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27 March 2019

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ONL191 topic 2 tweetchat - Open education

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I think I am really open but I don't know if the students and my colleagues are so open in the same way. Since 2010 I have a blog and it is not a problem for me to share my resources, despite sometimes I have to be care with results and details related to my research, when considering its publication. Recently, I used Padlet in my two classes (Thursday in the morning and Friday in the middle of the day), but until now 9:00 pm on the Sunday, no one wrote or made any contribution to these two padlets. Maybe the students are not so open as we could think they were or perhaps they need more time. I don't know... Anyway I believe MOOCs and other forms of open education can contribute a lot not only to the growth of higher education, but to the growth of all kind of interaction among people, and so I'm thinking about teaching, research and extension. The main problem I see to this development is the resistance of tradicional academic way to teach and learn which not agree yet with these new way to talking, seeing, hearing and communicate knowledge, there are a lot of conservatism. Some colleagues here in this Padlet are talking about parents who pay for their children's education and could not be happy if know this same educational content could be free available to others. I remember a movie I watched yesterday called "The boy who harnessed the wind" and I think about what the boy had to do in search for knowledge. He almost was not well succeed because his college was paid and his parents didn't have money. Of course the internet and social media could not help him, but what about young people who have to take two bus and a subway to go to the work and take 3 hours in this route? Would it be interesting for these young people to gain knowledge throughout this journey?

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Developing pre- and in-service teacher education courses as well as a brand new study specialization (Language Aware Multilingual Pedagogy) has been part of my tasks in the last couple of years. That is, using and adapting learning materials has become a routine to me. Working in an excellent and dedicated team, I contribute to brainstorming and writing sessions almost every week. We also encourage our students to share materials they found useful, and in some courses we plan the courses and activities with them. It need openness and flexibility from the teacher: you cannot teach the same course twice as the content keeps changing with the group... It is challenging but keeps me motivated and prevents burnout :-)

I can share an example with you to illustrate how we use freely available materials in online training. I lead an Erasmus+ in-service teacher training program "Everyday Creativity" for teachers from four countries (Romania, Hungary, Italy and the Netherlands). This is a blended course. The course activities are built on freely available materials which we put into a framework and linked to tasks we designed. Further, we organized an intensive week for participants with school visits and workshops. The group worked in our learning platform Moodle in a closed group, but we made the most important parts of the course materials available online for anybody: https://creativeschools.eu/en/page/138/in-service-teacher-training-program

About open vs closed courses, I'd highlight that in many cases you can't be totally open because some tasks or materials belong to community building and thus might include confidential information. You need to keep your doors closed in the incubation phase of a group, so to speak.

Finally, about financial issues. Our university doesn't collect tuition fees or if it does (in the case of non-EU/ETA residents), it also offers scholarship for compensation. However, even the lack of tuition fee and the scholarship cannot guarantee participation in education for all since on-campus programs require that the students stay in Finland, and several of them cannot pay for visa or cannot afford local accommodation and everyday living costs.

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I have been open in my teaching since the beginning, in a variety of ways. I've used webpages and blogs for my students and also shared plans, assignments, curriculums, lectures etc with colleagues, students and parents. I have recorded a lot of material so students can look at it when they need repetition, and these are open so other teachers can use them. Once my daughter came home and told me they had watched one of my recordings in class. I've used a lot of other teachers' material in my teaching as well, although my students preferred to hear my voice.

Now when I work with education in the corporate world instead of school, it's becoming increasingly interesting for organizations to share some of their courses for employees and put them in an open area for everyone to take.

One problem might be how to handle students using open resources and claiming it as their own, cheating so to speak.

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Friday 22 March

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LnuPlay - Linnaeus University MediaSpace

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Webinar on open education, topic 2 in the course Open Networked Learning (ONL191). 22 March 2019.

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I currently do not lecture on online programmes, my lecturing is more traditional face to face, thus don't really share in the ONL space. I do however share my material with my students, in term of PowerPoint slides and video links.
I'm very collaborative with fellow lecturers. My view is that if any student can benefit from my material, then that's brilliant.
In terms of accessing information, this is something that I need to explore further and it was useful to find out from yourselves the various OER sources.

