This guest lecture focuses on providing a quick introduction on OER to PhD students in the education stream at Allama Iqbal Open University (AIOU). The topics covered are (i) What are OER?; (ii) What are useful OER?; (iii) OER Search; (iv) Useful OER sources; and (v) OER vs. MOOC. .

1. Open Educational
Resources (OER)
A Quick Introduction
Guest Lecture
Faculty of Education
Allama Iqbal Open University (AIOU)
Islamabad, Pakistan
27th August 2014

2. Ishan Abeywardena
MSc, MSc (Brunel), BSc (Bangalore), MIEEE, MBCS, MIET, MTA
Deputy Dean and Senior Lecturer
School of Science and Technology
Wawasan Open University
Penang, Malaysia

3. Outline
• What are OER?
• What are useful
OER?
• OER Search
• Useful OER Sources
• OER vs. MOOC

4. What are OER?

5. “web-based materials,
offered freely and openly
for use and re-use in
teaching, learning and
research” (Joyce, 2007).
Joyce, A. (2007). OECD Study of OER: Forum Report, OECD. Retrieved December 12, 2011 from
http://www.unesco.org/iiep/virtualuniversity/forumsfiche.php?queryforumspages_id=33.

6. “teaching, learning and research
materials in any medium, digital
or otherwise, that reside in the
public domain or have been
released under an open license
that permits no-cost access, use,
adaptation and redistribution by
others with no or limited
restrictions”
(UNESCO Paris OER Declaration, 2012)
UNESCO. (2012, June 22). 2012 PARIS OER DECLARATION. Retrieved June 13, 2013, from unesco.org:
http://www.unesco.org/new/fileadmin/MULTIMEDIA/HQ/CI/WPFD2009/English_Declaration.html

7. OER: Just another means of getting there…

8. basis for training the global masses
increased access
reduced costs
increased equity
Impact

9. What are useful OER?

10. How useful is a resource really?

11. Measures of usefulness
Openness
Accessibility
Relevance

12. Less useful resources are less desirable for teaching and learning needs….
What is Desirability?
Openness
Accessibility
Relevance

13. Openness

14. four ‘R’s model:
 Reuse
 Redistribute
 Revise
 Remix
 Retain
Hilton, J., Wiley, D., Stein, J., & Johnson, A. (2010). The four R‘s of openness and ALMS Analysis: Frameworks for open educational resources.
Open Learning: The Journal of Open and Distance Learning, 25(1), 37-44.
O

16. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YkbeycRa2A
Lets watch a video on CC

18. Unported
Ported

19. Accessibility

20. Access (ALMS)
Hilton, J., Wiley, D., Stein, J., & Johnson, A. (2010). The four R‘s of openness and ALMS Analysis: Frameworks for open educational
resources. Open Learning: The Journal of Open and Distance Learning, 25(1), 37-44.
• Access to editing tools
• Level of expertise
required to revise or
remix
• Meaningfully editable
• Source file access

21. Relevance

22. Content repositories
Portal repositories
Content and portal repositories
McGreal, R. (2010). Open Educational Resource Repositories: An Analysis. Proceedings: The 3rd Annual Forum on e-Learning
Excellence, 1-3 February 2010, Dubai, UAE.
Curation

24. So…how do I find the material I need for my teaching?

26. Google“AdvancedSearch”resultsforOERonChemistry(24thMay2012)

27. Native search mechanisms perhaps?

28. i. Facilitate finding, retrieving
and sharing of OER.
Encourage the
development of user-
friendly tools to locate and
retrieve OER that are
specific and relevant to
particular needs.
(UNESCO Paris OER Declaration, 2012)
The Declaration
UNESCO. (2012). Paris OER Declaration, Retrieved September18, 2012 from
http://www.unesco.org/new/fileadmin/MULTIMEDIA/HQ/CI/CI/pdf/Events/Paris%20OER%20Declaration_01.pdf

29. Linked Open Data
http://linkeddata.org/static/images/lod-datasets_2009-07-14_cropped.png (accessed 23/06/2014)

30. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uju4wT9uBIA
Lets watch a video on LOD

