Presentation given at the World Aquaculture Society meeting in Jeju, South Korea on 28th May 2015

1. OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES
IN AQUACULTURE EDUCATION
AND TRAINING
World Aquaculture 2015
John Bostock
University of Stirling, UK
LLP – Erasmus – Erasmus Network

2. What are Open Educational Resources?
OER are teaching, learning, and
research resources that reside in
the public domain or have been
released under an intellectual
property license that permits their
free use and re-purposing by
others.
Source: The Hewlett Foundation.
http://www.hewlett.org/programs/education/open-educational-resources
OER have been
defined in various ways
but a key concept is
that they can be
adapted by others

3. What does OER include?
Open educational resources
include full courses, course
materials, modules, textbooks,
streaming videos, tests,
software, and any other tools,
materials, or techniques used to
support access to knowledge
Source: The Hewlett Foundation.
http://www.hewlett.org/programs/education/open-educational-resources
OER can include
any resources used
in teaching or for
personal learning

4. How are OER licenced?
Image source: http://www.creativecommons.org
The use of Creative Commons licenses is not
essential, but these have been widely adopted for
use with OER

5. How are CC licences specified?
Image source: http://www.creativecommons.org &
http://www.masternewmedia.org/how-to-publish-a-book-under-a-creative-commons-license/
The 4 basic questions covered by
Creative Commons licenses can be
combined in six ways which can be
displayed as a logo and included in
web page and other computer code

6. Where can I find OER?
http://www.merlot.org/
OER can be found in many different
places on the Internet. There have been
substantial efforts to create and curate
OER repositories such as MERLOT
(California State University) or portals that
provide access to resources elsewhere on
the Internet such as TEMOA (Latin
America) or OER Africa.
http://www.temoa.info/ http://www.oerafrica.org

7. Where can I find and contribute OER?
There are also
independent projects
to create open online
learning resources
such as Wikiversity – a
side project to
Wikipedia – inviting
contributions from
anyone with relevant
expertise
http://www.wikiversity.org

8. Searching for CC licensed media
Media with CC licenses and hence potential for use in OER can also be found
through various search tools such as the one at http://search.creativecommons.org
or by using appropriate rights filters with Google

9. When searching for images on Google, you can select “Search tools” and then
“Usage rights” to filter the results according to CC license
e.g. image search on Google

10. Why use OER?
Image source: http://www.unesco.org/new/en/communication-and-information/access-to-knowledge/open-
educational-resources// http://openeducationeuropa.eu and http://icore-online.org/
The development and use of OER is strongly supported by
the European Union, The United Nations Education,
Science and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) and many
other organisations for a range or reasons including:
• Belief in a principle of wide and free access to learning
• Potential for cost saving in education if efficiency in
producing materials is improved
• Potential for increased quality through peer review and
community improvement
• Opportunities for industry to contribute to enhancing
relevance of available materials

11. Why aren’t all learning materials OER?
Image source: Internet search - http://farm9.static.flickr.com/8508/8383353010_c394f891ef.jpg
Despite much policy support, most teaching and learning
materials are not published as OER. Reasons for this
include:
• Without potential for direct financial return the
production of materials by the private sector or
individuals will be inhibited
• Individuals may see little benefit and potential risks in
releasing their own materials for peer use and review
• OER threatens competition between institutions based
on the materials they produce and may alter existing
funding arrangements or hand more power to a smaller
number of global players
• A focus on open access to materials encourages
learner-centred pedagogies and diminishes the role of
teaching

12. MOOCs and other free education
Image sources: claxtoncreative.com & http://ielanguages.com/blog/open-lectures-course-materials-moocs-
itunes-u-the-internet-is-for-learning/
The Open Education Movement is part of a wider
ecosystem of free or low-cost education
provision. The most widely publicised and
debated initiatives in recent years have been the
Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) from
some of the leading universities. In most cases
the materials are provided free of charge, but
remain the copyright of the author or publishing
institution, so are not OER. An increasing
number of institutions are also providing
materials through Apple’s iTunesU or Google’s
YouTube EDU. In the long-term participants in
these projects expect to make financial returns
through attracting students to other courses or
charging for additional tuition, accreditation or
other additions to the free offering.

13. OER and Open Access Publications
Image sources: http://www.lotpublications.nl/ & http://www.aston.ac.uk/library/additional-information-for/open-
access-publishing-for-aston-authors/open-access-how-to-publish/open-access-compliance-form/
Open Access is related to OER as it aims to
make the results of research available to
everyone and allows redistribution. However it
does not generally allow repurposing (altering the
content)
Nevertheless, Open Access references fit well
with OER as part of a broader learning package
and are included in portals such as Temoa

14. Why OER can only be part of the picture
Image source: http://cde.athabascau.ca/online_book/ch2.html
Good access to high quality
teaching and learning materials can
only be part of the answer to
building knowledge and skills,
particularly if they need to be
accredited.
Much of the process of learning
exists in the type and quality of
interactions that the learner has with
other learners and the people they
are learning from as well as the way
the whole learning process is
managed and the feedback and
support that is available.

