogy … is
focused on teaching
and learning as
compared with broader
aspects of scholarship”
(Cronin & MacLaren
2018).
21. Images licensed CC0 on pixabay.com: ttrash can and symbol for no
Non-disposable
assignments
“… assignments that are sustainable
or not disposable, assignments that
would have benefit to others
beyond the limited course time and
space.”
-- Maha Bali (2017); see also David
Wiley on disposable assignments (2013)
23. Antologia Abierta de Literatura
Hispana, cover licensed CC BY 4.0
Environmental Science Bites,
Cover licensed CC BY 4.0
Open Textbooks
See A Guide to Making Open
Textbooks with Students
Fundamentals of Injury
Biomechanics (in progress)
25. Contributing to
curriculum
Creating assignments, exam questions, tutorials:
◉ DS106 assignment bank
◉ Rajiv Jhangiani’s Social Psychology course
◉ Video tutorials, Digital Photography course
Creating learning outcomes, assignments,
grading policies & rubrics
◉ Robin DeRosa’s First Year Seminar
27. Discussion
◉ What might be some
benefits to open
pedagogical practices?
◉ Possible challenges or risks?
28. Some quotes on OP
◉ “shift the student emphasis to contribution to knowledge
as opposed to simple consumption of knowledge” (Heather
Ross)
◉ “the ability for learners to shape and take ownership of
their own education” (Devon Ritter)
◉ “connect with a broader, global community” (Tannis Morgan)
◉ “teacher as ‘the’ authority vs. students being able to bring
other sources of authority” (Jim Luke)
29. Open pedagogy &
social justice
Photo licensed CC0 on pixabay.com
“open pedagogy is an ethos that has two …
components:
• A belief in the potential of openness and sharing
to improve learning
• A social justice orientation – caring about equity,
with openness as one way to achieve this”
-- Maha Bali, “What is Open Pedagogy?” (2017)
30. OER & OEP focus on:
Access
Cost
Publicly available
Accessibility
Agency
Revision, creation of OER
Contribute to knowledge
Contribute to curriculum
See, e.g., DeRosa & Jhangiani,
Open Pedagogy Notebook
32. Sava Singh on the fallacy of open
Photo licensed CC0 on pixabay.com
“… open is not good for everyone ... The hype around
open, while well-intentioned, is also unintentionally
putting many people in harm’s way and they in turn
end up having to endure so much. The people calling
for open are often in positions of privilege, or have
reaped the benefits of being open early on …”
-- Sava Singh, “The Fallacy of Open” (2015)
33. Your turn
◉ In pairs:
○ choose one or two “traditional”
assignments and turn them into open
pedagogy assignments.
◉ Share back with whole group.
35. Useful resources
◉ Annotated bibliography of multiple studies showing the
efficacy of open textbooks: the Open Ed Group Review
Project
◉ College Libraries Ontario OER Toolkit
◉ BCcampus Faculty OER Toolkit
◉ BCcampus OER by Discipline Directory (frequently
updated with new items)
◉ Rebus Community Guide to Making Open Textbooks
with Students
36. References
Daddely, F., & Korpa, J. (2019). How does the use of zero-cost textbooks and OER’s impact the
learning of students who have to use them? Presentation at Canadian Network for Innovation in
Education, Vancouver, BC.
Fischer, L., Hilton III, J., Robinson, J., & Wiley, D. A. (2015). A multi-institutional study of the
impact of open textbook adoption on the learning outcomes of post-secondary students—
Springer. Journal of Computing in Higher Education, 27(3), 159–172.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s12528-015-9101-x
Hendricks, C., Reinsberg, S. A., & Rieger, G. W. (2017). The Adoption of an open textbook in a
large physics course: An analysis of cost, outcomes, use, and perceptions. The International
Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 18(4). Retrieved from
http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/3006
37. References cont’d
Hilton, J. (2019). Open educational resources, student efficacy, and user perceptions: A synthesis of
research published between 2015 and 2018. Educational Technology Research and Development.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11423-019-09700-4
Hodgkinson-Williams, C. (2014, June 25). Degrees of ease: Adoption of OER, open textbooks and
MOOCs in the Global South. Presented at the OER Asia Symposium 2014. Retrieved from
https://open.uct.ac.za/handle/11427/1188
Jhangiani, R. S., & Jhangiani, S. (2017). Investigating the perceptions, use, and impact of open
textbooks: A survey of post-secondary students in British Columbia. The International Review of
Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 18(4). Retrieved from
http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/3012
Wiley, D., Williams, L., DeMarte, D., & Hilton, J. (2016). The Tidewater Z-Degree and the INTRO
model for sustaining OER adoption. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 24(0), 41.
