Personal Blogs

I saw the slidecase on “Academic output as collateral damage” (Weller, 2011) and drew out the following

LITTLE OER

BIG OER

I am very much in favour of the concept of little and big OER. I would call it micro and macro OER. Little OER, in particular, opens up a forum for the institutions, learners and practitioners to share their practices as well as resources to others  Example, I teach MS students in a university. I prepare weekly presentations, which are shared with the course learners only. But if I share these teaching resources online to others (with CC of course) it would help many teachers and learners to gain knowledge, and to use the same resources to prepare improvised or contextual resources.  This micro chain can gradually create linkages to form a macro level work.

TARGET AUDIENCE: UNIVERSITY TEACHERS

DURATION: FIVE WEEKS (6 hours per week)

Background: In the 21^st century, digital skills are important to accelerate the teaching and learning process. Digital teachers can use varieties of methods and techniques to gauge learners. It also helps to improve their professional development skills. Further, they can use various online platforms to accelerate students’ and their own interactions.

I read the article of Downes (2001) titled Learning Objects: Resources for distance education worldwide. Few of the technical things were complicated to understand, the rest was fine.

The article of Stephen Downes reflects on theoretical and practical elements of learning objects. He has quoted many interesting examples on learning objects and different programming structures. 

The writer states "Suppose that just one description of the sine wave function is produced. A high quality and fully interactive piece of learning material could be produced for, perhaps, $1,000. If 1,000 institutions share this one item, the cost is $1 per institution. But if each of a thousand institutions produces a similar item, then each institution must pay $1,000, with a resulting total expenditure of $1,000,000." 

True! On that premise, I have a question, are ALL the institutions willing to collaborate in producing quality content by a single institution and share with the rest?; are ALL the institutions willing to share resources with others free or at low cost? We all know the answer! The ongoing content war shows availability of the same content on hundreds and thousands of websites. Most of the institutions are chasing to adopt the business model of education than sharing quality content for free or low rate with all. That could be the reason for not finding much OER content production from many countries, except few, who truly understand its value!

After reading the article, I realized that we need to take many people into consideration when designing online courses.

Downes states "The vast majority of course syllabi require that students obtain more than one textbook". In Pakistan, as far as I know, textbooks until grade 12 is same and only one textbook for each course is required to be studied. They often buy workbooks (easy notes), which are legally not approved in Pakistan.

I agree with this statement  "students frequently use parts of books (or parts of journals) in their research and reading. That’s why most university libraries come equipped with photocopiers". This is the most common practice at the university level in Pakistan as well.

Few examples such as resources on Holocaust are good, but there are varieties of subject areas, which are unavailable such as I cannot find open education resources or any free online courses on Elements of Human Rights in Higher Education Policies of Pakistan.

The writer has discussed the concept of Rapid Application Design (RAD). The cost is reduced due to RAD, but indirectly, some cost is involved!

I like Bates model, but too expensive! From the readings, I understood that there is a gap in connectivity between producers, institutions and resources. OER agencies must provide free platform and assistance to writers and institutions who want to contribute their part for open access. Further "reusable learning materials and reusable applications" must be taken into consideration when designing learning objects. After all, learning object must look for performance-based outcomes than content-based,

I read the following book and webpage to derive the meaning of openness in education:

Weller, M. (2014). Battle for Open- How openness won and why it doesn't feel like victory. London: Ubiquity Press.

Bates, T. (2018). What do we mean by 'open' in education? | Tony Bates. [online] Tonybates.ca. Available at: https://www.tonybates.ca/2015/02/16/what-do-we-mean-by-open-in-education/ [Accessed 21 Mar. 2018].

Below given is my representation

Openness in education means empowering others with open access to knowledge and skills. It supports ownership of learning. These resources/ courses are available to the larger audience, which support transformative production. However, one needs to have the accessibility to technology in order to avail open learning resources.  For me, it a complicated term because, at many instances, this word is not integrated well into open education/learning system. Example, a good number of open resources lack accountability and reputation. Financial barrier still prevails to retrieve many credible books and research journals.

Regards

Dr. Munir

I would be adopting the following technologies at my university

Adaptive learning technologies: I read about this term in the report as well as online. It can be used to track students’ progress (expertise as well as areas of improvement) as well as to facilitate their learning needs. In our university, we cannot track students’ progress at large because of the manual grading system. We have a larger number of students and each teacher check assignments, quizzes and tests at their convenience. It makes harder for practitioners to trace students’ progress or to guide them accordingly. We have lots of teachers who are trained in IT but they are not using the most out of technology.  Kara & Sevim (2013) highlighted its significance for the similar purpose. “Adaptive learning systems can monitor each learner’s knowledge construction process simultaneously and present scaffoldings and provide immediate feedback in accordance with each learner’s expectations. Interactive tutor in the system helps students to excel each skill, give short quizzes about the content, keep individual score and offer additional help (p.112).” Learners can also trace their progress online through adaptive technology system in an online course (Heo & Joung, 2004), but in my institutional context, it can be successfully used in the blended-learning environment.

