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I posted a week ago, but it's not here.
Lisa, group 15

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How do students feel about participating in open resources - Jamie Murugan

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How do students feel about participating in open resources - Jamie Murugan

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Are students happy to be apart of open resources and have their questions and activities shared on the net. Or do they feel that this is an experience they paid for and should not be provided to other students without  a fee.

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Openness is the new Guru teacher posture - but wait it is also not all that new, is it?

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Openness is the new Guru teacher posture - but wait it is also not all that new, is it?

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I really liked the short talks by David White referring to the fact - and that comes up all the time during this topic, also in the great video input from Kay and Alastair - that being a teacher has changed from providing exclusive information to being a coach and supporter on the way to picking up skills and knowledge for the student.
And that, I am afraid has been like that, all along.

I would like to draw a comparison to the young university of Wittenberg, when Luther (1512) and Melanchthon (1518) were appointed professors and together revolutionized for one the christian religion but they also revolutionized teaching and information dissemination. And I am really not very much interested in the religious part of the story. But we have heard a lot about the analogy between the advent of bookprint and the digital revolution and I was struck by the following story last year when visiting Wittenberg.

Melanchthon was a very aggressive reformer of education, trying to open up education for women, poor people and to change the teaching language to the language of the people (German) to remove barriers to access information. The driver for his activities was for one his mindset that knowledge should be accessible for everyone interested and for two the advent of technology: bookprint. Luther and Melanchthon worked at a rather young university with a lot of very modern thinking people around them and they had access to some of the best printers in the world back then.

Luthers reformation would not have been as successful without the professional use of the technology that became available shortly before his academic and theological career took off. His bible was printed in 3000 copies within a few weeks after he had finished translating it.  The bible was now multipliable and could be distributed internationally without any problem. Unheard of until then. Just as another example: The famous picture of himself and the other one of his wife was copied often enough to allow for them to be presented in a majority of homes, changing the attitude towards priests being married for a huge number of people simultaneously.

Luther and Melanchthon turned into Gurus because of their openness. People did not necessarily need to travel to Wittenberg to understand their thinking and to further disseminate it. But of course still knowledge and information was restricted to those with access to books. Interestingly did professors make their living of students paying to follow their lectures in Wittenberg and there were people who warned them to not go that path of openness, because it would endanger their prosperity (sounds familiar?). Since Luther and Melanchthon had to turn down so many students anyhow they were not worried and they made money out of the sales of their books.

The digital revolution, in my mind the major leap in infiormation dissemination after bookprint, makes information accessible for everyone everywhere in principle. But it also makes it much easier to share information with everyone by anyone. This is the next level of distribution and access and it demands openness. Responsible openness. But "closedness" will for that very reason not be an option for most types of educational content.

I am deeply convinced that the digital revolution that we are all living in will have or has already had a very similar impact and I absolutely love the fact that I am amidst it.

But as in the 16th century there are many reasons to be aware of risks and abuse, but there is no reason to think that use of the new media and technology will be mainly harmful. It will not, if we take the responsibility to work with it. It may if we do not.

Ok, so, how open am I after giving this speech?
Very open in my mind, but not open at all in virtual educational life. I would share everything with everyone and I am very glad that I can start to learn here, how to do that in a responsible way, but I am not yet doing that, because  I am lacking the skills and I am lacking the organizational support to do that.

It needs to be responsible towards all others, but also towards myself. I want to make sure that the information that I distribute is valuable, correct and accessible without inequities. But I also need to make sure that I receive the deserved recognition and my university gets their return on investment. The closed-open slider metaphor will be helpful in that regard.

I have ways to go, but no way to stop or turn back.   Seems like a good starting point to be here!

Gregor-PBL3

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I love the idea of openness and sharing, but I am a busy lecturer, loaded with teaching, research and admin tasks. In case there is no institutional support in terms of working hours for such efforts, how (and when) I can find time to do this?
Judit Hahn

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Click below to see results

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Interact with your audience using real-time voting. No installations or downloads required - and it's free!