https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.24.1828
38. Credits
Special thanks to all the people who made and released
these resources:
◉ Presentation template (Viola) by SlidesCarnival, licensed
CC BY 4.0
◉ Icons purchased with a subscription to The Noun
Project
Hinweis der Redaktion
Hodgkinson-Williams, C. 2014-06-25. Degrees of ease: adoption of OER, open textbooks and MOOCs in the Global South. Regional Symposium on Open Educational Resources (2nd : 2014 : Wawasan Open University, Malaysia). University of Cape Town.
From Cronin & MacLaren 2018:
“Hodgkinson-Williams (2014) elaborated further, disaggregating the social dimension of openness into two dimensions: cultural and pedagogical. The revised framework has five attributes of openness within a larger ‘Open Education’ cycle:
●Technical (interoperability and open formats; connectivity; technical skills & equipment; availability and discoverability of resources)
●Legal (open license parameters; open license knowledge and advice)
●Cultural (conceptions of knowledge as given or constructed; curricula)
●Pedagogical (student demographics and types of engagement; pedagogic, learning & assessment strategies; accreditation/certification)
●Financial (costs ranging from free to fees; sustainable business models)”
Jan 2006-July 2016 Consumer Price Index
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/consumerpriceindex.asp
“The Consumer Price Index (CPI) is a measure that examines the weighted average of prices of a basket of consumer goods and services, such as transportation, food, and medical care. It is calculated by taking price changes for each item in the predetermined basket of goods and averaging them. Changes in the CPI are used to assess price changes associated with the cost of living; the CPI is one of the most frequently used statistics for identifying periods of inflation or deflation.”
“The CPI measures the average change in prices over time that consumers pay for a basket of goods and services, commonly known as inflation.”
UBC: AMS Academic Experience Survey 2019 results :Over 2100 undergrads in sample reporting the following:
30% report spending $600 or more per year on textbooks; mean spend per year is $829
38% somewhat or strongly agree that they worry about how to pay for books & other course materials (down from
BC post-secondary from Jhangiani & Jhangiani 2017:
Spring 2015, Summer 2015, and Fall 2015 semesters. “The final sample consisted of 320 undergraduate students enrolled in 19 courses at 12 B.C. post- secondary institutions that had adopted an open textbook.”
54% Didn’t purchase a required textbook at least once in past 12 months
27% Took fewer courses b/c of cost of materials: rarely, sometimes, often or very often
26% Didn’t take a particular course b/c of cost of materials: rarely, sometimes, often or very often
“When asked about how the cost of textbooks had influenced their course enrolment and persistence, 27% of respondents indicated that they had taken fewer courses, 26% had not registered for a course, and 17% reported dropping or withdrawing from a course, all at least once.”
JIBC Law Enforcement Studies Diploma cohort from 2017 (Presentation at CNIE 2019; slides shared with me)
Qualitative Research - 2017/2018 & 2018/2019
Survey Link: 68 of 250 (30%) Students Responded
60% of respondents said it was difficult or somewhat difficult to afford textbooks
Approximately 60% worked between 11–30 hours per week and complete a full course load.
85% strongly agreed or agreed that they liked the choices offered by open textbooks to access materials in different formats.