31. Useful OER Sources

32. http://www.pearsonlearningsolutions.com/pearson-bluesky/

33. http://www.globe-info.org/

42. OER vs. MOOC

44. “The large scale of the community, from several
hundred to several thousand participants,
maximizes the possibility that the “long tail”
effect will enable someone with even the most
esoteric interests within the overall focus of the
MOOC to find people with whom to share and
collaborate” McAuley, Stewart, Siemens, & Cormier (2010)
McAuley, A., Stewart, B., Siemens, G., & Cormier, D. (2010). The MOOC Model for Digital Practice. Retrieved 12 15, 2013, from
http://www.elearnspace.org/Articles/MOOC_Final.pdf

45. “...what MOOCs will not do is address the
challenge of expanding higher education in the
developing world. It may encourage universities
there, both public and private, to develop online
learning more deliberately, and OER from MOOC
courses may find their way, alongside OER from
other sources, into the teaching of local
institutions”. Daniel (2012)
Daniel, J. (2012). Making sense of MOOCs: Musings in a maze of myth, paradox and possibility. Journal of Interactive Media in
Education, 3.

46. Sentiment Analysis
What does the public think??
Paris OER Declaration 2012

47. https://about.twitter.com/company (15/01/2014)
• 230+ million monthly active users
• 500 million Tweets are sent per day
• 76% of Twitter active users are on
mobile
• 77% of accounts are outside the U.S.
• Twitter supports 35+ languages
• Vine: More than 40 million users

48. The Twitter dataset used in the study consisting of
tweets which include the terms ‘OER’ and ‘MOOC’.
Search Query Tweet History Timespan No. of Distinct Tweets
OER 1/11/2012 – 31/10/2013 12 months 1209
MOOC 1/05/2013 – 31/10/2013 6 months 2823

50. Change in public opinion on ‘OER’ vs. ‘MOOC’
for a 6 month timespan between May to October 2013

51. • there is an increasing amount of interest
on MOOC;
• the public still hasn’t formed strong
opinions regarding MOOC due to the
novelty of the ideology;
• the positivity towards OER is growing.
Trends

52. Questions?
I will also be happy to answer your queries if you
e-mail me via ishan.abeywardena@gmail.com
Thanks!

53. About…
Ishan Abeywardena
Deputy Dean and Senior Lecturer, School of Science and Technology, Wawasan Open University, Penang, Malaysia
• MSc in Wireless Enterprise Business Systems, Brunel University, UK.
• MSc in Engineering Management, Brunel University, UK.
• BSc in Computer Science, Bangalore University, India.
• PhD Candidate in Computer Science, University Malaya, Malaysia. Areas of specialisation: text mining,
metadata, faceted search
Professional Member of
– Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (MIEEE)
– British Computer Society (MBCS)
– Institution of Engineering and Technology (MIET)
– Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP)
– Microsoft Technology Associate (MTA)
Official Profile: http://www.wou.edu.my/IshanAbeywardena.html
Professional Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/ishansa
Research Profile: http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Ishan_Abeywardena/
Tech Blog: http://www.ishantalks.com
E-mail: ishan.abeywardena@gmail.com

54. Media Sources
• http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/58/Multimedia_icon.png/120px-Multimedia_icon.png
• http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/25/Nuvola_multimedia.png/120px-Nuvola_multimedia.png
• http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b5/Open_Clip_Art_Library_Piggy_Bank.svg/120px-
Open_Clip_Art_Library_Piggy_Bank.svg.png
• http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Active_learning_-_jigsaw_map_of_Southeast_Asia.jpg
• http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:%D0%9A%D0%BE%D0%BF%D0%B8%D1%8F_800px-Ua-er9m-558-20070728.jpg
• http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Public_Bus,_Cairo_02.JPG
• http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Polski_Fiat_126p_in_Krak%C3%B3w_(MWM_2010).jpg
• http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:PLM_2011_64_Jetalliance_Lotus.jpg
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YkbeycRa2A
• hydrodictyon.eeb.uconn.edu