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Word cloud - What does openness mean to you?

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Word cloud - What does openness mean to you?

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Click below to see the results

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Interact with your audience using real-time voting. No installations or downloads required - and it's free!

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This post provides a brief summary of my reflections and insights after an asynchronous discussion with the ONL181 cohort about the concepts of open education and sharing openly online.

As some of you may know, I have been involved with ONL for several years, and have blogged about my experiences as participant, co-facilitator and now as presenter on different occasions. You can read these reflections here, here or here.

This year, I once again have the honour of presenting Topic 2 with Alastair Creelman, and tonight we are presenting a webinar discussing the issues and ideas that have been raised by the participants in response to the introductory tutorial, which you may view here.

Since I became involved with ONL almost three years ago, quite a lot has changed within the open educational space. Not only has technology developed and changed, as one might expect, but it has become increasingly evident that the idealistic, inspirational 'open web' first imagined when the internet was born has not eventuated. Instead of presenting a frontier of choice and freedom, the web of 2018 has become a space dominated by huge international companies who control interaction and access through complex algorithms that feed into company profit. Manipulation, misuse and misrepresentation of data, as well as socio-political strategies employed by business and government to profit, polarize and promote have created an environment where doubt, fear and confusion reign.

The Internet and Privacy flickr photo by topgold shared under a Creative Commons (BY) license

In addition, governments are implementing privacy legislation and copyright amendments aiming to protect personal and business interests from exploitation online. These changes, perhaps made with best intentions, can also have unexpected or undesirable ramifications, as individual freedoms and many of the positive aspects of social technologies may be limited as a by-product. There is little wonder that some of the participants of ONL in 2018 are questioning whether open education is really worth pursuing in the face of such challenges.

The theme running through the asynchronous discussion which has been ongoing this week as we prepare for this webinar has been dominated by this question of value, in a variety of forms. This is not surprising and completely understandable. This is a time of tremendous change and upheaval, and the concepts involved with open education are neither straightforward nor easily answered. For those of you who are keen to delve more deeply into the area, I would encourage you to follow the work of Martin Weller, Catherine Cronin, Maha Bali, Mia Zamora and Chrissi Nerantzi. For my brief response to the themes that have been raised during this year's ONL topic 2, please read on!

Despite the changing context of open education, I continue to believe that how we approach it revolves around two elements - how we understand the role of the educator and how we apply the flexibility of openness.

The role of the educator

Every educator has their own, individual way of understanding what it means to teach others. My understanding of my role as an educator is characterised by the lighting of a flame.

As an educator, our role is to create and co-create knowledge and the environment for knowledge and learning to flourish. When we share what we know with others, and encourage others to share, what is known is not diminished - it grows exponentially.

I make this statement confidently, and believe that it is more important now, in 2018, than ever before. The context I described in my introduction - one of doubt, fear and confusion - is not only where educators exist; it is also the world of our students. As Catherine Cronin says:

In our increasingly open, networked, participatory culture of surveillance and distraction, all citizens require critical digital literacies, network literacies, and data literacies - as well as civic and educational institutions that work to ensure safety, fairness, and equity.

As open education is based upon the concepts of accessibility, sharing, transparency and interoperability, educators who model, scaffold and adopt open educational practices are leading their students to become responsible and well informed citizens and professionals regardless of discipline.

Of course, what is easy to say in theory is not always so easy to do in practice. This leads me to my second point:

The flexibility of openness

I see openness in education on a sliding scale. I do not suggest that it is a situation where we must choose to be either fully open, or fully closed in our attitudes and practice. There are times when privacy must be ensured, when access must be limited and when students and educators must feel confident and safe to practice without the eyes of the world watching. We must continue to ensure the safety and comfort of students and teachers. At the other end of the spectrum, open practice can lead to improved transparency and accountability, as well as greater efficiency through sharing limited resources and avoiding repetition and duplication.