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In medical teaching I use a lot of case-based teaching. Even though the cases cannot be traced to persons, some of them are rare diseases and therefore I am reluctant to share case discussions freely. Otherwise I am all in for sharing classes and educational resources.

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Nice, open discussion!

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This Padlet looks nice. Writing posts in a Facebook Group would have the same function but a slightly different view.. I'm interested in hearing reasons pro and con using Padlet instead of a closed Facebook Group?

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I’ve tried to reply to some posts here but my phone is acting up so this might work instead.
I wonder if the scrutiny of online resources/ education has a lot to do with snobbery ( control of knowledge and power and all that). The flip side is that we are pushed to prove the quality of online resources so much that it can only be a good thing for teachers and learners.
Levan asked how learners would react if they discovered the resources they paid for were freely available to all. That’s a fair point but when we teach someone, don’t we do more than just give them a book? Don’t we also draw out the knowledge and questions in the room? Don’t we share our experience? Don’t we help the learners make meaning and link theory to practice? I think the value is in scaffolded interaction and that’s why learners or governments are willing to pay for it.
I think OER and OEP is about removing barriers so that anyone who wants to learn can. Education is a good thing. Shouldn’t it be accessible to all?

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When the door is open, there is interaction between teachers and students. When only the window is open, there is limited or no interaction. When we share our knowledge without interaction, we may think that we are open, but are we? Isn’t interaction a basic element of borh education and openness? The digital space gives more possibilities for interaction which enhances learnig. More difficult to interact with a book :)

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Interaction and open education

When the door is open, there is interaction between teachers and students. When only the window is open, there is limited or no interaction. When we share our knowledge without interaction, we may think that we are open, but are we? Isn’t interaction a basic element of both education and openness? The digital space gives more possibilities for interaction which enhances learning. More difficult to interact with a book :)

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Thankyou very much for an interesting lecture on openness. Thinking about myself I slide on the open close scale. Some of my resources I can share openly but others I cannot at all. When it comes to MOOCs , its a good opportunity to have knowledge available for wider audience. But I think MOOCs have their own limitations. I believe medicine or surgery as in medical school cannot be delievered as a MOOC. while several other entities of knowledge can be put up as MOOC. What makes me confused about openness is whether an "paid open course" is called "open" or not?

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openness is everything and I do support it. I read man journal articles about open science, open data and open Access movement. but now I want ask What is the different between, Opening learning and Open science/access/data?

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Thank you for this presentation! I think that it is very important to give back to society when one belongs to the academic community. But I also think that there are some dangers of large open courses. I bet that within each field there is something to be communicated to a wider public and of pedagogical value for such a public. But each field likely has also something that requires higher levels of experience and/or understanding which could be only achieved after years of learning and practice. For instance, I think that it would be very useful and great for society, if a MOOC would tackle a problem of otherness, tensions that occur when people know little about others and fear their presence in own community etc. But on the other hand, I think that it is very dangerous to teach a wider public about cognitive-behavioral therapy methods; completing such a course could give the participants an impression that they are as skilled as a certified therapist and could do more harm than good, advising others as a "specialist".
To sum up - I think that openness, like probably everything else in the world, gives great opportunities, but  needs to be used wisely. And it would be better if the academic community (and e.g., public universities) took responsibility for such courses instead of leaving this job to others, who might not necessarily have the experience and skills to teach the wider public and convey scientifc knowledge.

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Open access to educational material is great. An overwhelming quantity of resources to revise, remix, reuse and redistribute. But… the main output is in English or other “big” languages and is not applicable to the reality of a small country/culture with another language. So far, my experience is that production of local material is somehow hampered by the accessibility of “global” material. Is this an unnecessary fear – or even a misinterpretation of the circumstances?

