Jump to a specific section on this page   What new benefit models are emerging? What kind of OERs do we see being adopted and used, and how? How can OERs be integrated sustainably into curriculum processes? In what ways are curriculum processes  challenged and contested through the use of OERs? How does the use of OERs impact on student engagement?   What impacts were experienced at the cascade/partner institutions?

 

What new benefit models are emerging?

This question was not in the original Phase 2 synthesis framework due to extensive coverage of benefit models in the pilot phase, but some new evidence did emerge from the Cascade strand

 

An OERCafe presentation listed six components of a business model for OERs:

- Gaining efficiencies through economies of scale, that is re-using content multiple times in similar contexts

- Gaining efficiencies by exploiting economies of scope, that is re-purposing content to extend the range of courses offered more easily

- Differentiating a college’s offerings from those of actual and potential competitors

- Leveraging content assets more effectively

- Exploiting “stars”

- Viral marketings

 

C-SAP asked rhetorically: 'is [the motivation] institutional visibility, pedagogical innovation or knowledge networking?' but the Ripple project was comfortable to see OERs being adopted at partner institutions for a variety of reasons:

1. Pedagogic innovation

 2. The marketing of courses to new audiences, particularly for online distance learning

3. Improving access to resources for outreach programmes,

4. Open scholarship through adoption of Creative Commons licensing of teaching materials

5. Development of graduate attributes for employability when students are themselves engaged in the creation of open educational content. (Ripple final report)

 

The 'institutional marketing' model seems, on the evidence of these few projects, to be making headway. Oxford University, for example, is seeing reputational gains not only from releasing quality content to potential students, but from doing this on such a scale that it is being identified as an 'exemplary' institution in the openness movement. However, benefits to staff are becoming harder to quantify as time and resource for innovation are squeezed. The ADM project noted two potential benefits, though they seem inherently contradictory:

- achieving recognition for their valuable learning and teaching content;

- embracing education as a shared enterprise 'when no-one is concerned with taking credit'.

Implicitly there is also benefit in challenging existing modes of learning and teaching, and the traditional role of the teacher as 'gatekeeper and transmitter of knowledge', though again the project recognises that this is seen by equally many as a disincentive.

 

Finally C-SAP uncovered an interesting example of the benefits OER can confer on threatened subject matter: 'sharing is essential to sustain teaching in social sciences through the medium of Welsh'.

 

What this demonstrates is that: 'no single business case would cover all types of OERs deriving from all contexts. In particular models developed in an HE context may not be immediately applicable, relevant or persuasive within an HE in FE context. By extension, it may be the case that the business models for OER development and use may be different in other sectors, for example the NHS, professional bodies, learned societies etc.' (OER Cafe) 

 

What kind of OERs do we see being adopted and used, and how?

All five projects had substantial findings in this area, from focus groups, surveys of staff and (in some cases) engagement with students.These indicative findings should be cross-referenced with the more detailed research study from the TALL team at Oxford University.

 

From the OSTRICH project there is evidence of OERs from entire units of study down to small granular elements being reused.

There is an unspoken assumption that OERs will be content- rather than process-based and will have the potential to support independent study, for example because they provide some contextualising explanation, embedded feedback, or other means of making them interactive. One Education academic at Derby withdrew from releasing materials because she decided they were only suitable for use in a directed study context. Several project reports highlighted that text-based materials are not always the most valuable to users, though they can be an achievable first step to OER release. Media-rich OERs which lend themselves to re-use include powerpoint presentations with voice-overs and other 'captured' lectures, simulations, video and well-contextualised graphical materials. A C-SAP study which asked academics to reflect on what makes OERs reusable found that pedagogic features were highlighted over technical, though one respondent felt that 'for OER to be proper OER (and really stressing the Open word) it needs to be provided in open formats and using open platforms'.

 

An internal evaluation at the University of Derby for the OSTRICH project surveyed 124 staff and students. The 'ideal' OER was described as having minimal text, video and interactivity. The capacity to break up an OER into elements for re-use was important. Participants also wanted OERs in alternative media formats e.g. podcast with script, text with voice-over.