When asked about how they redirected their cost-savings, students provided responses that fell into a few common themes:
Paying for tuition towards next semesters courses
Buying learning equipment like laptops
Paying for living expenses - rent
Transportation – gas and transit
Eliminate Financial and Emotional Stress
Replacing Car Accessories including Battery
…
Paying Debts (to eliminates financial stress)
Volunteering: Contributing to local communities
Fischer, L., Hilton III, J., Robinson, J., & Wiley, D. A. (2015). A multi-institutional study of the impact of open textbook adoption on the learning outcomes of post-secondary students—Springer. Journal of Computing in Higher Education, 27(3), 159–172. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12528-015-9101-x
“The initial data set consisted of 4128 students enrolled in undergraduate courses from the following 4-year colleges: Chadron State College, Mercy College, Peru, and Pittsburg State University. There were also 12,599 students enrolled in the following community colleges: Middlesex Community College, Middle Valley Community College, Onondaga Community College, Santa Ana Community College, Salt Lake Community College, and Tompkins Cortland Community College. Courses included a wide range of content including mathematics, English, psychology, biology, chemistry, business, history, education and developmental courses. Only 15 courses included sections in which either OER (treatment) or commercial textbooks (control) were used. … The initial sample included 4909 students in the treatment condition with 11,818 in the control condition.”
“When comparing the groups within each course in terms of completion, the pattern across the 15 courses showed almost no significant differences. In two courses, Business 110 and Biology 111, students in the treatment condition showed a significantly higher rate of completion than students in the control condition. In the case of Business 110, the differences in withdrawal rates were quite clear; 21 % of students in the commercial textbook condition withdrew from the course while only 6 % of students in the OER condition withdrew from the course”
“he differences in enrollment intensity between the control and treatment groups are likely a function of affordability. Students whose faculty assign OER save a significant amount of money compared to students whose faculty assign commercial textbooks. Some treatment students will chose to reinvest these savings by taking an additional course in order to accelerate their graduation. Consequently, we would expect members of the treatment group to take more credits than the control group, on average.”
“Even when controlling for differences in previous enrollment, students in courses using OER enrolled in a significantly higher number of credits in the next semester. This may be due to the cost savings associated with OER. In community college settings where tuition costs are based directly on the number of credits taken with no cap on costs for “full-time” enrollment, funds saved on textbooks can be applied directly to enrollment in additional courses.”
Wiley, D., Williams, L., DeMarte, D., & Hilton, J. (2016). The Tidewater Z-Degree and the INTRO Model for Sustaining OER Adoption. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 24(0), 41. https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.24.1828
“If some percentage of students are registering for fewer courses (in which case the institution collects no tuition) or dropping courses (in which case the institution refunds tuition) because of textbook costs, then eliminating textbook costs by adopting OER might encourage students to enroll in more courses and/or drop fewer courses.”
Tidewater Community College Z-degree: associate of science degree in business administration
Drop rate for courses in Z-degree in 2013, 2014: 2.8%
Drop rate for sections of same courses not in Z degree & using commercial resources: 3.6%
143 respondents who took PHYS 100 in Fall 2015 or Spring 2016
2016-2017 survey results (226 respondents)
very or somewhat important:
●No cost: 91%
●Access anywhere w/internet connection: 89%
●Customized: 88%
●Didn’t have to carry heavy textbook: 81%
Woodward: From 2014 interview in Campus Technology
Open pedagogy, as defined by David Wiley, focuses primarily on the relationship between the open licensing of content and the additional options students and instructors then have to remix that content as part of the work of the course. He stresses the move away from "disposable assignments." That is undoubtedly important and powerful.
Still, a broader consideration may be useful. Looking at open pedagogy as a general philosophy of openness (and connection) in all elements of the pedagogical process, while messy, provides some interesting possibilities. Open is a purposeful path towards connection and community. Open pedagogy could be considered as a blend of strategies, technologies, and networked communities that make the process and products of education more transparent, understandable, and available to all the people involved.
At VCU, we attempted to create a truly open pedagogical experience with the #thoughtvectors cMOOC. It can serve to illustrate some key elements of open pedagogy: open planning, open products, and open post hoc (reflections after the fact).
Open planning. Prior to the start of a course built on open pedagogy there is a focus on collaboration regarding what the course might be — the content, the lessons, the tools of construction, and the teaching strategies are all part of a larger conversation. You can see what other instructors have done — their resources, their lessons, or their reflections on what happened during their course. You can use what they or their students have made. You can engage those students and instructors directly. This is a complete reversal from what is normally a very isolated and opaque process.
Open products. There are a couple of pieces that happen in the process of the course (and beyond, if things work well) that engage with the concept of open in a few ways.