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Openness means for me exchanging, giving access of informations of all kinds and making it accessible to anybody who is interested in - in our today online world it is important to keep in mind, that not all human beings on this planet have an access and a almost free access to information, which I think is completely unfair and not equal. I think time is coming for a change, in any perspective, and therefor yes ... I am open and I want to help to work more on the accessibility of information for anybody.
In an university it's quite difficult to work "on openness" because of property and data protection laws - but still I think we are public institution and get subventions from the government (public money from tax payers) and therefore we should be open and share our information and knowledge.

MOOC - I have used some MOOCS already and was quite happy about it. The whole course were set up in a way that you had a diversity in medias where informations were shared, which inspired and motivated me a lot. I didn't wanted to participate in the Forum, which was free to choose so, I was more concentrated on the contents, because I'm quite into Social Medias where I Share and exchange opinions etc.. very regularly and often. So I wanted to be more concentrated and get the most out of it.
I'm thinking myself of setting up a MOOC or something else for course I'm giving for professional - the aim would be to make the information again more accessible to a bigger audience. But I don't finde time and of course would need quite a support to built this up.

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Since I work in a library, I see openness as something fundamental to our work, making information and research available and accessible. However, when thinking about how open and closed my work practices really are, I see some pitfalls in our openness. Databases and e-resources are available 24/7, but only to our own students and staff, due to licenses. We have opening hours without self service-hours so this is a limit of course. The open access movement is however growing rapidly, which hopefully will lead to information and research being more open and available in a democratic and equal way in the future.

Thanks for a great lecture!

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I am very open in many aspects: I use mostly open source software, I publish scientific articles mostly open access, I publish code myself under free licenses, I contributed a lot to Wikipedia.

This said, I do put less effort into openness of teaching materials, I guess because there is very little to no credit given.  I also find it hard to use other peoples materials. The programs are way too different from country to country or from university to university, I find myself constantly redoing teaching units.

Regarding MOOCs, Sonja pointed me to the acronym LOOC for "little", which fits this course very well. This course is not the same thing as the MOOCs of for example Sebastian Thrun, it is not the same category.

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I usually use free datasets in my teaching, and I have no experience of sharing materials online. We usually organize closed groups for specific courses and share resourses and materials with students who are participating in the course.
It will be interesting to learn how one can effektively use open resources and where to find them. This is of utmost importance also for students.

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How open are you?
I am very much as open as you describe it in the video: I am quite open about my work online, each of my publication are Open Access and I really am a strong advocate for OA scientific results, I use twitter to share my ups and downs at work, success and fails, to discuss new and old work, about celebrating submission of grant applications or of research manuscripts. But when it comes to discuss the content of those manuscripts or grant applications I am only happy to do so around a cup of coffee with a stranger, not really online. I think when I could be scooped I backup a little and protect my ideas. Even though, again,  discussing them verbally is totally fine.
I have always want to make my teaching slides an open resource for others to use. But actually never found the time to do so, or is it really the time, or more the fear to be criticize for what they truly contain? I share mini videos of my work, I know they are not perfect, but I think they can still inspire people who watch them, and brig them closer to science. So why would I be scared of sharing more of my teaching work? I have used and modified slides from other people for my own teaching, always with permission, but I had not always mentioned them in my presentation. Once I did because that particular teacher had to cancel at the last minute (two days before the class) and I replaced her using her slides.
For my personal life I assume I am also pretty open, but not to the whole world. I believe I have put restrictions to my Facebook account, such that only my friends or direct friends of friends can see my profile and pictures and posts. I am not scared of pictures of myself, and as long as you ask me, I will be fine if you take a picture of my son playing with yours for example.

Have you used MOOC?
Yes! I have used MOOC from coursera in two ways:
First time I was following a curse to learn as a student. The goal was not to get credits (my studies were long finished), but really to learn on a topic I was not specifically strong on and I wanted to learn.
Second I took a course not so much to learn about the topic but more to check how the teacher of that particular MOOC was teaching the topic, and what can I take out for my own teaching. His content a little,  but mostly his pedagogy and ways of making the learning happening on a rather difficult topic. It was inspiring and I am most likely to do it again.
I can also see myself trying other MOOC course later when my life gives me more time to learn on extra topics

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I started to think about Kay's question How does you environment change with openness? In my previous work we were not that open I often wonder why is it so difficult for my colleagues to share what they have done. I then decided that I will start to be more open. And I noticed a change in myself but also in my colleagues. So now I'm trying to be as open as possible in my everyday work. Of course some of my work tasks are confidential. I still have a long way to go to be completely open but some day.
I also liked that you lifted up the word accessibility, sharing, transparency and introperability. I think that these words are important to think about when you speak about openness. It was a great lecturer and it got me thinking what more can I do and what should I learn more about.

