Open Educational Practice: knowledge in the open web - heutagogical open weaving. #KNOWHOW

Using a connectivist learning approach this project will evaluate, curate and create resources to enable students and staff alike to understand and access the learning opportunities available through open, connected practice.

This project aims to help to address the knowledge and skills gap that exists for both teachers and learners to give wider awareness of how to locate and contribute to opportunities for learning through connecting in open digital spaces. We will be investigating the steps needed in order to normalise safe and effective open practice and work confidently in the new digital domain for scholarship. The project participants will explore existing networks in order to weave together resources for a self-access MOOC to enable others to benefit from OER.  The need for further exploration in this area is identified in a paper by Czerniewicz (2016). The project follows on from a previous WIHEA student experience project which revealed an interest in open practice and a core of students from that project are eager to continue and build on the work started under that project. We are also continuing to advance the collaborations across SMLC and synergies we have with CAL and CEP on learning and teaching. For example, the Linguistic Landscape project (SMLC Hispanic Studies) has demonstrated the value of using social media (twitter @HSLingLands) to alert students to the many physical manifestations of the language they are studying that exist in the real world, sharing them openly with their twitter channel. Opportunities exist to build on this further, curating the shared pictures and building a clear way of working which, if adopted in other contexts can successfully help cross the formal/informal learning divide, bringing greater student engagement in their learning. The lessons learned through the Clavier project which also successfully crosses the borders of formal and informal learning and demonstrates effective online intercultural exchange will be able to inform other disciplinary activity into telecollaborative practice through the networking the project will engender.

The project is centred on the importance of understanding and managing online presence. The project team enact that through accessing and sharing resources online in a variety of spaces. 

These include:

• A course space on the Languages@Warwick VLE available only to team members
• Shared folders on our Google Apps for education drive
• An outward facing blog
• An open G+ community
• Hashtags #wihea #knowhow to enable sharing and amplification of resources on social media
• Videos on Kaltura gallery, vimeo and YouTube channels

The ambition of this project is to get a sense of the level of understanding of online identity management that happens across our campus. The concept of open practice is quite abstract for many, especially those who are suspicious of any online activity. Arriving at a point where any individual feels confident in sharing their work and revealing a professional online identity to others involves a series of complex decision making processes which may need to be actively managed over time. 

Some of the team members had taken part in an earlier WIHEA project. For those that did not have that background I shared some important take-aways to give context. The resources and interactions use a range of online spaces and it takes a while to get familiar with them, just managing your passwords, mastering permissions and navigation requires lots of practice. 

Beyond these practical hurdles we were also dealing with the very personal decision making processes that we all have to engage with if we are active online. There are no quick answers here. In the early stages of the project I undertook a piece of action research for the #LERMOOC course, a cognitive review of the research approach with a staff team member which highlighted that we may be find this area difficult to explore.