Somewhere in the middle is where most of the action happens, and the position on the sliding scale may change depending upon the context, the students' or educators' needs, the content or information being used or any number of other influencers. This is the flexibility of openness.

There are many ways to introduce openness into education without drastically changing your entire practice. The Open Pedagogy Notebook is a wonderful source of inspiration for teaching ideas, however, if you have never considered openness previously, perhaps a first step may be just to explore a repository of Open Educational Resources (OERs) such as one of the many listed on this Padlet below:

Another great point to begin your open journey might be to become familiar with your country's Creative Commons organisation, and to learn more about how Creative Commons Licences allow for sharing content while retaining particular rights of the creator. Understanding what these symbols mean can make it easier to identify and use openly shared resources appropriately, and introducing these concepts into your teaching helps students to navigate the world of copyright more effectively.

Small steps are all that is needed to make great progress. The world of open education is one of constantly shifting sands, and while it is possible to become deeply involved (and I would encourage you to if you feel drawn to this area!), simply becoming aware of what open education is, and introducing small changes where possible can move us all closer to the shared ideals of accessibility, transparency, sharing and interoperability.

CatherineCronin.OER16 flickr photo by Beck Pitt shared under a Creative Commons (BY) license

The world of open education is a huge one, that is constantly changing. Open education is important - to promote the social justice principles of equity and access and to leverage technologies to innovate and create. Openness can be a mindset, a practice and a policy - and each of us have the potential to contribute in at least one, if not more of these areas to further education and the global learning community.

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This post provides a brief summary of my reflections and insights after an asynchronous discussion with the ONL181 cohort about the concepts of open education and sharing openly online. As some of you may know, I have been involved with ONL for several years, and have blogged about my experiences as participant, co-facilitator and now as presenter on different occasions.

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I can definitely relate and do some reflections with regards to this topic. While I feel that I'm often reluctant and fearful of sharing and being 'open' per say, I've also realised that educating oneself, broadening perspectives and being well rounded involved 'breaking barriers'. Getting out of your comfort zone, so to speak. This topic is an interesting one for me and I look forward to learning more about ways to 'break the barrier'.
Alistair gave me some good advice which was to take it slowly and take it one step at a time, paced at a tempo which I feel comfortable with and that's exactly what I'm doing :-)

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Collection of recent reports and publications on quality in open education (OER, MOOCs etc)

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Collection of recent reports and publications on quality in open education (OER, MOOCs etc)

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Support Centres for Open education and MOOCS in different Regions of Europe 2020 (SCORE2020, 2014-2016) builds a European consortium of regional expertise centres on open education and MOOCs with the support of the European platform of OpenupEd experts.

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I don't think I'm very open about it. When I think about sharing my ideas, it's hard for me. A colleague, however, has given a good example. By sharing, I don't reduce my knowledge by half, but double it. If you think like that, then you can be happy that your own knowledge is disseminated.

Inside the institution I pass on my documents, but I don't do that to the outside world. But there is also the institution's claim to intellectual property.

I can use almost all documents, but in consultation with the creator. So also not completely openly. But if I represent someone , then I can use the documents without problems and adapt it.

Unfortunately, I don't know MOOCs for very long and can say less about them.  And sharing learning and teaching materials doesn't always mean taking everything 1 to 1, but always looking at it with a reflective eye.

Problems for me are when bad knowledge about it is spread. How is this knowledge checked, who controls it? I would like an answer to that.

If you look at the whole thing through the eyes of a publishing house, the door usually remains closed because there is an economic background.

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Including open textbooks

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Who decides on openness and may it effect the financial status of the university?

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Who decides on openness and may it effect the financial status of the university?

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Thank you for the presentation of various course formats for open learning. I got the impression that we, as teachers, may decide on open learning courses. I work in a university in Sweden. My university is very anxious not to take on more students than what is stated in our national responsibility. Educating more students may indicate that we can produce more learning for the same amount of money, which may result in the government cutting down on economic funding.
My impression is that there is not a great formal interest for open learning within my university.

