K-12 LORs, Too LIttle, Too Late?

Slide 1: Learning Object Repositories Is it too little, too late for K-12 ??? Eleanor Liddy Open School BC

Slide 2: Where it all Began - A Brief History of Learning Object Repositories  In 2000 - 20+ different learning object repository projects and initiatives in Canada  Post secondary focus - CAREO, CLOE,POOL,Savoir, TILE, etc  K-12 projects were limited to SchoolNet, and those funded by districts/provinces

Slide 3: What was Happening in K -12?  Rapid growth in the number and interest in online learning programs  Each province/district implementing their own program  Lack of resources for teachers and no easy way to share  Let’s not Reinvent the Wheel!

Slide 4: *@#&% Metadata !  Endless debate about standards, tags, definition of learning object, interoperability, reusability, etc  Countless $$ spent addressing these issues  Edusource established to create a network of linked repositories, tools across Canada

Slide 5: Results???

Slide 7: Results???

Slide 8: And us?  AOC (Alberta Online Consortium), BC Campus and Open School issued joint RFP for LOR software  Criteria - demonstrated functionality and robustness, customizable, ability to link to any common LMS  Successful proponent - Equella (The Learning Edge) from Australia.

Slide 11: Challenge for OpenSchool BC Problem: How do you create a Learning Object Repository without funding???? Solution: Use teachers!! Goal is/was to create a space where educators can share, exchange and review digital resources. Content can range from full units in html, to worksheets in Word, flash animations, interactive resources, images, maps, podcasts, pdf files, lesson plans, ……!

Slide 12: Educators’ Resource Centre  Piloted with 8 districts  Asked pilot teachers to contribute items  Made it available to all teachers in BC at no charge  Seeded with content from Open School, COOL School, other orgs

Slide 13: What actually happened?  Official launch in April 2006  Sept 2006  Number of downloads >200  Number of teacher contributions = 2 Why?

Slide 14: Logging In http://erc.openschool.bc .ca/institutions.do

Slide 15: Maybe not enough, but not too late!!

Slide 16: Contact Information Eleanor Liddy Educators’ Resource Center Open School BC  http://erc.openschool.bc.ca/ Eleanor.Liddy@gov.bc.ca Open School BC Tel: 250 356 1118  http://www.openschool.bc.ca/  View samples of online courses