"OER's 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 or re-purposing by others. 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." William and Flora Hewlett FoundationThis week we'll stray from the usual format and work completely from this blog entry and the assignments/readings on the syllabus.
Start with this video. I know that most of you have already gone through the OER Commons Tutorial, and that should have really given you a good overview, but watch this video. The speaker gives you some additional 'quick' resources to gain more of a solid foundation on the concepts. As he goes through resources, pause the video and try to recreate his steps.
Next, I'd like you to watch this video on the impact of 'open' on teaching and learning:
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- Now I'd like you to read a little more about "How Resources are Organized" w/i OERcommons, then pore through the rest of the instructions to help you more easily find useful and practical Digital Content.
- Once you've finished with the dull stuff from # 1, you can then dive in and really get to use this resource. The only realistic way to get familiar with Digital Content that is free to use is to jump right in, so for the next hour or so, I'd like you explore the OERcommons site. (Ideally to find material that is practical for your setting.) They have a new tool there called, "Open Author". I haven't used it yet, so spend some time playing with it to see if this might me a good spot for you to begin collating your content for your discipline. Once you've had your fill, share out under the 'comments' link below the Session 3 posting. Let us know what you found, what your impression is, and forecast what this trend will mean for your workplace setting.
- When you are done with posting your comments, I'd like you to begin exploring the link below. Dozens, if not hundreds, of colleges and universities are now offering many of their courses for free. Through podcasts, videocasts, and free downloads of supplemental material a motivated person could acquire the equivalent of a degree, completely on their own and for FREE! Spend some time visiting the schools from this link and check out some of the free material available for your discipline. If you visit the MIT link you'll see that they have over 2000 courses freely accessible. It's mind-blowing and exciting, but be careful not to spend too much time there. Every time I visit this site, 2-3 hours disappear in the blink of an eye.
- Now if this all scares you a little or you feel a little intimidated---that's justified. I'm sure that you have a lot of questions. The biggest concern I hear is about the quality of the information. We'll go into more detail about that in the next few sessions, but for now think about how many teachers stray from the textbooks in their class and instead use high-quality, credible information that they have screened using their professional judgment.
Now think about how much information teachers have in their heads. If they took the time to write it out, and share it freely with the world, we would have a tremendously powerful tool.
Well, that's probably more than enough information for this week. If your eyes aren't going buggy by now then spend the rest of your time trying to exploring the different colleges linked from #3. See if you can find one to use in your educational setting.
You'll notice in the syllabus I had you read a little snippet or two on CK-12.org. I had hoped to cover some of them this week, but I was afraid that I'd overwhelm you. You'll notice that I have been 'polling' you to see how much time your spending going through these resources each week. I'm trying not to overwhelm, while at the same time, I'm challenged with giving you enough information for you to gain a solid foundation. I'll take another poll this week about the workload and will adjust each week's load accordingly. Please keep the suggestions coming.
Good luck and as always please feel free to contact me if you have any questions or concerns.
Dave Fontaine
6 comments:
I am looking forward to using the OER to create a brand new instructional unit that I'd like to implement next year. Since it is a nascent unit and I am new to this, I I am little reluctant and intimidated about putting it up on a resource like OER. Choosing when to publish alleviates some of that angst, however. I can revise and experiment first.
Jack hits on a great point. Take your time and wait until you reach your comfort level before you open up your material. Often you have to change your way of thinking to accept the fact that these eBooks will be perpetually evolving, improving, and enhancing your lessons forever.
I agree with Jack as well. Posting anywhere right now is intimidating. After browsing OER I found there be a wealth of information but I was struggling to find relevant topics for my area of teaching. I think I may to keep looking. I did like the information videos you posted at the beginning of this lesson Dave.
I was very pleased with OERcommons.org website. I was able to find a number of Algebra 2 resources. It was a bit time consuming to sort out the appropriate level of content even though I did click on the high school level sorting option. The most helpful website I have come across (so far) is OpenAlgebra.com. They have an unbelievable amount of notes, sample questions with directions for solving, and questions linked to videos explaining the process of how to solve. This is going to be a great resource for me to utilize.
@Laurel
Thanks for sharing that OpenAlgebra.com site. I hadn't seen that one before, but I see a lot of potential for embedding the videos and simulations into your own eText. An added benefit is that there are also plenty of worksheets as well that you can copy and use. All the material is CC licensed.
I still have not found a one stop shop (CK12, OER) that has what I am looking for in terms of High School Health Education content. It seems like STEM, History, and ELA subjects have more content added to these sites. Re-formatting everything I have to add it here and connect to Canvas may be a duplication of work. I know that colleagues and I have a collected a ton of resources but finding the right platform to easily share/and add is elusive.
I am hoping to meet f2f with Donna and Jackie soon in order to problem solve. As always time is hard to find! I'll keep plugging away. I look forward to hearing how everyone else is doing! :-)
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