Alastair do you know, if OER courses has the same funding as on campus course in Sweden? What kind of funding is it for MOOC courses?

Apart from the university being internationally famous, could there also be financial benefits from OER/MOOC?
Cecilia, LTU

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I am all for digital tools - but I feel that I getting less and less open at the moment, or should I say, I navigate on the web and search for information, resources and so on, but I do not want to share i.e on Social Media so much.

I use in my education Learning Plattforms for every course, but they are not shareable for the bigger public, and I don't even think that is possible (actually I know it is not possible) because of my relationship
as an employee, legal issues and the wishes and wants from the university. A very short comment but still.

On the other hand, I attend MOOCs myself quite a lot - so I am torn :)

/Maria

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I have mixed feelings about openness, sharing and transparency. I think it is a great idea to have online courses in the University of Applied Sciences where I work, that gives the students the opportunity to participate whenever they can and whereever they are. But that is still not an open course, I still have a way to go there.
I could describe my feelings as a mix of fear and curiosity. Fear of "not beeing good enough" and "what if something is not correct", and at the same time a little anxious about the feedback. Still, I am curious of giving it a try, seeing if people like my course and also curious of knowing if I can do it!
I have seen MOOC courses and I am in a project right now where I am supposed to produce material to a MOOC. That will be exciting and scary at the same time.
"Even if it ends badly, it's worth it.
If it made you feel something,
it taught you something."
Annika Skogster/ PBL6

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Thank you for some interesting insights into openness and sharing. One reflection that I make is that many of us, including myself, have expressed doubts and fears in relation to working in an open environment. It also appears that we can quite easily  identify a number of challenges and even risks with openness of this kind. Therefore, I found it useful to twist the issue around a bit (as you did) by asking what are the challenges and risks with a closed door? We very seldom ask that question but I can imagine that there is the risk of education becoming something for the few - that it will increase the status of the few. I can also see the risk, if we are too closed, that we will not be able  to collaborative in a productive way to manage some of the most urgent problems that we, as a global community, are facing.
(Cecilia, PBL14)

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I also had a question about the public domain. I have understood that e.g. classical pieces of art are in the public domain. But if someone takes a photo of them, is that photo also in the public domain or copyrighted by the photographer

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I also had a question about the public domain. I have understood that e.g. classical pieces of art are in the public domain. But if someone takes a photo of them, is that photo also in the public domain or copyrighted by the photographer

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/Stefan

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Thanks for an interesting talk that raised a lot of reflections.

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Thanks for an interesting talk that raised a lot of reflections.

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Answers to the question:
• As a person I think that I am very open when it comes to professional matters but maybe somewhat less so in personal matters (my children say that I’m coded like a bitcoin). However, professionally I am maybe mostly restricted by the context within which I am acting. For instance, I don’t decide myself how open my courses should be or who can access the material in them.
• I try as much as possible to publish my research open access and open it up on resources such as ResearchGate although I’m often unsure of what I’m really allowed to do. I am also always willing to share ppt:s etc with anyone when I have presentations, conferences and so on. But in that respect, I have been a little worried regarding copyright about images that I may have ‘borrowed’ from somewhere on the web. Last week’s presentation did much to clarify this – thanks. I have a blog at the university’s web (not so active unfortunately) which is completely open and I try to use our communication department to spread the research results that I may come up with as much as possible. I would definitely be happy to share much more of my academic material openly if this was made possible.
• Obviously, I use others’ research in the form of scientific articles and the like. It’s also useful to have access to images and maybe films. Otherwise, I generally prefer to develop my own course material in a personalised way that fits me.• MOOCs should be a great way of introducing topics to potential students. There are so many choices today and it’s really difficult for young people to choose where to go. MOOCs could afford a possibility to get some insights into an area without committing oneself to a lifelong career.
• I don’t see any problems with MOOCs but in general being open with personal details probably entails some risk with regard to fraudsters, online predators, trolls and possibly oppressive governments.
• Maybe there is sensitive knowledge that could be dangerous out of its context. Could be people starting to experimenting with their health after reading all the disparate health advice that exists. But there is also the issue of financing. If all knowledge is openly accessible, how do you finance knowledge production? Possibly, parallels can be drawn to the music industry. Earlier, no music was freely accessible and the music companies made their revenues through selling records. Now most music is freely (or almost freely) available on the web and the music industry instead makes money from concerts with the artists who have become famous by sharing openly on the web.
• Yes, probably there should be a good balance between what is open and what is closed but having as much open as possible (unless it’s too cold outside)   Stefan Lagrosen