 

Though release projects in the pilot phase of UK OER were required to put in place means of tracking use, and although Coventry University (hosting the OERCaFE project) has impressive data on downloads for its own iTunesU content, data on the reuse of OERs remains generally scarce. The ADM focus groups highlighted several uses that they were aware of: 'for open educational practice; facilitating learning and enhancing the student experience, enhancing teaching through the cross-departmental and institutional sharing of ideas and practices, maintaining contact with alumni and promotion and marketing of courses.' However, the C-SAP final report noted that we still have much to learn about what materials are in practice reused and whether they have the desired impact. The project did contribute considerably to our understanding of academic re-use, through a study which found tensions between teachers' espoused values around online content - typically quality and provenance - and their observed search practices. Most used non-academic sites and searches (google, wikipedia, amazon, youtube etc) and ignored the boundaries between academic and non-academic content in considering re-use, showing confidence in their own judgement of what was suitable for students. (It is possible that this finding was influenced by the subject specialisms of the participants, as C-SAP subjects often make legitimate academic uses of social data and content.) The real criteria for judging OERs appeared to be 'useability, relevance and transparency' i.e. the availability of transparent re-use indicators and user comments, as on Amazon or TripAdviser. 

 

A C-SAP presentation, based on the same study, lists features of open content that are relevant to re-use:

- Trust – people prefer inhouse or resources from known universities or publishers

- Own data sets preferred

- Licensing not seen as an issue within academic institutions

- Disciplinary origin of resources less important than examples which connect with students

- Google considered more useful for finding resources

 

A survey carried out by the ADM project confirmed the blurring of boundaries between academic and non-academic sites/searches in the discovery and use of OERs. Tools used by academics included:

- blogs and wikis (to encourage student participation)

- Twitter and email (to notify students of content available online)

- named services providing access to online video tutorials (Lynda.com, TED) and other online content (YouTube, Spotify, UbuWeb, MIT website, Creative Choices website)

- the search engine, Google.

 

OERCafe concluded that 'teachers use the tools that they like using. Ease of use is important and use of external tools can avoid internal technical / reliability issues....You tube is very reliable avoids links that don‟t work on local servers.  

C-SAP called for tools such as Zotero to be used to discover and collate OERs, and suggested re-use would be supported by the integration of Jorum with library catalogues.

 

How can OERs be integrated sustainably into curriculum processes?

As evidenced in the previous section, many academics routinely search for online content - whether openly licensed or not - to support curriculum delivery. The evidence from the two subject-based projects is that this use tends to be non-compulsory i.e.  students are offered links to content in support of required learning activities. Projects variously recommended enhancing general awareness of OER among academic staff, developing more useable tools for distinguishing open content from content with more restricted uses, and enhancing the digital literacy of staff and student users, to enhance these practices.

 

Several projects also made recommendations concerning the use of OERs in curriculum design i.e. to inform the overall design of a programme of study, or to be embedded fully in the learning activities. A C-SAP conference paper integrating OERs within curriculum design along with presentations on OER integration into teaching and learning, pedagogical challenges of OER use in teaching and learning, and using OERs in research methods teaching, present the case for an embedded approach. The project team argue that a wholesale rethinking is required to address 'the pedagogical principles of “design for openness” and how OERs are situated in curriculum design'. Three different ideas of 'the curriculum' emerged from the project's partners, with different implications for the use of OERs: formally or informally, in compulsory or optional activities, via a semi-open shared platform or 'out in the wild', etc.
First the curriculum as a “process” for engaging staff (Blackburn College). Secondly, the curriculum as an “object” or commodity to be consumed (Teesside University) by distance learners and thirdly the “translated curriculum” (Welsh Medium resources) responding to the needs of a disparate and dispersed constituency of learners.

Across all of these approaches to design, the project considered that embedding of OERs was a scholarly process, which once again raised considerations of academic reward and progression. The QAA should take an interest in OER now that higher volumes of scholarly material are available to course design teams. Similarly: 

'to be successful the information and digital literacy skills required by students to find and utilise OERs need to be addressed.'

 

The OSTRICH workflows also support the process of embedding OERs into curriculum design.

