Motivations to deposit: Two approaches to Open Educational Resources (OERs) within Languages and Social Sciences

Sarah Hayes

Shared resources, unshared language?

C-SAP Conference, London8 July 2010

Our paper, presented at EUNIS2010 in Warsaw in June 2010, examines language in use about OER, with insights from C-SAP, Humbox and JISC

Hayes, S, Lowe, P, Marsh, D & Gruszczynska, A (2010)“Motivations to deposit: Two approaches to Open Educational Resources (OER) within Languages and Social Sciences (LSS) at Aston University

School of Languages and Social Sciences

Participation in 2 Open Educational Resources (OER) Projects run by our 2 Higher Education Academy Subject Centres & funded by JISC:-

C-SAP Evaluating the Practice of Opening up Resources for Learning and Teaching in the Social Sciences Participation co-ordinated by Pam Lowe

LLAS Humbox (Languages) Participation co-ordinated by Sarah Hayes

..an inspiring collectionof free Humanitiesteaching resources

www.humbox.ac.uk

Introducing....

Why use HumBox?

• Showcase your learning resources to the world

• to colleagues and potential students

• People can put a face to the learning resource

• You can disseminate your research too - as part of your profile

Why use HumBox?

• Diversify your teaching• Receive feedback from

others on how they use your resources – a peer review and comments facility enables this

• For project partners the HumBox has provided a ‘focal point’ for building an OER broadly subject-based community

But, there are nowmany OERs to choose from in many different places ‘You don’t need to reinvent the wheel’ – if someone else has already developed a learning resource similar to what you need, then you can download and adapt it.

This sounds easy – but is it?

What if ‘re-inventing the wheel’ is an important, necessary part of teaching?

• In Social Sciences students question/add to knowledge• The C-SAP Project evaluated the process of re-purposing• What does this mean for teachers in Social Sciences?• They developed a toolkit to 'map' out a module into an

enhanced open framework• Released their teaching materials to ‘Jorum Open’ • Conducted a literature review. Read more on C-SAP at

http://www.csap.bham.ac.uk/oer/index.html

HumBox and C-SAP took different approaches Does OER mean different things to subject groups, institutions, funding bodies, individuals?

Our paper asked:-Q: Are we sharing resources, but not

sharing the language we use to discuss these?

Examined discourse from C-SAP, HumBox, JISC to ask: What are different ‘voices’ saying?

Where are there common themes?

Antconc : free concordancing softwarehttp://www.antlab.sci.waseda.ac.jp/antconc_index.html

Antconc is free, easy to use and can quickly provide data on where there is emphasis within discourse. This can aid discourse analysis when identifying themes to discuss

Comparing word counts - What language is shared by all?

……..In short – not all that much!C-SAP: materials, teaching, learning…….HumBox: HumBox, resources, meeting…….JISC: JISC, Project(s), JISC OER Call……..

“I think that teaching materials are always embedded in contexts, users need to read them critically to identify pedagogic assumptions”

“takes the class into areas not necessarily scripted in the teaching materials but this direction is tacitly assumed”

Re-use needs tacit understanding of the context in which we teach

1. C-SAP (Centre for Sociology Anthropology & Politics)

2. HUMBOX (LLAS – Languages, Linguistics & Area Studies)

“to introduce the dissemination of teaching materials in School or Faculty’s strategy maps?”

“the potential Humbox has in relation to both teaching and research and the building of a personal profile”

“the big advantage of the Humbox is that it caters for every member of the teaching and learning community.”

Dissemination, profile, inclusive community

3. JISC (Joint Information Systems Committee)

“helping universities to share educational materials freely online”

“so that universities are able to continue sharing materials at a similar pace beyond the funding period”

“Sharing quality learning materials in this way can enhance a university’s reputation. A ‘shop window’ for the university’s work.”

“especially when material is being used as a marketing tool.”

Sharing as a ‘marketing tool’ for the university

OERs for constructing knowledge?

‘OER initiatives can draw strongly on institutional discourses that aim to raise profiles, leaving to a second plan the commitment to offering true possibilities for the knowledge construction’

Santos, A, McAndrew, P, & Godwin, S 2007 The Discourses of OERs: how flat is this world? From:-http://aisantos.files.wordpress.com/2007/11/the-discourses-of-oers-final-licensed.pdf

What form should OER take?What are we asking people to do with their teaching materials – do students benefit?“Academic staff can reuse and repurpose materials rather than needing to develop them from scratch. This frees up time to work on aspects of their work where they can truly add value, such as furthering their research and effectively tutoring their students.” (JISC)

Is OER recycling or re-inventing?

”How a module is taught doesn’t just depend on the availability of appropriate and useful materials. It depends on the dynamism of the teacher, the rapport with the class, the adjustments that need to be made depending on the different needs in different years.” (C-SAP)

Recycling requires human effort as well as the materials

‘You may need to reinvent the wheel’

Should we change the metaphor?

Or how we use it about OER……

Our understandings of ‘openness’

`'open' and 'openness' is new! ...There's a lot to be thought, discussed and clarified regarding 'openness' and what it means to be 'open', particularly when the ideological bases of education are buried under business 'realities' as they seem to be more and more...

http://cloudworks.ac.uk/cloud/view/3826(Cloudworks discussion on Open Educational Practices)

In summary: discussion invited• OER discourse from the informal discussions to the

formal report can be revealing. • Marketing rhetoric does not mirror educational reality• But ‘openness’ could offer possibilities• What are the personal critical goals for academics, for

funding bodies and the benefits for students from OERs? • We can examine the social, cultural and political

environment around ‘OER’ as an ‘interpretive resource’ (Mautner, 2005) to aid sustainability

• We can ask what motivates tutors from ‘language in use’ and ensuring all ‘voices’ in the rhetoric are heard.

• Visit HumBox and set up your own account• It is now completely open to all

•Create your own profile•Find a useful resource and help yourself – lots there•Give some feedback to the creator on how you use it

• Have a look here at partner videos discussing Humbox

www.humbox.ac.uk How do I get involved in OER?

• Visit C-SAP and read about the project to map modules into an enhanced open framework

•Try the online demo of the Toolkit

http://www.csap.bham.ac.uk/oer