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Thanks for the insight. I get impression that we are still having great difficulty with the mindset aspect of open learning (the tool-sets and skill-sets are outpacing the mindset?). I would have thought that being ‘open online’ provides more positives than negatives? It certainly offers one the opportunity to show case, positioning if you like from a professional point of view. Going public or being open, might mean that you are going to be challenged. As a professional I would think that you would be equipped to meet these challenges and create further opportunities to learn, both from a tutor and student standpoint.

Why is that we are happy/comfortable to be open in a social media environment but hesitate when it comes to the professional space? Please correct me if I’m wrong.

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How open are you?

I believe I am in between the two ends and hoping this course will take me to the much to the open side of the being open. I do believe in open content, open learning. This has been the main source of knowledge for me in the last last 6 - 8 years. Today, 90% of new knowledge comes from open platforms.

How do you share your resources?

Currently, I share my “open” resources within the university only, for students and colleagues. All other sharing is via peer-reviewed publications where the publisher has the rights.

How can you use others’ resources in your teaching?

Majority of the times I point to others’ resources as additional learning or complimentary reading. I also use them to improve my own knowledge and to make course notes and handouts (Many books come with a supplementary CD that has course slides and programs used is the book (software programming courses)).

How can MOOCs and other forms of open education contribute to the growth of higher education?

Over the years, the concept of MOOC has changed a lot, bluntly put, many are using it as Massive Paid Online Courses. But, the openness (free, open to anyone) still exists and many early pioneers still offer it for free (but, they just make it harder to let you know that it is free, for example, Coursera courses can be taken for free if you don't want to do quizes and assignments and just want to see the lectures, the option is “Audit the course”). Note that I am not being negative about Coursera here. I love Coursera and have taken paid courses. The reason behind paying for courses is obvious, there are many costs associated with running such systems, to do that you need investors, and many investors want to profit. EdX when I last checked was not for profit, but they had heavy investment from MIT and Harvard (if my memory serves right).

I think the best use of MOOC by universities today can be to teach the bridge courses and/or additional material. In Sweden universities, in 8 weeks (actually six weeks if you take examination period out), students are expected to learn two subjects. I don't think it is possible to learn something in that much time. So, those who want to learn more or become an expert can turn to MOOC’s. Also, many courses require pre-requisites. Students can use MOOC for these (referred to as generic courses in the video). I love the Udacity model. All their nano degree programs are paid, but almost every pre-requisite exists as a free course on the platform.

What possible problems do you see in this development?

Heavy commercialization leads to bad content (Ex: Udemy). MOOC also leads to stale content if not updated regularly. I have seen many courses that are three years in the past and you won't know that this material is useful today until halfway through the course and sometimes until end of the course (personal experience, maybe lack of digital literacy on my part to check properly before? I learnt from that and I now make enough research before taking an online course).

What are the affordances of a closed door? Can we imagine a space with a closed door but open windows?

I am combining the two questions together. I want to look at it from course development point of view. You develop your early version of the course for a closed audience (could be students, colleagues). Then you open the windows for feedback and then you open the doors and remove the walls.

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Thanks for the shared talk!