15. OER granularity and use in context
Image source: Krull & Mallinson 2001 reproduced at:
http://classroom-aid.com/2013/05/25/what-you-should-know-about-learning-object-part-ii/
OER resources
vary from single
images, through
complete lessons
to all the materials
needed for a
taught course or
guided learning.
Using appropriate
OER in the right
context greatly
enhances their
value (i.e. focus
on pedagogy first)

16. So how about OER for
aquaculture teaching and
learning?

17. Testing the portals – search “aquaculture”
MERLOT – www.merlot.org
6 hits for materials, 401 hits for members
OER Africa – www.oerafrica.org
2 hits
OpenEducationEuropa – openeducationeuropa.eu
5 hits (3 projects, 1 MOOC, 1 News item)
TEMOA – www.temoa.info
364 hits (290 English, 36 Spanish, 32 Portuguese)

18. Testing media search – “aquaculture”
(reuse allowed)
Flickr – www.flickr.com
2,186 hits
Google Images – www.google.com
103 hits
Wikimedia Commons – commons.wikimedia.org
643 hits
YouTube – www.youtube.com
1080 hits (all Creative Commons)

19. Google Scholar – aquaculture + “open
educational resources”
52 hits (some broken) including:
Reference to the EU VOR3R project - http://voa3r.eu/
(Virtual Open Access Agriculture & Aquaculture
Repository)
Links to resources in DOER - Commonwealth
Universities directory of OER
Policy Document from the Tasmanian Government
promoting use of OER and eLearning

20. Aquaculture industry case studies as
Open Educational Resources with
learning activities and supporting
country profiles on video
Example: AQUA-TNET
Collaborative Learning
Platform

21. A 5 ECTS course has been developed to introduce European Aquaculture, making
use of the resources on the web site. There are also some presentation slides and
other materials on research project management, data management and
communication of results. Most materials have a CC licence.
Example: AQUA-TNET
Collaborative Learning
Platform
www.aquacase.org

22. Conclusions
Image source: http://pixabay.com/en/learn-note-sign-directory-64058/
To date, relatively few aquaculture oriented learning
materials have been explicitly published with a CC
license that encourages adaptation and reuse.
With the exception of the AQUA-TNET project there
seems to have been relatively little debate and
focus on the potential benefits of OER for the
aquaculture industry and few directly funded
projects or collections of aquaculture OER
Many teachers and learners use OER, but also use
other accessible materials that are not specifically
labelled for re-use. Conversely few teachers publish
materials as OER (and/or may be prevented from
doing so by their institution)
Further exploration of the potential benefits of OER
for the aquaculture sector and how this can be
developed is strongly encouraged.

23. Thank you for your attention
Email: j.c.bostock@stir.ac.uk
Website: www.aquatnet.com
Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/jbostock

24. • The Open Educational Resources Movement has gained momentum in recent years, facilitated by
Internet technologies and supported by many universities and international institutions including at
the policy level, the European Commission. Open Educational Resources (OER) can be distinguished
from other free educational materials through a licence that enables their repurposing and reuse by
others. OER can help teachers develop courses more efficiently and potentially with higher quality;
whilst their free availability opens up educational opportunities for people who would otherwise be
excluded for reasons of finance, location or personal situation.
• Although OER offer significant social benefits, there are many barriers to widespread adoption. These
range from issues of funding, a desire to protect individual or corporate copyright, concerns over
greater transparency, academic and institutional competition, and critique on the basis of
pedagogical principles.
• The availability of OER for aquaculture education is limited, although increasing through project
initiatives such as Aqua-tnet. Potential drivers for further development include the increasing
support for open access publications, the evolution of MOOCs, the activities of online communities
of practice and the widespread sharing of photos, videos and presentations online.
• Examples of OER for aquaculture are identified and considered in relation to the wider OER
movement, and prospects for increased uptake within the aquaculture sector are discussed with
reference to industry benefits and wider community engagement.
Abstract

25. Aqua-tnet project – http://www.aquatnet.com
Aqua-tnet AquaCase website – http://www.aquacase.org
Aqua-tnet photo share on Flickr - http://www.flickr.com/groups/aqua-tnet/
Aqua-tnet video share on YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/user/aquatnet
Aqua-tnet links share on Diigo - https://groups.diigo.com/group/aqua-tnet
Aqua-tnet discussions on LinkedIn - http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=4447985
Aqua-tnet discussions on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/groups/aquatnet/
Aqua-tnet news on ScoopIt! - http://www.scoop.it/t/aqua-tnet
Aquaculture International Special Edition on Advances in Teaching & Learning from Aqua-tnet -
http://link.springer.com/journal/10499/23/3
Wikiversity - https://www.wikiversity.org/
Open Education Europa portal – http://openeducationeuropa.eu
Temoa - http://www.temoa.info/
OER Africa - http://www.oerafrica.org/
African Virtual University Resources - http://oer.avu.org/
OER from the UK Open University - http://www.open.ac.uk/about/open-educational-resources/
Creative Commons Education - http://creativecommons.org/education
UNESCO OER - http://www.unesco.org/new/en/communication-and-information/access-to-knowledge/open-
educational-resources/
Martin Weller book: The Battle for Open - http://www.ubiquitypress.com/site/books/detail/11/battle-for-open/
Useful web links

26. This presentation is based on work carried out
within the framework of the AQUA-TNET project
which received funding from the European
Union’s Lifelong Learning Programme, Erasmus
Thematic Networks under grant agreement No.
2011-3997/001-001 and Project No. 518700-LLP-
1-2011-1-UK-ERASMUS-ENW. This presentation
reflects the views only of the author, and the
European Union cannot be held responsible for
any use which may be made of the information
contained therein.
Graphic images used in this presentation were
sourced from the Internet with the origin cited on
the appropriate slide.
Disclaimer