Open educational resources (oer) for teaching and learning

1. Open Educational Resources(OER)
for Teaching and Learning
By
Archana Thakran
OER Expert, Progia LLC
Email: athakran@progia.com
Tel: +1-732-983-0154(USA)
www.contentbyexperts.net

2. OER Introduction
• Open Educational Resources (OER) are
‘materials offered freely and openly to use
and adapt for teaching, learning, development
and research’.
- The Commonwealth of Learning (COL)
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3. Poll #1
• Are you familiar with Open Educational
Resources?
a. Yes
b. No
c. Somewhat familiar
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4. How do I recognize OER?
• OER are recognized by the licenses associated with them. Creative
Commons has created an open licensing scheme that allows you to
use OER without any legal issues.
• There are 6 CC licenses. The content author can decide to release
their work under any one of these.
• 3 licenses give you the freedom to use OER commercially and 3
only allow Non-commercial (NC) use.
• The interpretation of NC term is subjective. It is often clarified by
the author what non commercial use means.
• However, in each of the cases, you have to give credit to original
author.
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5. Benefits of OER
Better Learning Outcomes
Excellent opportunity to learn from high quality top notch
material
Students motivation who can review the course material at
their own pace and time
Faculty development and recognition
The school cannot retain its competitive edge without it.
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6. Poll #2
• Are you currently using OER in your
organization/practice?
a. Yes
b. No
c. Planning to adopt
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7. Why
OER is Important for
Developing Countries like
INDIA?
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8. Why OER is Important for India?
OER has the promise of meeting huge challenges facing
Education Industry in India
Soaring Demand
• 240 million additional
students will seek
college education by
2020
• By 2022, India will be
short of 180 million
skilled workers in
sectors including
technology,
infrastructure and
automobile. (Tribune
India, April 2013)
Capacity Gap
• India needs additional 800
universities and 35,000
colleges by 2020 to reach
goals set for higher
education," Kapil Sibal,
Former Human Resource &
Development Minister, India
• Shortage of Qualified
Teachers: India faces shortage
of nearly 1.4 million trained
teachers, Deccan Chronicle,
July 7, 2013
• Outdated curricula and
learning material
Access
Inequality
• Rising Cost
• Uneven Infrastructure
• Student Enrollment
varies widely from state to
state
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9. What is in It for Me?
Students
 Opportunity to learn
from the best teachers
in the world
o Higher motivation level
o Reduced dropout rates
o Better career options
 Better way of learning
o 24x7 Access
o Most up-to-date
learning material
o Peer to peer
discussions
o Lower cost
Faculty
 Empowerment & Self-
Development
o Participation (and
networking) in
transformation sweeping the
Education Industry
o More time in problem solving,
critical thinking, coaching
rather than just delivering
routine lectures
o Exposing students to real
world situations and
examples through widely
available, high quality OER
 Opportunity
o Opportunity not to become
irrelevant by new ways of
learning and teaching
o Opportunity to create a
brand for yourself, to win
world-wide recognition for
your work
Education Institutions
 Competitive edge
nationally and
internationally
o Faster turnaround time
creating new courses
o Reduction in the cost of
producing, maintaining
and distributing learning
material
 Increased Student
enrollment
o Continue to maintain
brand image that is
respected and
recognized by the public
and the employers
o Building Capacity through
introduction of new
learning models (flipped
classroom, MOOCs, SPOC,
etc.)
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10. 10
Issues and Challenges of OER Adoption
 Lack of Awareness & Mindset: What is OER? How to motivate teachers to use it? Why
should I share my content for free? What is in it for me and my faculty? Thoughts which
resist in OER adoption.
Quality Control: Strongly impacts the School's Brand and its Reputation. How do you select
OER for use? Is the material relevant, significant, accurate and presented in an effective
manner? Is the content that you create discoverable by others?
 Localization: The power of OER may not be realized unless the learning material is tailored
to the needs of your students. MIT material may not be at right level for your students, may
not be complete, may have extra administrative content etc.
Standards and Compatibility: There are no agreed upon standards for mixing and matching
OER material from different sources and working with different devices
 Resources & Commitment: Adopting OER and the new models of teaching require
substantial resources and commitment. Does every teacher and class use OER as they wish
or there is an institution guideline and central resources for them to use?
 Potential Misuse of Social Media: it must be carefully monitored and best practices
followed along well thought out guidelines
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11. Poll # 3
• What issues or challenges do you think would
hinder OER adoption in your context?
a. Lack of Awareness & Mindset
b. Quality Control
c. Localization
d. Standards and Compatibility
e. Resources & Commitment
f. Lack of Institutional Policy
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12. 12
• Be Bold, Show Leadership
• Educate yourself with the OER Movement and its Best Practices (start from
http://www.oercommons.org)
• Engage, Network, Partner with OER implementers
• Explore your Options: Create a Strategy, Implementation Plan and Guidelines for
OER adoption
• Allocate Resources: Technical, Financial and Promotional
• Promote OER, Train Faculty and Students for OER adoption
• Don't let Technology stand in the way of adoption, start small and experiment.
Adapt and Tailor OER to your unique needs.
• Give teachers tools to select, organize and use high quality OER effectively
• Track Progress, Recognize and Reward Effort and Performance
To Adopt OER, Schools Must
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13. 13
•Awareness
•Content creation using OER
•Technology to use OER in classroom –
Open LearnWare
What Progia is doing in India
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14. Awareness-Workshop
What we cover in workshop:
• About OER
• Licensing of OER
• Finding OER
• How to use OER in a Classroom
• Technology to run courses
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15. Content Creation
• We have created 25 Courses using content
from OER.
• Eg. NIESBUD, Govt. of India
• They are commercializing these OER based
courses and students are taking it for a
minimal fees.
• Through these efforts, we have made OER self
sustainable.
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16. Technology: Open LearnWare
• Open Learnware is an on-line learning &
teaching platform that integrates Open
Education Resources (OER) with a practical set
of software tools that make OER delightful to
use for schools, educators and the learners.
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17. 17
Screenshot of Course Taker
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18. Poll #4
• Would you consider integrating OER in your
practice?
a. Certainly,Yes
b. Not decided
c. May be
d. No
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19. Discussion & Questions
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