I think I like open resources although it is a jungle out there with all sorts of things to use but I don’t use it at all at the moment in my teaching. I teach a lot in online courses and everything are in the learning management system mymoodle with very closed both doors and windows. I give recorded lectures, sometimes also in real time over adobe connect or zoom and we also meet for seminars. The thing is that I haven’t even thought about that my lectures could be shared open. It seems that it is not an option. I don’t know how to do it and I also think that there are probably already lectures in my subjects. There is also this with pictures that are used in the presentations. I am allowed to publish the pictures, often from the course literature and they have copyrights, in the closed environment with my students. What do I have to consider if it goes open? Here I feel both scared to do wrong and also a bit lazy. It is easier not to share. Who has the responsibility if I do something wrong? And what happens if I do wrong?

/Anna Asplund Persson, PBL 11

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The new European Copyright Reform threatens the openness and sharing online? 

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The new European Copyright Reform threatens the openness and sharing online? 

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It's a huge discussion about this in higher education in Norway now. eg I love Padlet and have used it a lot in an educational context. But because of the new reform I cannot use it anymore because the IP-address can be traced back to the students....So if ONL was in a Norwegian context, you couldn't use Padlet at all?

Hope you can address this reform and how it affects the "openness" and use of good tools in education on thursdays webinar.

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Hi Kay and Alistair
Thanks for a great overview and explanation of the relevant concepts.
Alistair, you had listed some of the opportunities that MOOC’s present and I would like to expand on that by adding that I think it presents to develop well-rounded students (or lecturers or even citizens ). In an higher education context, it would allow for student to develop competencies and gain exposure to fields which are not part of the prescribed curriculum for a qualification –like for example a mechanical engineer who also takes up an advanced writing or public speaking course which would greatly assist him/ her in the workplace.  Also, it really allows for individual expression – there is a quote by Plato that one of our colleagues recently shared at a conference I’m attending, “knowledge obtained under compulsion retains no hold on the mind” which made me think that often with their prescribed material students feel it is forced knowledge, but now they have an opportunity to explore other fields of interests to them and still gain knowledge. It also allow for cross-polarization between different fields eg medical and fashion.
A factor that does however worry me is the accreditation of the courses and the fact that they seem not be regulated so can the course content and completion certificate be trusted? Are they regulated? Also I have heard the term “blockchain university” and I’m not yet sure I understand it correctly. Would it mean that in the working world of the future, instead of producing a degree, you would simply present a print-out of all the badges and courses you have completed? And if so, is this a future that you see?
Karin Muller, South Africa

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One of the benefits with MOOCs must be that you can reach out to people who maybe more seldom apply for university courses, as the classroom activities take place wherever you get online. In this aspect you can also find a democratic aspect - education is not a secluded world for a few.
I run courses that can be seen as further education and my participants to a high degree work and have families all over Sweden. So, very often online courses suit them really well, as they don't have to go away for some days just to attend a course.
One aspect that I see as crucial when it comes to further education is peer-learning. When it works it is brilliant, but this demands quite a degree of responsibility. Not just for your own learning, but also for your peers. And in this context one also sees that some are willing to share, but that does not go for everyone. If they can make use of the course material, including each others experiences, afterwards one of my goals have been reached. Networking is a great outcome of a course, but one of the challenges when the course is online.

/Anders Green, PBL 11

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Hi all, first of all thank you for the presentation. I have a few questions about Creative Commons:
– How do you use it and
– Which licences are you using?
The types of licences are described on the CC Website, but honestly, I am not sure if I really understand right. So there's is my third question:
– What does "share alike" or all the other labels really mean and what is "alike" here in this context? Like the way I as an author use it?

Miriam PBL08

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I enter Topic with the following quest
1) What are the copyright policy regarding the content shared ?ions in mind:
2) Who owns the content that is created if you are employed by an institute?
3) What percentage of the content that is already shared can you incorporate into your own work?

The concept of sharing is beneficial to all but I also think that instutions need to have policies in place regarding openess in order to hinder the fears of those that are sharing their work.

Travis (Dhavayogan). S

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Thank you for your talk!

