Wednesday, October 15, 2014

#Oepsforum14 #Openscot Reflections




I enjoyed the aspiration of this week's OEPs Forum http://oepscotland.org/tag/online-hub/    there is a lot of Scottish Funding Council money going into this programme and I am sure we will get something built from this that is distinctly Scottish and reaches into the challenges being faced in schools,  colleges , community learning  as well as higher education across Scotland.  The main thing I think we need to focus on is high level policy change - without this institutional blocks will remain the common denominator for those who wish to open up learning resources. 

The project objectives are here http://oepscotland.org/about/project-objectives/ 

Great too that the OU will match funding from SFC with DFID resources to build a new product for international markets - but would have liked some more focus on acting  local as well as thinking global. 

If Open Education is anything it is about life long learning , its about developing open practitioners and it has got to be about ground up practice and top down policy changes. 

I made point to organisers at end - when we were invited to come back and see them again early in the new year - that what we really need ASAP is an on-line community associated with the programme. There is already a lot of grass roots activity going on in Scotland and across the UK . I hope the partners in the OEPS project harness all of this .  Understandably a lot of focus at event seemed to be around what the Open University could do for us - question for long term sustainability should really be around what can we all do to open up learning.  The other question which I thought was rude to ask on day - was where were the other OEPS partners at the event - some thoughts from Glasgow University , Edinburgh University , Strathclyde or UHI in introductory presentations were missing from day - to make the most of this opportunity really requires broad range of stakeholders and thinkers. 

I highlight below some useful workshops being supported by ALT and JORUM really as indication that there is a lot going on in this space. 

The following webinars run and delivered by the Open Education Special Interest Group of ALT may be useful to members of this list. The content is a mix for those who are both new to and familiar with OER. Jorum will be supporting the webinar on Creative Commons in December.

1. How to write an OER workshop (for staff development)

Wednesday 5th November  13.00 - 13.40

This workshop will look at how advocates of  Open Education can use and reuse existing OER materials for training sessions cascading the OE message.

By exploring the huge variety of materials that exist, this webinar will demonstrate how your workshop can represent the OE agenda itself and act as an example of how reusing materials can be an effective and efficient choice when designing and creating learning activities.

Presenters: Alex Fenlon and Ella Mitchell

Link to webinar:

https://sas.elluminate.com/m.jnlp?sid=7565&password=M.EB5A1870DD4B812AC04FD7BDAD8E0F


2. Title: Creating and using video resources for language teaching.
(Open Educational Practice)

Tuesday 25 Nov  13.00 - 13.40

The University of Warwick Language Centre and the Centre for Applied Linguistics are partners in an EU project called Video for All. The project’s mission is to support language teachers in all sectors in the exploitation of video for teaching. The Language Centre has been innovating in the use of digital media for some time and is the subject of a Jisc Digital Media case study. Video for All will produce exemplar practices for teachers which are searchable and available as Open Educational Resources. However, challenges are evident. The presenter has recently co-authored a submission to the Education Policy Analysis Archives (EPAA) for a special issue exploring “Models of Open Education in Higher Education”. This webinar will discuss some of the issues we are dealing with in the hope that the OER sig will be able to contribute to our discussions and offer feedback on our decision making process.

Key words:

Streaming media; creative commons licensing; repositories; repurposing and remixing; copyright.

Teresa MacKinnon
LinkedIn Profile
Principal Teaching Fellow,
School of Languages and Cultures
University of Warwick.

To join go to:
https://ca-sas.bbcollab.com/site/external/jwsdetect/meeting.jnlp?sid=2012058&username=&password=M.7E015779A2D9581AF91B36BB9F5E97

3. Creative Commons - understanding the basics (CC for Dummies)

Thursday December 11th 13.00 - 13.40


Creative Commons (CC) licences are a simple way of retaining copyright whilst allowing others to reuse your work. The range of licences lets you define how others can reuse your material. This session will demonstrate how simple it is to use CC licences and what they mean in practice.

We will also introduce the UK repository JORUM, demonstrating how to apply CC licences to materials as you deposit.

Presentation: Vivien Sieber and Siobhan Burke
Moderator: Alex Fenlon

Webinar link

https://sas.elluminate.com/m.jnlp?sid=7565&password=M.4F5E50E2B182B1FEE046461D9A8CA6

TECHNICAL NOTE

Please note that the sessions will take place in Blackboard Collaborate. Even if you are familiar with Blackboard, it is important that in advance you check that your system and connection are capable of handling a session, and that you have the (small) Blackboard Collaborate client successfully installed. Do this from the support page at http://www.elluminate.com/support/