The document outlines the Berta Project, which aims to (1) collate open educational resources (OERs) relevant for training teacher educators in quality online and distance education (ODeL) in Africa, (2) organize the OERs into a course format to empower teacher educators to adapt the resources for their contexts, and (3) develop the resource in consultation with stakeholders. The project methodology involves finding appropriate OERs, integrating them into a program organized into 4 thematic modules on program design, assessment, student support, and using ICT tools, and getting feedback from stakeholders through webinars and conferences. The final version will be published under a Creative Commons license for open use.

1. Collating and modelling OERs to
train Teacher Educators in Quality
ODeL on the African continent.
Brenda Mallinson and Tony Mays

2. Outline
Background
The Berta Project
Demonstration of Online Resources
Discussion & contributions

3. Background
• Need established for:
– massive and ongoing expansion of quality teacher
development in Africa
• Possible solution:
– identify OERs that fit the needs
– organise currently scattered OERs more efficiently
• Offered:
– via expansion of ODL
– in collaboration with stakeholder community

5. Project Objectives
1. Collate a set of OER organized into a course format that will enable
teacher educators to explore the potential of distance and
eLearning to support teacher development, empowering them to
adapt existing OER to suit their own contexts of practice.
2. Provide a set or collection of themed resources in a form that
promotes flexible delivery options of the full set or a selection
thereof by the target audience.
3. Develop the resource and its constituent parts in consultation with
the target stakeholder community.
Note: The final version will be published under a creative commons
CCBY license and will become available to anybody with an interest in
using distance and eLearning provision to support expanded quality
teacher development.

6. Berta Project Methodology
• Find and collate appropriate OERs
• Integration of OERs in the programme and environment
• Interacting with stakeholders
 1st webinar - recording http://goo.gl/LQhB57
 ACDE Conference
 Wherever/whenever the opportunity arises
• Analyze and respond to stakeholders feedback
• Finalise learning environments

7. Why OER and why 4 ODeL Modules?
• Provision of learning resources is a key
characteristic of ODeL, hence it is logical to think
about OER
• BUT: learning resources do not on their own
make an ODeL programme
• Learning resources need to be integrated with:
– an appropriate assessment strategy, hence Module 2
– decentralised student support, hence Module 3
– interaction and collaboration can be enhanced
through ICT integration, hence Module 4
– and the whole has to be designed coherently, well
before registration, hence Module 1.

8. Demonstration of Modules
• 4 Themed Modules:
Programme Design
Assessment Strategy
Student Support
Using ICT Tools
• http://riga.uoc.es/berta/
• Guest access: password ‘ICDE’

9. Questions for reflection & contribution
• If you are integrating OER into your teacher
education programmes:
– what sources have you found particularly useful?
– what are the challenges and how can they be
overcome?
• If you are using ODeL methods to offer your
teacher education programmes:
– what sources have you found particularly useful?
– what are the challenges and how can they be
overcome?
• Please indicate your interest and/or send active
links to useful relevant OER to tonym@saide.org.za
or brendam@saide.org.za

10. Thank You!
Brenda Mallinson
brendam@saide.org.za
Slideshare - http://www.slideshare.net/brenda6
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported License.