Finding, Creating and Sharing OER for language teaching and learning

Finding, Creating and Sharing Open Educational Resources for

Language Teaching and Learning.

Tita Beaven & Anna Comas-Quinn,Department of Languages, The Open University, UK

Chris Brown & Evan Rubin, Language Acquisition Resource Centre, San Diego

CALICO 2012, University of Notre Dame, Indiana

Outline of the session

• Introduction: OER & OEP• Finding OER• Creating OER: licenses & images• Reuse, feedback and quality• An introduction to LORO• Discussion: sharing content, sharing

learning designs

Introduction: OER and OEP

The Open Educational Resources Movement

• Inspired by the Open Source software movement

• 2001-2 MIT starts its OpenCourseWare initiative

• 2002 Term OER coined by UNESCO• 2006 OpenLearn - The Open University• and many others

“…the world’s knowledge is a public good…”Smith & Casserly, 2006

http://www.briansolis.com/2008/08/introducing-conversation-prism/

What are OER?• Open Educational Resources• Digital Resources (big and little OER)• Openly available for reuse and repurposing• Creator indicates that they are for public use

and reuse through a Creative Commons license or similar

For more info on Creative Common licenses, see the video ‘Wanna work together’ on YouTube or at

http://creativecommons.org/licenses

Definitions• Open Educational Resources (OER) are “materials used to support education that may be freely accessed, reused, modified and shared by anyone” (Downes, 2011).

• Open Educational Practices (OEP) “support the production, use and reuse of high quality OER through institutional policies, which promote innovative pedagogical models, and respect and empower learners as co-producers on their lifelong learning path.” (ICDE, 2011).

Finding OER

Finding OER

• Merlot http://www.merlot.org• NDLR http://ndlr.ie/ • Xpert http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/xpert/ • Humbox www.humbox.ac.uk • Language Box www.languagebox.ac.uk • LORO http://loro.open.ac.uk • Openlearn http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/ • Foreign Language Resource Centers

http://nflrc.msu.edu • LARC http://larc.sdsu.edu/resources/

Creating OER

You need to think about…

• Usefulness and discoverability of your material

• Copyright (images in particular)• Attribution and ownership• Licenses• Quality assurance & peer review

http://unow.nottingham.ac.uk/resources/resource.aspx?hid=c1eaf7af-c8b8-afa9-6d47-0a7f60e7e8e3#

, from University of Nottingham is a great introduction

• To get over the copyright problem• Enable the 4Rs:

Reuse – make exact copies

Revise – make adaptations

Redistribute – share copies

Remix – combinations / mashups

(see http://creativecommons.org)

(see full information at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/)

More about IPR and licensing at http://www.web2rights.com/SCAIPRModule/rlo2.html

Finding reusable images

– Flickr Commons http://www.flickr.com/commons

– Wikimedia Commons http://commons.wikimedia.org

– Google Images> advanced search> usage rights > free to use or share, even commercially, etc.

– Xpert http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/xpert/

http://commons.wikimedia.org

http://www.flickr.com

Slides 14-21 created by Bea de los Arcos

Hands on: Google images

Reuse, feedback and quality

©2011 Anna Calvi

©2011 Anna Calvi

©2011 Bea de los Arcos

©2011 Bea de los Arcos

©2011 Bea de los Arcos

©2011 Bea de los Arcos

Sorting game from Chris Pegler, National Teaching Fellow, The Open Universityhttp://www.slideshare.net/orioleproject/chris-pegler-reusable-card-game

Looking at Quality (pink cards)

An introduction to LORO

Languages at The Open University

• English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Welsh & Chinese (beginners to advanced) to 7000+ language students

• Blended approach: independent study using mixed media and support inc. face-to-face, synchronous and asynchronous online teaching

• Course materials produced centrally, teaching support provided locally

• Course developers and course directors: 50+ academics plus support staff

• Teaching staff: 320+ part-time teachers

What was the problem?

• Storing and managing resources for teaching (servers, the VLE…)

• Finding out what others are doing

• Avoid reinventing the wheel…(30-40 teachers might be delivering the same course in parallel)

• Sharing resources produced by all colleagues

Languages Open Resources Onlinehttp://loro.open.ac.uk

LORO is about: • ...making all teaching materials for all levels

and languages available to all users,• …making OU tutorial materials available to the

wider languages community,• …allowing users to share their own materials

with the whole languages community, • …starting a change in the way we work (OER,

access, transparency, quality).

Languages Open Resources Online http://loro.open.ac.uk/

Perceived benefits

• Professional development (feedback from colleagues)

• Time saving • Student support • Authorship & showcasing your work

Survey of OU language teachers July 2009 (N = 129)

Perceived challenges

• Quality and usefulness of resources• System must work (search, browse, structure,

file formats)• Time consuming• Lack of remuneration• Reciprocity• Recognition and authorship

Survey of OU language teachers July 2009 (N = 129)

Teachers are using LORO…

• To find resources for their teaching“I often also check what other teachers have done to teach the same topic or a similar structure”

• To find inspiration and ideas“even if I don’t find anything I can use, it starts the

ideas flowing in my head”

• To standardise their practice and ensure comparability of the student experience

“to make sure the contents covered in my own tutorial are similar to those used by the rest of the course team and tutors”

Benefits of using LORO

• Increased confidence in one’s own practice“Seeing other work enables you to judge your own, and reassures you that you are doing the right thing”

• Freedom to develop other aspects of one’s teaching practice

“It gives us time and space to create some individual styles” “I can concentrate on how I will teach culture or how to teach through the asynchronous forum”

Benefits of using LORO• Value of feedback on one’s work

“gives me an opportunity to gain useful feedback on the work I do”