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Thank you both for a great lecture. You've raised some really great issues, some of which I am grappling with in my line of work.

Agree wholeheartedly with Kay that openness exists in a continuum, and that there is a case to be made at either end of that spectrum.

While I agree that knowledge should be freely and openly shared, how do we measure "educatedness". Because really, when you think about it, does it  not boil down to the measure of one's qualifications? As Alastair pointed out, an ONL certificate may not necessarily be "recognised". By that same token, "educatedness" does not necessarily mean someone is knowledgeable.

So yes, a framework that allows for open education is key to breaking down barriers for learners who are thirsty for knowledge, but it is one that requires many layers and levels of support and quality control in order for it to work.

After all, in an era where any piece of information you're ever curious about is a Google search away, the real value in educators is the ability to c this vast reservoir of information in a coherent manner to help our learners learn. And it is also about imparting critical thinking to our learners so they can be discerning consumers of such content.

Looking forward to a some really interesting discussions around this. Thank you.

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I´d like to share and collaborate more, than I do now. However, I consider myself more a consumer than a producer at the moment. I guess I need to gain more self confidence, before going totally open and "viral" :)

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Educators need to be charged to implement new learning and teaching environments by being open and global. But he culture of openness need to be examined in the light of the value of the credentials. Is open education "validated"? I have seen many statistical  Youtube videos with high percentage of "likes" but wrong content.

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Thanks for an interesting lecture! I personally find it interesting that there is such a focus on community and collaboration in online courses, whe the thing I love most about online education is the extent to which individuals are always choosing their own learning adventures online, at their own pace, in their own time. In fact online education can even be something of an escape from social situations that affect learning -- the class clown who disrupts the lecture, the bully in your group, the harassment you might face from fellow students or teachers. Online spaces are not free from these dangers of course, but one can certainly avoid them more easily. Highlighting the individual-centred benefits of online education does not mean there is no sharing -- just that the sharing happens at one remove, in perhaps a more linear, but not unreflective way.

As far as my openness as a teacher: I happily share my materials with other teachers, and use others' materials, though there is no substitute (at least in the kinds of things I teach in the social sciences) for developing your own tools. I have to be able to explain it, and if I was not part of the thinking that went into the development a presentation (for example) I would completely redevelop it so that I was able to do it justice.

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During my still rather short teaching career I have strived to be as open as possible with my students. This entails sharing slides, answering emails rather promptly, facilitating student engagement, and inviting meta-reflections on the course design, teaching methods etc. All of this, however, takes place in class or on the LMS, not with the wider world, though the syllabus including course readings are publicly available. The challenge I’m currently facing is that my department struggles with student numbers and as a response we are in the process of designing new online-only courses. Crudely put, we need more students who take their final exams, and the question is whether more open courses would positively impact on enrolment figures and completion rates. If you could recommend any literature on that, I’d be delighted to learn more.

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In my opinion, openness is key to learning. Openness regarding attitude, accessibility, interaction etc., but openness includes critical thinking regarding sharing materials online, copyrights etc.

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For MOOC courses you do not need any pre-qualifications to join. Is it good to accept all applicants? Are we not wasting the time of the people who might not be qualified when pre-qualifications are not specified? What about the progression in the learning that is necessary to guarantee the proper learning? I am not totally against it but would like to trigger some discussions.