I enter Topic 2 and this introductory video with the question in mind: What is my starting platform for learning more about openness and sharing in a university context and in an online environment? In particular, three issues caught my attention and triggered further thoughts when listening (!) to the video. I share these here as they are related to the questions you asked

(I added my thoughts to a Mindjet Mindmap in order to test a tool I haven't used much. I saved it as a .jpg which is not easy to read, I am afraid. (I further saved it as a Word doc and then as a PDF. If needed, I can add the PDF.)/Snowflake Sunshine PBL12

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How can you use others’ resources in your teaching?

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How can you use others’ resources in your teaching?

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The presentation nicely explained the continuum from copyrighted (closed) material to material owned by the public domain (open) with the creative commons licenses being in the middle. I now know that I will need to take a closer look at the different versions of the creative commons (CC) licenses to understand whether I can share & store others’ resources, even edit them, or only share a link to the original version. I also recognise that I need to understand how to use the CC licenses in my own material that I share online. What I am left wondering is whether there is any “quality control” for online teaching material? How do I/we/students evaluate whether a resource is trustworthy?

(Linda H)

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I am working at Linköping University, Sweden that still wants to identify itself as a campus-based university. The personal meeting between students and teachers is very highly valued. The idea of opening up the door or even tear down the walls feels foreign and scary. Parts of it is although attractive, e.g. the idea of teachers sharing lecture materials. Where can one do this?

Another question on MOOCs – are they always given by a university or who can arrange them? Is there some sort of quality control and evaluation? How can I as a student choose a course of high quality?

/Karin Festin

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I love the idea of MOOCs and online open learning. Every time I visit Coursera or other platforms, I feel like I'm in a candy store. However, it's difficult to find time to take all of these courses. :)

With my background as a foreign language teacher, I am used to the idea of sharing educational resources online. I used to have a blog where I would share lesson plans, activities, or ideas. It is quite common in fact, there are many blogs and platforms online to find and share foreign language learning/teaching resources for the language class.
/Caroline Cruaud

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Coming from a Linux background, free software (free as in free, not as in beer!) and open licensing of my own work (mostly photographs) has been completely natural for me for over a decade. However, bringing this mindset to the university has been a challenge! Let me give a few examples of things that people has told me the last few years in regards to information sharing:
* I can't add an open license to my article, because the publishing magazine owns the copyright.
* If I record this lecture, the institution won't need me anymore!
* I worked hard to develop this course design, I don't want anyone else (read: any competing university) to be able to copy it.

I find that the mindset at the university is quite different from what I would have thought when thinking about higher education. There is quite a lot of competition and keeping your findings to yourself. Perhaps we need a discussion on a different level (this isn't something that is easily changed by any one teacher, rather the model of what a university is needs updating) so as to encourage openness in higher education?
// Linnea Björk Timm

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I´m feeling a little bit selfish :( … For me, it is amazing to have the opportunity to participate in open courses but I have never thought of sharing even a presentation online.
However, my question is: considering all the data available, should we all be encouraged to add even more information to the web?
(Fernanda Lacerda)

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Interesting hear you talking about different aspects of openness in education. I thought of myself and how open I am. NOT. No, I'm unsure if what I'm doing is so good that others want to use it.
I and my colleagues are in a network between Swedish universities where we work together around a learning platform. In the ”Commons” we can share courses or minor course objects. I think that I in the future will contribute with material.

Creative Commons is a fantastic construction. I like the choices you have as a contributor. It´s an easy way to share different kind of objects.

/Lotta S

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Thanks for a very nice and instructive video!

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Thanks for a very nice and instructive video!