The course itself happens in the open. Students are publishing for an audience greater than their instructor. That matters. Their work, being open, has the potential to be used for something larger than the course itself and to be part of a larger global conversation…
Another element of openness that is inherently valuable but often overlooked is creating assignments that are open enough to engage students. There is value in allowing for students to shape and construct the products that show evidence of their learning. In #thoughtvectors, assignment options were flexible and focused on student choice within certain parameters. These assignments weren't oriented around word counts, or formats, or following precise directions; instead they focused on higher-level outcomes. …
#thoughtvectors also focused on explaining to the students the pedagogical choices being made — why we're doing what we do. This also hints at another element of open construction, which is the ongoing shaping and refining of the course in progress. Courses need to evolve and change with the participants. The students should understand what is happening and why. The more students can understand and participate in the construction of the course, the better. This isn't something done to the students but something done with them.
Open post hoc. After the course, reflecting and documenting how the course went is valuable both to the instructor and to those who might be considering similar courses or pedagogical strategies. People are happy enough to present and document success but it's still not common practice to reflect on elements that don't work well…
Beetham et al (2012)
Open scholarship includes open access publication, open science and open research
Open pedagogy having to do specifically with teaching practices with students
Link to info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wiki_Ed/UBC/ENG470D-003_Canadian_Studies_(2017)
400 level English course at UBC, Canadian Studies: Kathryn Grafton, instructor.
CanLit Edit-a-thon (43 students plus instructor), 2017.
“This CanLit Edit-a-thon assignment asks you to address the exigence of equitable representation in Wikipedia by contributing new or expanding existing articles about Canadian literature. … As a group, choose a topic relevant to our focus on Canadian literature (e.g., an author, text, or institution) that you argue is currently underrepresented in and symptomatic of systemic bias on Wikipedia.”
Links:
Antologia Abierta de Literatura Hispana: https://press.rebus.community/aalh/
Environmental Science Bites: https://ohiostate.pressbooks.pub/sciencebites/
Fundamentals of Injury Biomechanics: https://wiki.ubc.ca/Fundamentals_of_Injury_Biomechanics
A guide to making open textbooks with students: https://press.rebus.community/makingopentextbookswithstudents/
The following is from Rebus’ Guide to Making Open Textbooks with Students:
Dr. Julie Ward, an assistant professor of twentieth- and twenty-first-century Latin American literature at University of Oklahoma…. In the fall 2016 semester, she embarked on a project in her Spanish-language literature course, Introduction to Hispanic Literature and Culture, in which groups of four to five students selected ten texts from the fifteenth century to the twentieth century to include in a critical edition.
Ward and a graduate student “research guide” had pre-established lists of texts students could review and choose from.
For each work, the student groups compiled context in the form of an introduction, at least ten annotations on the text about style, references and colloquialisms, an image and a biography about the author… and a bibliography.
The content of the critical edition was developed in the class, but the work on the text didn’t end there. In the subsequent semester, two students were paid to take the critical edition, verify the facts and public domain licenses, and format it using Pressbooks.
Environmental Science Bites
From Letter to Readers:
“This book was written by undergraduate students at The Ohio State University (OSU) who were enrolled in the class Introduction to Environmental Science. The chapters describe some of Earth’s major environmental challenges and discuss ways that humans are using cutting-edge science and engineering to provide sustainable solutions to these problems. Topics are as diverse as the students, who represent virtually every department, school and college at OSU. The environmental issue that is described in each chapter is particularly important to the author, who hopes that their story will serve as inspiration to protect Earth for all life.”
Fundamentals of Injury Biomechanics (4th/5th year class)
All students work in groups of 3-4 to create a literature review on a selected topic & do a presentation. This work will go into the textbook (though students can choose another option if they don’t want their work published). Grad students also write main topic section of textbook.
KPU United Nations Sustainable Development Goals Open Pedagogy Fellowship: https://www.kpu.ca/open/un-sdg-fellowship
KPU & Montgomery College in Montgomery County, Maryland (U.S.A.)
