OER1163 Oral Presentation pptx

Wednesday 11 May 11.30 Breakout Room 6

CSI: Milton Keynes – in search of the OER user

Chris Pegler, The Open University

Conference Theme: OER strategy and sustainability; collaboration and communities

Abstract: Who is using OER? Who did it? Where? Why? With what tools? This paper draws on interview and survey work with suspected users of OER conducted by the ORIOLE (Open Resources: Impact on Learners and Educators) project. It is grounded in forensic examination of research into the role of motivation, quality and technology in fostering reuse of resources within formal and informal, large and small scale systems or communities (building from Pegler, 2010). How are users of OER different from other resource users and why? What is the chance of repeat 'offences' to create sustainable patterns of behaviour from which we can learn?
The investigation presented here, draws on evidence collected by the Milton Keynes-based team from ORIOLE, but is not restricted to work at the UK Open University (home of OpenLearn and SCORE initiatives). It takes its questions from OER10 (Reuse: the other side of sharing OER) and OpenEd10 presentations in particular. For example the enthusiasm for little and big OER (Weller, 2010), the difference that openness makes to users Wiley (2010) and the impact, and representativeness of UK OER project case evidence.
There are many different reasons for engaging with creation of OER use, from showcasing content to attract students (Beggan, 2010), to sharing practice to develop staff (Conole, 2010). OER-use opportunities now address many different communities, but the impact is not limited to sharing. For sustainable impact it needs to address users and their needs. Understanding what leads to and inhibits use of OER, and what might fuel growth in use relies upon understanding who the users of OER currently are, and why they are using OER. Who did it and why? This session will share evidence gathered from the search for users of OER and examine their testimony about the impact that OER is having. Resources from Policy-Police (policy-police.blogspot.com) will be used in this presentation.

Keywords: reuse; oer; oriole; sustainability; impact

References:

Beggan, A (2010)
Enhancing and expanding Nottingham’s existing Open Educational Repository to progress the vision of sustainable OERs, Presentation at SCORE workshop, Birmingham, 10 March http://www.slideshare.net/SCORE/ber-li-n-ou-oer-nottinghamuniversity10032010day-v1-4068227

Conole. G. (2010)
Redefining openness: a vision for Open Practices, Online Educa Workshop, Berlin

Pegler (2010)
Reuse: the other side of sharing OER, Presentation at OER10 conference, 23 March, Cambridge, UK http://www.ucel.ac.uk/oer10/abstracts/1055.html

Weller (2010)
Big and little OER. Paper presented at OpenED2010: Seventh Annual Open Education Conference, 2-4 November, Barcelona, Spain. http://oro.open.ac.uk/24702/

Wiley (2010)