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I am giving a seminar each semester at our medical school, where students should prepare in advance to talk about  invasion and immune evasion strategies of four different pathogens (selescted by us), as well as the immune defense mechanisms trying to protect us from them. They are then, at the seminar, randomly selected (by lottery in front of the class) in groups of 3-4, to be either the invader, or the host defense to one of the pathogens. and they do a "role play" in fron of the rest of the class, so that by the end of the seminar everyone has "been on the scene". I have been thinking of having the students to the preparatory work for the seminar by online networking, e.g. by Padlet.
Now to the question - how can I ensure they fo not post copyright protected material on the web page?  In general, if I want to encourage my students to use this tool in sharing their knowledge either in their PBL group or with the whole class. Waht can they post and waht can they not post? How do i deal with these issues?
And the 2nd question - If I suggest specific web pages within my subject of teaching - what do I need to tell them about using and sharing that material??
(Bettan, PBL3)

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Thanks for a great presentation! As with all information on the Web, I think a difficult question is how to deal with virtually unlimited content, the quality of which may vary greatly. The risk exists for us, experienced teachers/researchers, but is probably higher for students, who might not be able to choose how to best use their time. They could also find wrong/outdated information and take it for reliable. Therefore, could a reasonable statement be that open resources are excellent as complement, but not as subsitute to traditional learning sources?(Jérôme Monsenego)

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Thanks for a great presentation! As with all information on the Web, I think a difficult question is how to deal with virtually unlimited content, the quality of which may vary greatly. The risk exists for us, experienced teachers/researchers, but is probably higher for students, who might not be able to choose how to best use their time. They could also find wrong/outdated information and take it for reliable. Therefore, could a reasonable statement be that open resources are excellent as complement, but not as subsitute to traditional learning sources?(Jérôme Monsenego)

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I have been trying to get open to open and online education, but I have to say that when I think about make available (to any persons) a class or course that I've made, I am afraid of being misinterpreted or that some people use part of my presentation or speech to defend, for example, something that I do not believe. It scares me. And in fact I think it's not something impossible and so unusual to happen.

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I have been trying to get open to open and online education, but I have to say that when I think about make available (to any persons) a class or course that I've made, I am afraid of being misinterpreted or that some people use part of my presentation or speech to defend, for example, something that I do not believe. It scares me. And in fact I think it's not something impossible and so unusual to happen.

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Danielle M Santos

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I think the development of MOOCs is central when thinking about the future of higher education, bringing both opportunities and threats.

Opportunities

A way to market what the university has to offer

If we put the lectures online, we can reallocate teacher resources to provide more formative feedback and have more interactive teaching activities

We may even be able to use the lectures from a different university

Threats

If courses are provided for free online, perhaps by the greatest teachers in the world, what remains the role of a local university? What is our unique selling point?

If we provide the courses online for free, how do we cover our costs?

// Björn H., Stockholm University

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This idea of a closed door with open windows is interesting to me.  I imagine it as offering part of a resource (a teaser of kind) and then ways to get more information - contact by email, download after providing info.  The risk is that the person will not want to continue or will find it a barrier and search elsewhere.  However the potential discussions or possible collaborations that can come out of this might be richer if contact is encouraged. (Rachel Plews)

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This idea of a closed door with open windows is interesting to me.  I imagine it as offering part of a resource (a teaser of kind) and then ways to get more information - contact by email, download after providing info.  The risk is that the person will not want to continue or will find it a barrier and search elsewhere.  However the potential discussions or possible collaborations that can come out of this might be richer if contact is encouraged. (Rachel Plews)

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These are the questions considered in the tutorial video. Add your reflections on these questions to this padlet for discussion during the Webinar.

How open are you?

How do you share your resources?

How can you use others’ resources in your teaching?

How can MOOCs and other forms of open education contribute to the growth of higher education?

What possible problems do you see in this development?

What are the affordances of a closed door?

Can we imagine a space with a closed door but open windows?

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On this page we would like to gather your reflections and questions about open education.

FIRST watch the introductory tutorial video (click the box on the right)

THEN write questions or short reflections on questions raised in the video on this page. Check the information box A short instruction on how to use Padlet on the right to learn how to use this page.

We (Alastair and Kay) will use your reflections and questions in our course webinar  on Thursday 18 October 12:00 CEST.

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An introduction to Openness. After viewing, share your questions, comments, reflections on this Padlet.
Just click on the image below to start the film.