“This fellowship is designed to assist faculty with creating renewable assignments (all of which will carry a Creative Commons license) to help students become agents of change in their own communities. Each fellowship team (which will include at least one faculty member from KPU and one faculty member from MC) will design three renewable assignments during the Summer semester. A minimum of two renewable assignments will be deployed in the classes of each fellowship team during the subsequent academic year.
It is anticipated that 2 applications will be selected per year for the UN SDG Open Pedagogy Fellowship, which includes training and support from the Office of Open Education along with a grant of CDN$1000 that may be used to hire one or more student assistants.”
Example: Kathy Dunster (Urban Ecosystems), Michelle Franklin (Sustainable Horticulture), & Zev Cossin (Anthropology, Montgomery College): https://www.kpu.ca/sites/default/files/Teaching%20and%20Learning/Assignment%201_%20Mapping%20Food%20Access%20in%20Our%20Neighbourhoods%20.pdf
Map: For this assignment you will be mapping food access around your campus in order to explore local food security or insecurity. You will inventory all food sources within the municipal boundaries of the community in which your campus is located. This includes, but is not limited to grocery stores, restaurants, convenience stores, and free food sources such as food banks, places of worship, and community gardens and kitchens. You will locate them on a Google Map that is shareable with your classmates.
Discuss:After the map is compiled you and your classmates will discuss and determine whether (and why) your campus is located in a food desert, food mirage, or food swamp from the perspective/reality of being a post-secondary student that is affected by access (or lack of) to healthy food. We will compare the maps produced by students at both KPU and MC to discover similarities, differences, challenges, and creative opportunities. How might others in your community have differential access to these food sources? What might some of the social/health effects be of them?
Create: After individually reflecting and then collectively discussing what we have learned, the class will look for practical solutions to the food problems surrounding the campus. The final task in this Assignment is to create a document that can be distributed in and around the community to help others seeking affordable and nutritional sources of food.
Links:
Ds106 assignment bank: http://assignments.ds106.us/
Jhangiani Social Psychology course: https://thatpsychprof.com/why-have-students-answer-questions-when-they-can-write-them/
Student video tutorials explained: http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/3022/4222
DeRosa First Year Seminar: http://robinderosa.net/higher-ed/extreme-makeover-pedagogy-edition/
From above article on student video tutorials:
“… at certain points in the course where students have struggled in the past, all students are given the opportunity to raise their grade if they create a tutorial video for a particular assignment. These tutorial videos are evaluated and a few of these are selected to be placed into the course.
“Finally, after demonstrating high levels of mastery, strong students are offered the opportunity to be a teaching assistant for the upcoming semester. These students create notes for each unit, study guides for exams, tutorial videos, and review presentations and games that are all added to the course and released as OER.”
From Jhangiani’s blog post:
The students were asked to write 4 questions each week, 2 factual (e.g., a definition or evidence-based prediction) and 2 applied (e.g., scenario-type).
For the first two weeks they wrote just one plausible distractor (I provided the question stem, the correct answer, and 2 plausible distractors). They also peer reviewed questions written by 3 of their (randomly assigned) peers.
For the next two weeks they wrote two plausible distractors; For the next two weeks they wrote all 3 plausible distractors; For the remainder of the semester they wrote the stem, the correct answer, and all the distractors.
From DeRosa:
“In OpenSem, I decided to let students design the grading process. It took a couple of weeks (while we simultaneously did other things as well) to hammer it out. Basically, they designed a competency-based model where they would have unlimited time within the confines of the course to improve each assignment if it initially they did not “achieve the competency.” Achieving the competency would require them to meet all of the parameters of the rubrics, which were often designed by the students as they crafted the assignments.”
DeRosa & Jhangiani, “Open Pedagogy”: http://openpedagogy.org/open-pedagogy/
“we might think about Open Pedagogy as an access-oriented commitment to learner-driven education AND as a process of designing architectures and using tools for learning that enable students to shape the public knowledge commons of which they are a part.”
Jesse Stommel: https://www.slideshare.net/jessestommel/open-pedagogy-building-compassionate-spaces-for-online-learning
”Open pedagogy creates a perforated community—a networked group of learners tat extends beyond the bounds of those officially enrolled in a term-based class. And hopefully a community that outlives the course that gave birth to it.”