Mobile Learning: Most of our university students have access to mobile and internet. During the last module, I conducted one activity, where learners used mobile for research purpose. It was a successful attempt. But learners mostly use mobile for chatting than for productive purpose. I want to initiate mobile learning among students to improve their listening and communication skills.

Mobile technology is useful for language learning. Demouy and Agnes (2010) successfully used mobile devices for French language programme. Similarly, Zhang (2010) highlighted the positive impact of mobile technology on improving listening skills of English as Second Language Learners.

Most of the students studying in our university belong to the rural background and lack vocabulary. I will be using mobile technology to send them one vocabulary each day along with one audio file to improve their listening skills.  In return, each student will use the vocabulary in a sentence and will share the audio with others on a dedicated Whatsapp group (initial plan).

Natural User Interfaces (NUI): I read about a model for an online educational game using natural user interface, which can potentially improve the physical, emotional, cognitive, and social development of learners (Shapi'i & Ghulam, 2016). NUI has been successfully used for medical learners, but I our university can potentially test a prototype and then use it for the future teacher learning by creating virtual learning environment using NUI.

References (IN APA)

Shapi'i, A., & Ghulam. S. (2016). Model for Educational Game Using Natural User Interface. International Journal of Computer Games Technology. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2016/6890351

Kara, N., & Sevim, N. (2013). Adaptive Learning Systems: Beyond Teaching Machines. Contemporary Educational Technology, 4(2), 108-120. Retrieved from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1105533.pdf

Heo, H., & Joung, S. (2004). Self-Regulation Strategies and Technologies for Adaptive Learning Management Systems for Web-based Instruction. Retrieved from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED485141.pdf

Demouy, Valérie and Kukulska-Hulme, Agnes (2010). On the spot: using mobile devices for listening

and speaking practice on a French language programme. Open Learning: The Journal of Open and Distance Learning, 25 (3), 217-232

Zhang, Y. (2016). The Impact of Mobile Learning on ESL Listening Comprehension. 3rd International Conference on Advanced Education and Management. Retrieved from dpi-proceedings.com/index.php/dtssehs/article/viewFile/4290/3928

Behaviorism

a.       I saw the video of Operant conditioning experiment conducted by Skinner. Pigeon behavior was shaped by controlling the environment. I argue that if the environment is controlled, then a child might not behave same in other environments. I like the idea of giving children schedule of reward as reinforce strategy. But we need to give more intrinsic rewards than extrinsic one to the learners.

Behavior is not a static characteristic. It changes by time, situation and experiences. We can shape behavior by rewards. But for consistency in changing behavior, we need to design sustainable strategies such as constant encouragement and exposure to multiple learning environments.

 I am not in favor of isolation strategy of Skinner to change behavior!

b.      In Thorndike’s ‘trial and error’ theory, he proposed that learners learn a lot of new things from trials and errors.  Also, behavior changes because of its consequences. But providing reward all the time is not a good option. It might attach behavior changes with expectations or reward all the time! If children will not receive reward, they might get demotivated! Further, new habits are also developed by situations.

Cognitivism

According to Ausubel, learners must be taught directly through organizing materials. I am not in support of his idea. I am the proponent of Bruner’s idea of discovery learning approach.

According to Bruner “learners should be given opportunities to discover for themselves relationships that are inherent in the learning material.” So true! He proposed the teaching strategy called scaffolding, where the teacher demonstrate how to solve a problem and later give ownership to the learners to master the task, while teacher play the role of a facilitator/ supporter. In my viewpoint, it gradually shifts learners from DEPENDENCIES TO IN DEPENDENCIES.

Advantage: develop critical thinking skills, when pair diverse learners; observation is key to success; moving from simplified to complex tasks.

Disadvantage: difference of learners with regard to skills and level of competencies.

We must give opportunity to learners to take ownership of finding relationship that are inherent in the learning material.

 Constructivism

Piaget studied how knowledge develops from birth to adulthood. Although the stages he describe is the foundation of constructivism. But I argue, why he associated development with restricted age bracket? Children are sharper today because of increasing interactions with environment and because of availability of more learning opportunity at early ages. He did not focus on this domain.  What if a child is disable or a slow learner? Children discover new things now only by knowledge but participation!

