Open Pedagogy
Open Pedagogy builds off of the concept of Pedagogy which I had previously explored in a blog post:
With Open Pedagogy though, we have this new emphasis on top of those concepts toward the shared and collaborative nature behind the learning resources. Typically in a learning environment, a teacher may have their own lesson plans alongside provided videos, books, or media. Instead of this, open pedagogy allows for usage of openly licensed materials, which will be explored further down below. Essentially, it allows for cheaper, more accessible resources, by giving teachers the ability to use, adapt and provide these materials to students to enhance their education. This could be a variety of things such as textbooks, lesson plans, quizzes, etc. It empowers the teachers to be more in control and supported in what they teach, and gives the students barrier free access to education.
Open Educational Resources (OER)
Open Educational Resources are under the openly licensed materials mentioned above, and are these materials that teachers can use, adapt and share to their students. At its core, its really “all about saving costs and sharing resources”, which is a great quote from this Cengage podcast, which gives an introduction into OER and the interest into it: https://video.cengage.com/watch/i2vrKZMBZP4JWgVbVw1Zqo
The Role and Impact
With my experiences, a lot of courses have avoided the usage of mandatory textbooks. I find that financially, it has helped a ton not needing to set aside hundreds of dollars each semester just for a book. I cannot speak to how things used to be, but I see the positive impacts of this transformation of the educational landscape.
One of my courses used Carnap, an “open software framework … for teaching and studying formal logic.” https://carnap.io/ This allows for others to contribute to these learning materials, and allows for me to seek out resources or the textbook material on this website for free instead of paying for access to it.
This removes barriers for registering into classes, given students will drop courses at the start of the semester when they see there are mandatory $200 textbooks on top of the course. Alongside this, it gives others interested in the topic access to these resources, even if they don’t register in the course at all.
Global Trends
The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural institution has a great policy briefing that covers the global trends in OER: https://iite.unesco.org/pics/publications/en/files/3214676.pdf
One thing I find most impactful mentioned from this is the support gained for this from governments, foundations, and institutions. This helps integrate these resources into the hands of educators and students alike, breaking down barriers to adoption.
One issue that comes from this is the adoption process and integration into typical educational practices. For some, there is a real barrier to adoption with the lack of technology needs being met, as well as lack of digital literacy for educators or students. This is something that will need to be tackled with better support systems and investment into these kinds of initiatives.
Creative Commons Licensing
This is an extremely important topic to know in order to facilitate the usage of OER to its fullest potential. Essentially, these are the licensing agreements that creators put onto their materials that define how it can be used, modified, or sold. Understanding what a material is covered under will allow you to best utilize the resources to suit your classes needs, but will need to be evaluated on a case by case basis.
Here’s a great related example, take this course on OER: https://www.open.edu/openlearn/education-development/an-introduction-open-educational-resources-oer/content-section-0?active-tab=description-tab As per their Creative Commons Licensing here, https://about.open.ac.uk/strategy-and-policies/policies-and-statements/conditions-use-open-university-websites, I cannot present this material as my own work within this blog post, but can provide a link to it for you to explore on your own.
Attributes of Open Pedagogy
One great attribute of open pedagogy is transparency, and I think its an important aspect to integrate into educational practices. Making clear expectations, goals and learning outcomes, such that students and teachers alike are fully aware of whats expected. This comes from a great video on how to best integrate OER into your course, as these go hand in hand with supporting students and breaking down barriers for student-centered learning.
Through this, and having transparent, student-centered learning, students will be empowered, more engaged, feel more valued and be in a more equitable environment. It is important for all students to have barrier free access to all resources to enrich their education, without any hinderances.