'many elements of OER (e.g. quality assurance, permissions to use third party materials, accessibility, appropriate file formats, logical structure, clear learning outcomes) can be mirrored within an effective learning design process. The DORRE model was developed to explore how these elements can be supported ... within a learning design framework' 

The project final report argues for JISC to fund projects that combine the lessons of the Curriculum Design and OER programmes: 'the focus would be on embedding and sustaining an OER culture through curriculum design and delivery'.

 

In what ways are curriculum processes  challenged and contested through the use of OERs?

How does the use of OERs impact on student engagement?  

student autonomy? student grasp of the subject? Models of teaching/learning?

The potential for OERs to change curriculum processes and associated models of learning and teaching can be implied from the evidence reported in the previous sections. This potential lies around changing attitudes to content, away from viewing content as constitutive of the curriculum and towards viewing it as an artefact of the learning, research and knowledge-sharing process which can be re-inscribed into new learning situations as and when appropriate. The OSTRICH project has evidence of staff attitudes towards 'their' content changing as they engage in the process of release, and a C-SAP participant wrote that:

 When we are thinking about what works best as an OER, we are invariably asking questions about our discipline and how we think about teaching and learning.

 

The two subject-based projects devoted time to developing a shared understanding within the subject community of what an 'open pedagogy' would look like and how it might be supported by open educational resources. The C-SAP project, in a posting on project methodology, presented an outline 'Pedagogical framework for OERs' in which the following aspects are considered:
closed - open
private - public
embedded - free
dependent - independent
prejeudiced - neutral
contextualised - decontextualised
messy / dirty - clean
crude - refined

 

The same two projects were both able to undertake some work with students, though of limited scope. The ADM final report concludes that 'students, who in many cases are informally creating and sharing learning materials, should be actively involved in the development of open educational practise, including the creation of resources where learning and sharing are aligned.

C-SAP focused directly on the issue of student engagement, studying cohorts of undergraduate, postgraduate and distance learners using OERs. The project found three approaches:

- The 'content approach' whereby existing open content (in this case an OpenLearn SPSS research methods OER) was repackaged and built into learning activities with specific learning outcomes. This offered the least radical change to established curriculum practice, but 'in spite of the success of this approach to student engagement, staff reported that some students objected to the use of external content by “lazy lecturers”. Also content not rigidly grounded in learning outcomes/assessment attracted little student interest.

- The 'connoisseur approach' whereby students review and give feedback on OERs for learning. This 'tends to treat students as consumers or at best commentators' on the learning process.

- The 'creative empowerment approach', whereby students were encouraged to develop their own open content to be critiqued by their peers.

The project found that in the limited samples available to them, student engagement was low in all three approaches.

Virtually all members of the [student] group had not really interacted with the materials in any way whatsoever. So, I asked them why this was the case, and the various (though quite standard) responses related to the ‘context’ (or perceived rationale) to actually embark upon such activities. The group (even the few students who had made at least some attempt to access the OERs) identified as part of their feedback, that, as undergraduates, their preference is to focus upon specific and directed research, self-directed activities that can ‘clearly’ (and positively) influence the grades attained in assignments (and exams). (C-SAP final report)

They argue, however, that the focus should be moving away from the 'optional extra content approach' and towards more creative and transformational forms of engagement: 

Viewing OERs as supplemental means that issues around assessment, accreditation or embedding OERs within the core curriculum fail to be adequately addressed. Both students and academics might be missing out on a chance to enhance their digital literacy skills and engage with more innovative teaching and learning practices. Certain assumptions about using online resources remain unchallenged. (C-SAP final report)

 

What impacts were experienced at the cascade/partner institutions?

This question encapsulates the impact of the strand as a whole. A more detailed account of impact generated by each of the projects has been recorded, along with a summary of outputs and deliverables. This is a summary of the impacts evidenced.

• Raised awareness, principally among academic staff, but also taking in other stakeholders such as students, professional service staff and academic managers
• Enhanced policies and documentation for dealing with IPR i.e. copyright clearance and open licensing
  
• Enhanced workflows and other processes for developing learning materials, particularly for open release
• Technical developments including a new repository, repository tools, and development tools
• OERs released
• OERs embedded into curricula (to a limited extent)
• Ongoing discussions about open content, open educational practices, and how these impact on the curriculum