• … but there are constraints“peer comment should be extended, but the restraints of all our workloads make this a problem”

• Increase quality of teaching materials“sharing the resources I have created with colleagues stimulates me to write very good materials, test them and improve them so that they can be used by someone else. LORO really pushes me to produce better materials”

Sorting game from Chris Pegler, National Teaching Fellow, The Open Universityhttp://www.slideshare.net/orioleproject/chris-pegler-reusable-card-game

Looking at Motivation (blue cards)

Discussion

Finding OER

• Merlot http://www.merlot.org• NDLR http://ndlr.ie/ • Xpert http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/xpert/ • Humbox www.humbox.ac.uk • Language Box www.languagebox.ac.uk • LORO http://loro.open.ac.uk • Openlearn http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/ • Foreign Language Resource Centers

http://nflrc.msu.edu • LARC http://larc.sdsu.edu/resources/

Hands on

Go into a repository to browseSelect ONE resource that you find usefulTell us why you selected this particular

resource.

Think about the pedagogy behind your selected resource and about some of the aspects discussed earlier (discoverability, usability, adaptability, quality assurance through peer review,…).

Is content the teaching or just a part of it?

Tutorial: Using a search engineLearning Outcome: A clear understanding of the

role of the critical factors in the systemSummary: through preparing their own account

of using a search engine, to demonstrate the role of the critical factors, using the Library guidelines; presenting it to their group; defending it against questions and comments; and revising their account in the light of the tutor’s summary of the discussion

Tutorial: On a system or processLearning Outcome: A clear understanding of the

role of the critical factors in the systemSummary: through preparing their own account

of the system/process, to demonstrate the role of the critical factors, using the resources provided; presenting it to their group; defending it against questions and comments; and revising their animation in the light of the tutor’s summary of the discussion

Tutorial: The water cycleLearning Outcome: A clear understanding of the

role of the critical factors in the systemSummary: through preparing their own

animation of the water cycle, to demonstrate the role of the critical factors, using the OER cycle; presenting it to their group; defending it against questions and comments; and revising their animation in the light of the tutor’s summary of the discussion

Tutorial: The water cycleLearning Outcome: A clear understanding of the

role of the critical factors in the systemSummary: through preparing their own

animation of the water cycle, to demonstrate the role of the critical factors, using the OER cycle; presenting it to their group; defending it against questions and comments; and revising their animation in the light of the tutor’s summary of the discussion

OE Patterns libraryTutorial: Using a search engineLearning Outcome: A clear understanding of the

role of the critical factors in the systemSummary: through preparing their own account

of using a search engine, to demonstrate the role of the critical factors, using the Library guidelines; presenting it to their group; defending it against questions and comments; and revising their account in the light of the tutor’s summary of the discussion

Tutorial: On a system or processLearning Outcome: A clear understanding of the

role of the critical factors in the systemSummary: through preparing their own account

of the system/process, to demonstrate the role of the critical factors, using the resources provided; presenting it to their group; defending it against questions and comments; and revising their account in the light of the tutor’s summary of the discussion

Sharing pedagogical patterns

OER repository

By Diana Laurillard, at http://www.slideshare.net/alanwylie/the-critical-role-of-teachers-in-optimizing-technologies-for-open-learning

Sharing pedagogical patternsTutorial: On a system or processLearning Outcome: A clear understanding of the

role of the critical factors in the systemSummary: through preparing their own account

of the system/process, to demonstrate the role of the critical factors, using the resources provided; presenting it to their group; defending it against questions and comments; and collaborating to produce a better animation to post on their website

Tutorial: On a system or processLearning Outcome: A clear understanding of the

role of the critical factors in the systemSummary: through preparing their own account

of the system/process, to demonstrate the role of the critical factors, using the resources provided; presenting it to their group; defending it against questions and comments; and revising their account in the light of the tutor’s summary of the discussion

Tutorial: The water cycleLearning Outcome: A clear understanding of the

role of the critical factors in the systemSummary: through preparing their own

animation of the water cycle, to demonstrate the role of the critical factors, using the OER cycle; presenting it to their group; defending it against questions and comments; and revising their account in the light of the tutor’s summary of the discussion

Tutorial: The water cycleLearning Outcome: A clear understanding of the

role of the critical factors in the systemSummary: through preparing their own

animation of the water cycle, to demonstrate the role of the critical factors, using the OER cycle; presenting it to their group; defending it against questions and comments; and collaborating to produce a better animation to post on their websiteTutorial: The water cycle

Learning Outcome: A clear understanding of the role of the critical factors in the system

Summary: through preparing their own animation of the water cycle, to demonstrate the role of the critical factors, using the OER cycle; presenting it to their group; defending it against questions and comments; and collaborating to produce a better animation to post on their website

and collaborating to produce a better animation to post on their website

Tutorial: Using a search engineLearning Outcome: A clear understanding of the

role of the critical factors in the systemSummary: through preparing their own account

of using a search engine, to demonstrate the role of the critical factors, using the Library guidelines; presenting it to their group; defending it against questions and comments; and collaborating to produce a better account to post on their website

OER repository

By Diana Laurillard, at http://www.slideshare.net/alanwylie/the-critical-role-of-teachers-in-optimizing-technologies-for-open-learning

Online communities: types of users

• Passive• Active• Creators

• The 90-9-1 rule

• Web 2.0 turns us into ‘prosumers’

Jakob Nielsen (2006) “Participation Inequality: Encouraging More Users to Contribute”

Jakob Nielsen (2006) “Participation Inequality: Encouraging More Users to Contribute”

Contact [email protected]

Tita Beaven [email protected]

Anna Comas-Quinn [email protected]

©2012 Anna Comas-Quinn & Tita Beaven, CC BY-NC