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Thank you so much for this very informative video-lecture! I’ve tried different models in my own work, depending on the group I’m teaching to. At some occasions, my course (e.g. masterclass with PhD students) has been closed, with none of the resources made open online. On other occasions, I’ve used a very open model (e.g module for Master students) with everything available online: slides (through Shareslide), pre-recorded lectures (on Vimeo or YouTube), and a semi-open course blog. Not sure which model I prefer to be honest, but the closed model seems to me requires less preparations. Making your slides or talks available online raises the bar considerably since you don’t know who is going to watch. I’ve been involved in one MOOC, and that required very professional support to get the quality of sound and video to a level to share internationally. Another drawback is that you sometimes want to present preliminary research results that have not been published yet. You don’t want that sort of info available online. Besides from that, an open model is preferable (if I have the time and resources), and allows other people to connect to you, and use your lectures for other purposes.

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I love the concept of openness, but am aware of many practical issues. I loved the MOOC concept, and took a few in the beginning. Some were great, others not so much. And the truth is, it requires a lot of discipline to keep track. As for OERs, in my field of higher education it is a big deal now. My university is trying to move to OpenStax books, but there is pushback from instructors. Interestingly, the issue is not so much about the actual textbook, but supplementary materials around them that are usually provided by publishers.

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I think I'm quite open -- I think one often has to be to learn. MOOCs/open online learning platforms can present their own problems. If I were to think of myself as a student, I may feel "lost in the crowd" --  it can be difficult for some to learn/work without close interaction with a teacher figure. There is also the question of certification or credits at the end of the course.

Coming from a South African context, where a majority of the population does not have access to these kinds of tools, it would be interesting to see how the problem accessibility can be addressed, so that more people (who may not have access to traditional institutions) can empower themsel

However, I think open learning is a wonderful tool for gaining access, not only to knowledge but to people, perspectives and approaches to the subject matter that may not occur in a traditional setting. The onus is certainly on each individual student to engage and be accountable for their learning.

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My main issue is being open with courses that students have "competed" to enter. I could gladly share recorded lectures or other material but not the whole course.
Another thing is scientific articles that I use - they are not always in open access

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If there is no sharing, there is no learning (David Whiley). I think openess is the key to further learning and development in all education and situation. I think this is a challenge but online environment is a great opportunity for sharing knowledge with students.

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I  believe MOOCs have great potential but I agree with you the the problem with credits needs to be solved. What is the progress on that?
Another thing that is difficult in a MOOC/ an Online-setting is, as a teacher, to get to know your students. When you meet live, you get a lot of information about the student, how he/she is feeling, what he/she is enjoying, finding difficult just by observing the student. How shall we deal with that in a online setting?

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Very interesting topic. I could say that openness is all. I think not only me but all of us are open to share knowledge to support learning, both for ourselves and for others. It is what make us humans and the ground of communication. Besides that, each time we are getting even more open with the help of the information and communications technology.

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I'd say, I am open enough. I have been sharing my text books on my blog for years receiving very positive feedback from all over the country. But I am afraid, there are some financial issues arising every time we talk about openness in education: Of course all of us agree upon the idea, that education has to be freely accessible and transparent for everybody, which is made easy thanks to unlimited opportunities of internet and online-tools. However, we must also consider the fact, that our students pay for education they get. And they won't feel very happy, if one day they would find out, that all the resources they paid for are actually freely available for everybody.
Another issue to be considered would be quality insurance: In fact, everybody can create open educational resources, but how can we make sure, that the quality of those resources is really good, how can we make sure, that the knowledge we are given by online courses is reliable and up-to-date.
And last but not least: Knowledge is connected with power and I am afraid, it will never change. There will always be knowledge that is closed and inaccessible for everybody. And those who possess that kind of hidden knowledge will always dominate over those who don't. Out of this perspective all the talk about openness in education sounds a bit naive.

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Watch this presentation by Alastair Creelman and Kay Oddone and then follow the instructions on the left. The slides from this presentation are available on the right.

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LnuPlay - Linnaeus University MediaSpace

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Introduction to Open Networked Learning (ONL191) topic 2 - Open learning - sharing and openness. Autumn term 2019.

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Including links to click and investigate!

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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 "How to use this page" on the left to learn how to use this page.

We (Alastair and Kay) will use your reflections and questions in our course webinar  on Friday 22 March 11:00 CET.