Vygotsky focuses on social construction of knowledge [learning process] and on the role of language. Learning happen with interaction with environment. The more you interact the more you learn. All children have different abilities to accomplish tasks either independent or with the help of others guidance.

I would be grateful if you all can share your viewpoints about asynchronous discussion forum uses for learners and practitioners. Can you share its strength and weakness according to your experiences, please?

OER is reducing the digital divide, and making resources accessible to the larger audience, because these resources are available free of cost, which help in cutting the cost of education, but in my personal opinion, OER cannot completely replace the conventional resources and classrooms. In Pakistan, most of the public schools do not have the accessibility of the basic facilities like books, so we cannot think of using technology for accessing resources, unless providing the basic educational resources to the children. Weak technological infrastructure may also hamper its use. It is good that globally, instructors have the facilities to use these materials, but teachers must be trained to incorporate these resources and bear the additional workload, beside the routine work, to use OER. Also, let the teacher decide, if he/she want to use OER or not. Further, there remains a question on the quality of the available resources. I always wonder why the resources are available free of cost? Is it for the social benefits, or for marketing the organization?. Obviously, no one works for free, so there must be some potential benefits for the organizations, in addition to providing the social benefits. The OER resources on all the areas are unevenly distributed. I tried to search for OER on Islamic teaching methods, but I did not find any.  Also, you may not be able to find updated resources all the time. Culture and ideology of every country has great influence on the content, so this might be a challenge too.

OER has potentially reduced the cost of higher education due to disruptive technology (Anderson and McGreal, 2017). It also supports the concept of lifelong learning, and expand the access to learning for everyone by bridging the gap between non-formal, informal and formal learning, but there are many social, legal, economic and technological barriers attached to the use, produce and share of OER (Hylen, 2007). Many people do not have access to technology to use these resources. Also, if the technology is available, many are misusing these freely available resources. In Pakistan, pirated books are available, printed out of the OER materials. It has now become a business industry to use OER for this purpose, with no check and balance from the government.  Thus, the issue of open content and copyrighted of the material is at the forefront of OER.

OER can be implemented worldwide, but technological infrastructure, particularly in the developing countries, along with awareness and training of teachers on the proper utilization of resources is required to turn this idea into the reality.  Also the role of institution is crucial.

The questions raised in week 10a were, ‘What are learning institutions for?’  and ‘[open learning will] smash the structure of the modern university’. The demand of the conventional classes will remain the same forever. Although open access to resources are providing more access to teachers and learners towards free resources, but OER cannot replace institutions. Challenges like quality assurance, etc remain at forefront.

There must be a global policy for OER. Also, quality must be ensured. In addition, if we want to implement OER worldwide, we must first do the 'resource mapping' and 'technological mapping' of the countries 

Reference

Hylén, J. (2007). Giving knowledge for free. 1st ed. Paris: OECD.

Anderson, T. and McGreal, R. (2017). Disruptive Pedagogies and Technologies in Universities. Educational Technology & Society, [online] 15(4), pp.380-389. Available at: http://web.a.ebscohost.com.libezproxy.open.ac.uk/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=11&sid=1f99fbc3-f1e1-43ca-a95e-e917ff0761e7%40sessionmgr4008&hid=4204 [Accessed 23 Apr. 2017].

Universally, there is a challenge of accessibility, quality, and inequity. Regarding cost, I think it is the barrier to overcome these challenges. Education, no doubt is one of the solutions to increase accessibility, but it also carries many challenges like the issue of privacy, quality, etc. Availability of the technological infrastructure and adaptability of the people is also critically important. Regarding universal primary education, this common phrase has only reaped quantitative gains, i.e., more enrollment, poor quality and no assurance of sustainability. In Pakistan, there was an admission drive last year. Results: more enrollment, low quality, and now, ghost students.  Quality of learning can affect conventional as well as technology based classroom as well.

Daniel et al (2006) shared that open and distance learning and ICT has improved accessibility, improved quality and cut cost. I agree, but not in case of Pakistan. In Pakistan, during the recent years, the cost of distance education has increased with no quality improvement. Technology based distance education is not yet functional due to social and cultural barriers. In conventional classrooms, ICT equipment are available in private schools, but most of the children go to public schools, where the students are not even familiar to the term ICT. Education for All an SDG failed in many countries including Pakistan. EFA Goal 2 states “Ensuring that by 2015 all children, particularly girls, children in difficult circumstances and those belonging to ethnic minorities, have access to, and complete, free and compulsory primary education of good quality.” During the past three years, many girls schools are blown up in the conflicted areas by the extremists. We can’t trust the data presented in the fabricated reports. Technology in education has potential, but we need infrastructure and resources, as well as need to see the current social, cultural and political scenario.