1. Catherine Cronin
#PRAXIS Project webinar  Uruguay  28th May 2018
Image: CC BY subherwal
Open Educational Practices in Higher Ed:
Practical & Critical Approaches

2. Catherine Cronin
open educator, open resercher
CELT, National University of Ireland, Galway
@catherinecronin  catherinecronin.net

3. Le spectre de la rose Jerome Robbins Dance Division
from the New York Public Library (public domain)
To hope is to give
yourself to the future,
and that commitment
to the future
makes the present
inhabitable.
Rebecca Solnit (2004)
Hope in the Dark
“

4. networked
educators
networked
students
Physical
Spaces
Bounded
Online
Spaces
Open
Online
Spaces
Image: CC BY-SA 2.0 Catherine Cronin, built on Networked Teacher image CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 Alec Couros
higher education

5. pen
Image: CC0 by Nadine Shaabana

6. open education
goal  philosophy  values
resources, tools and practices
that employ a framework of open sharing
to improve educational access
and effectiveness worldwide
- The Open Education Consortium

7. Use/reuse/creation of OER and
collaborative, pedagogical practices employing
social and participatory technologies for interaction,
peer-learning, knowledge creation and sharing,
and empowerment of learners.
OEP: open educational practices

8. Open education is a tool
for social change.
Santos, A.I., Punie, Y., & Muñoz, J.C. (2016)
Opening up Education: A Support Framework for Higher Education Institutions
“

9. Openness is not the opposite of closed-ness,
nor is there simply a continuum between the two…
An important question becomes not simply whether
education is more or less open, but what forms
of openness are worthwhile and for whom;
openness alone is not an educational virtue.
Richard Edwards (2015)
Knowledge infrastructures and the inscrutability of openness in education
Learning, Media and Technology 40(3)
“
Adopting a critical approach

10. Openness and praxis:
A situated study of academic staff
meaning-making & decision-making with respect to openness
and
use of open educational practices (OEP)
in higher education
PhD research study completed April 2018

11. I began with a question:
In academic settings in which the use of OEP is
not required, requested, expected, or
specifically supported, why do some educators,
and not others, choose to use OEP?
(...and then what happens?)
Image: CC0 BY Mark Solarski on Unsplash

12. Image: CC0 photo by Saksham Gangwar

13. Institutional, role-based identity DIGITAL IDENTITY Open, networked, ‘Resident’
identity
Not using social media, or
personal use only
DIGITAL NETWORKING Using social media personally
& professionally
Using VLE & email only DIGITAL TOOLS FOR
TEACHING
Using VLE & email
as well as open tools & social
media
Not intentionally using OER OER Intentionally using OER
less open more open
i) digital practices
Using OEP

14. ii) categories related to OEP
Strong attachment to privacy,
focus on risks
PRIVACY Balancing privacy & openness,
valuing both
Using ‘digital natives’ discourse DIGITAL LITERACIES Developing digital literacies
(self & students)
Valuing knowledge/information
transfer
PHILOSOPHY OF TEACHING
& LEARNING
Valuing social learning
Accepting traditional teaching
role expectations
CONCEPTION OF
SELF AS TEACHER
Challenging traditional
teaching role expectations
less open more open
Dimensions shared
by open educators
(i.e. those using OEP)

15. Balancing
privacy and openness
Developing
digital literacies
Valuing
social learning
Challenging traditional
teaching role expectations
4 dimensions shared by open educators

16. Balancing privacy & openness
Image: CC BY 2.0 woodleywonderworks

17. Balancing privacy and openness
will I share openly?
whom will I share with? (context collapse)
who will I share as? (digital identity)
will I share this?
MACRO
MESO
MICRO
NANO

18. Image: CC0 Stijn Swinnen
It has never been more risky
to operate in the open.
It has never been more vital
to operate in the open.
Martin Weller (2016)

19. OEP: Potential benefits
• Increased access to education
• Decreased cost (e.g. OER, open textbooks)
• Developing digital, data, & network literacies
• New forms of dialogue and global collaboration
• Student agency & empowerment
• Bridging formal & informal learning
• Public outreach and engagement
• Enhancing & expanding the scope of learning

20. OEP: Barriers & tensions
• Lack of…
o awareness
o understanding (e.g. permissions, attribution)
o skills (e.g. digital/information literacies)
o support
• Coordination across the institution
• Incompatibility between existing institutional cultures
& the philosophy of open education

21. Use of open educational practices (OEP) is:
Complex
Personal
Contextual
Continually negotiated

22. Open Educational Practices (OEP)
Using/reusing/
creating
OER
Collaborative, learner-
centred practices employing
social & participatory
technologies for interaction,
peer-learning, knowledge
creation & sharing, and
empowerment of learners
OER
open pedagogy
+ other forms of OEP
emerging in situated
studies of OER/OEP
well-established link
See: Beetham et al (2012),
Cronin (2017), Czerniewicz et al. (2017),
Nascimbeni & Burgos (2016)

23. We must rebuild institutions that value humans’
minds and lives and integrity and safety.
Audrey Watters (2017)
“
Image: CC BY-NC 2.0 carnagenyc

24. Thank You!
Catherine Cronin
@catherinecronin
catherinecronin.net
Le spectre de la rose Jerome Robbins Dance Division
from the New York Public Library (public domain)