Unveiling the Relationship between the Use of Open Educational Resources and the Adoption of Open Teaching Practices in Higher Education

Fabio Nascimbeni,Daniel Burgos

doi:10.3390/su11205637

Fabio Nascimbeni, Daniel Burgos

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/su11205637

Copy DOI

Journal: Sustainability	Publication Date: Oct 13, 2019
Citations: 22	License type: CC BY 4.0

Affiliation: Universidad Internacional De La Rioja

Abstract

The goal of this paper is to advance the understanding of the way university educators currently adopt open educational practices (OEP) by analyzing the relation between the use of open educational resources (OER) and the implementation of open teaching practices. The results are based on data collected through an online survey among 724 university educators. Depending on the actual use of OER and open teaching practices by the survey respondents, we have categorized them along a scale that goes from “novice” to “expert”, and we analyzed the data to evaluate their use of OER and their adoption of open teaching practices, looking for relationships between the two phenomena. The main finding of this paper, which confirms the latest research findings from the open education community, is that a strong relationship exists between the two dimensions: The more an educator uses OER, the more he will probably adopt open teaching practices, and vice versa. These results are discussed with a view to use this virtuous circle between the use of open content and adoption of open teaching as a way to build generalized open education capacity among universities’ teaching staff.

Highlights

In the last decade, the concept of open educational practices (OEP) has raised interest within the open education movement [1]
The goal of this paper is to contribute to improving the understanding of the correlation between the use of open educational resources (OER) and the adoption of open teaching practices within higher education, as well as to investigate whether an inverse relationship exists, where the use of open pedagogies is influencing the potential adoption of OER
The online questionnaire has generated plentiful data: In this paper we present a fraction of the resuTlthse, foonculisniengquoenstthioenrnealairteiohnabsegtweneeernattehde apdleonpttiifounl dofatOaE: IRnatnhdistphaepuesrewofeoppreensetneat cahfirnagctmioenthoofdths,e reinsulilntse, fwoictuhstihneg roensetahrechreqlauteiostniobnestwpreeesnenthteedaadboopvteio. n of OER and the use of open teaching methods, in line with the research questions presented above

Summary

Introduction

The concept of open educational practices (OEP) has raised interest within the open education movement [1]. Cronin defines OEP as “a broad descriptor of practices that include the creation, use, and reuse of open educational resources (OER) as well as open pedagogies and open sharing of teaching practices” [3]. Much has been written on the innovation potential that the use of OER could have on the way educators teach, to the point of formalizing the concept of OER-enabled pedagogy, defined as teaching practices that take place “in the context of the 5R permissions (retain, reuse, revise, remix, and redistribute) which are characteristic of OER” [6]. When learners are encouraged to develop and meaningfully revise the teaching resources, the relationship between the teacher, the student, and the teaching content is inevitably transformed: knowledge converts from a stable asset (contained in a book, for example) into a fluid process in which students can actively and critically engage. Some teachers might be attracted to OER because of their potential for social justice, others by their impact on pedagogical innovation, others by both these drivers [8]

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion