Smart Marbles

Here are questions and responses for the final week of the open ed course I took this semester.

Blog your overall feelings about the course. On the content side, what did you learn?
Wow, I can’t believe we’re already to the end of this course. What a great semester! The most important parts of the course for me dealt with the consequences of copyright (lost innovation, government-granted monopoly problems), the incompatability of open licenses, and sustainability in OERS. In each case I was surprised to learn how complex these problems really are, and I have learned to be more cautious in coming up with quick-fix solutions to problems that often deserve a more thorough look.

How will you use it after the class is over?
To be frank, I’m not quite sure. I’m on the brink of making some rather large decisions about my PhD focus which may have some bearing on this question. However, regardless of what my career decisions are, I feel that I will always be an open education fan. The need is so clear in my mind and I already find myself bringing it up with professors whose material I appreciate (gotta have those materials next semester!).

What did we not cover that you realize now we really should have?
If there is one thing I would like to cover more it is the arguments that people make for lengthened copyright. I listened to the Jack Valenti vs Larry Lessig debate, and enjoyed hearing the other side of the argument. In fact, I came away with some appreciation for the difficulties that the recording industry faces. Event though I believe openness is the right way to go, it doesn’t make it any easier for those depending on the old model.

On the process side, how could the class be better next time it’s taught?
What would you change?
We started out with so many people and after a while it began to be a bit confusing regarding who was still participating and who was not. You’d go out to people’s blogs and be unsure if they had stopped posting or if they were just a prolific writer and the post was buried by newer entries. Providing a mechanism to identify who is and is not still participating may be helpful

What would you keep?
I would definitely keep the assignments to go out and review other’s blogs. It not only helped me to see what others were thinking and writing, but I also really appreciated the feedback on my own blog.

Is there anything we as a group can do after the course is over? (Stian Haklev)
Yeah, let’s keep writing on these subjects. We all have blogs now and if we keep writing and commenting we may be a force for change in getting an awareness of these issues out there!

Jesse begins this weeks review of blogs with some interesting observations about how the changes towards openness might happen in China.

So I am thinking if we want the higher education become more open in China, maybe we should start with the bigger universities in educational-centric cities, then move on to local universities. When the time the open education movement has been well developed in China, many people not only school students but more lifelong learners will be benefit from it;

Even though, as Jesse states, larger universities will probably be the place where OERs receive the most traction, I wonder if the initial interest in China will come from a very different source: namely, people like Jesse who have caught the vision of OER and then return home to share it with others. I am by no means an expert in Chinese culture, but I think it is important to realize the impact that we can each have on the world. This class itself and our collective group of blog entries for the semester, may have an effect on getting the word out about openness.

Rob made some interesting predictions about the GFDL and CC licenses:

My first prediction is that we will have compatible versions of the GFDL and CC licenses by 2010, although concessions will have to be made on both sides, and they will not be fully compatible. There will be certain versions of both that play together. Some people will care and use the license-exchange option, and some will continue not to care and mix them anyway.

This is particularly interesting given the fact that within days after making the prediction Jimmy Wales announced an agreement made between Wikipedia, the FSF, and Creative Commons to modify the GFDL so it is compatible with CC-BY-SA license (Wiley’s coverage of this amazing turn of events). Way to go Rob, the prediction is already coming true! The very fact that this is happening is simply incredible to me. It is amazing to be taking this class and learning so much about these issues, and yes even getting frustrated from time to time about them, and then to see such a drastic change happening related to topics we have been studying. It is all very exciting and I am sure that when I go home for Christmas I will get the same blank stares that I got during Thanksgiving when I try to explain it all

Yu-Chun talks about the availability of resources and the division between poor neighborhoods and more wealthy neighborhoods.

For those people from poor areas, the access to technology will be a problem. If they are not provides enough technology facilities, those abundant online free materials might be useless to them. Besides, most websites are English-based, but not all learners are English-native speakers. Hence, extending the idea of OER and have local places to produce their own free materials based on their cultures, languages, etc. would be a better way to sustain the development of OER.

Excellent point Yu-Chun! And how important it is to remember that when we speak of OERs that we are often referring to materials that are available primarily on the Internet. Hopefully in the future, this will not be a restriction; however, currently there are many who will not have access to these materials. In fact, both Yu-Chun’s post and Jesse’s describe this need for a intermediary between those who desire open resources and those who do not have them. In Jesse’s post it is the parents, in Yu-Chun’s the focus seems to be on local community centers that would produce materials based on the culture.

Erik discusses his reaction to last weeks readings and makes the following comment:

In the end each student will have access to the information and teachers will have to make the courses more unique and difficult because of the spread and easy accessibility of information from prior courses. This in turn will keep information fresh.

I totally agree. In fact one of my favorite “consequences” of openness is that it often results in higher levels of performance. For example, a focus on openness might encourage a teacher to prepare better materials, be more prepared for class, and have motivation to deliver something more than power point slides during a lecture. The role of teacher changes from content deliverer to wise-use-of-knowledge-enhancer (put that on your name plaque). I also agree that this pattern encourages teachers to “keep it fresh.” It reminds me of my first experience with Subway restaurants. “You mean you’re going to prepare everything in front of me!?” I realized that it wasn’t only about developing trust in me as a customer, but helping the employees perform at their best as well.

Whether we work at a University or are students attending a University, we sense it. A feeling of restlessness, boredom, uneasiness, and dissatisfaction. It is becoming more and more clear that the structure of the modern day University is not meeting student’s expectations. Where this malcontent speaks most clearly, however, is in the stories of the lives of everyday students. One student complains of attending a course in a sixteen-hundred seat room, filled to capacity. Another student bemoans his freshman Biology course that requires a $215 textbook along with a $45 charge for copies of the class notes. Yet other students complain of rising tuition costs without corresponding increases in services.

No longer fitting into the campuses that were made for their parents and grandparents, some of today’s students are looking to other sources. University of Phoenix, Cappella University, Western Governor’s University, Walden University each has sought in its own way to meet the changing needs of students and to provide alternatives to traditional higher education institutions. As competition from outside competitors grows, and as the degrees coming from these alternative sources become more and more reputable, the traditional Universities will feel some pressure to cut costs and discard antiquated beliefs about what a University education means.

One of these adjustments might be the movement towards the use of OER materials. Although the OER movement may be influential in bringing awareness of these resources, I do not see the OER movement being the driving force behind the changes that need to be made in the University environment. What it will most likely come down to is money. Universities will latch on to OERs out of necessity, to reduce costs and to remain competitive with other establishments. Furthermore, as students become aware of other Universities reducing, and in some cases even eliminating, these costs, it will become more difficult for professors to require large expensive textbooks.

High schools will be even more effected by the changes taking place within the University, because the reduction in cost is more significant (schools pay for their own texts in most high schools, compared with the University where students pay for their own books). Elementary schools may be similarly influenced, attempting to reduce costs by turning towards OER resources. The question that arises is where these changes will begin? Will it be with the Universities or in the public education sector? In my opinion, it really depends on where the most competition exists for improving the quality of education. As mentioned above, I believe that the competition that is growing to attract University level students will possibly spur the adoption of these materials at the University faster than that at public high schools and elementary schools. However, it may be that competitive forces at the primary and secondary levels of education (such as private and charter schools) will encourage adoption of these materials before the University level.

Rob approached last week’s question from a novel perspective. He based his observations on a framework proposed by Souza and Preece which includes two major components: sociability and usability. He questions how the learning objects community measures against this framework, surmizing that no one uses the standards so they don’t seem to measure very well.

How usable are the software and standards we ended up with? Well to give you a hint, people don’t use them. They use tagging and RSS, which are simple and friendly for all the non-engineers that are actually trying to develop and share content for teaching, rather than IEEE’s LOM and other complex metadata implementations that the software engineering community designed.

However, Rob is also very realistic about where we are now, realizing that the OER movement has a lot of work to do. I agree. In theory OER easily solves many of the problems associated with learning objects. In practice (as we’ve learned this semester) the situation is much more difficult. Creative Commons licenses, OER repositories, and sustainability models; each subject is laden with complex and very specific issues to be resolved…but it is better than where we have been.

Greg’s comments really touched a thread that I am interested in. He observes Wiley’s comments about not being able to make a piece of instruction “effective in every culture everywhere” and questions whether this means that Merrill’s theories on First Principles of Instruction will work in cultures where traditions of pedagogy are vastly different.

Should M. David Merrill put an asterisk on his first principles linking to fine print stating that they only work in the United States and some places in Europe?

I would be interested to hear how Merrill would respond but I think he might argue that First Principles doesn’t mean that instruction can’t be changed to meet the needs of differing cultures. Instead it means that instruction that retains these principles will be more effective than instruction that does not. This, in turn, leads me to wonder 1) how much is lost (in terms of elements associated with First Principles) when instruction is localized and 2) if there are ways of preventing this loss. Certainly, we will all need to dig into the research a little more to arrive at the answers to these questions, but it certainly gets you thinking…thanks Greg!

Allesandro points out that words such as ‘materials’ (and I would also add ‘objects’) portrays “a sense of non-living, dead, non moving, heavy.” He continues:

Thus my core idea is that we as teacher are not interested in objects - which are in themselves static (whatever small they can be), we as teacher are interested in processes (of learning) and relationships. Education is all about relationships and the processes of learning.

In other words, learning objects never died because they never were alive in the first place. Learning objects started with the premise that learning content could exist within a vacuum. What we are realizing is that this premise is false. The realization, and I think this speaks to Allesandro’s point, is that openess allows content to live. In such an environmnet content can be changed, content can be used in different contexts, and content can grow beyond it’s original form. The OER movement overcomes the failures of learning objects to the extent that it builds upon these principles.

Anton echoes this point in his blog post stating that the idea of complete reuse is mistaken. Even some of the most basic content must be changed periodically to deal with changes in the environment. Anton gives an excellent example.

If we ask to any experienced teacher, he/she could says us that this “total reuse” is a chimera. Yes, of course, previous year materials could be reused, but near certainly they have to be adapted.

Adaptation and openness are not only the key to making learning possible, but also allow that learning to be effective in real world contexts.

As mentioned by Wiley in his review of learning objects literature, there are several metaphors for learning objects but none have viewed learning objects as components that can modified. After describing several of these metaphors he states:

The most important thing to notice is that each metaphor assumes that a learning object is a closed, uneditable unit—but unlike the primedia of Nelson’s Xanadu, there is no mechanism for creating alternate versions of the objects. The prevailing metaphors make the assumption that learning objects can be aggregated but not adapted.

This is certainly one area where open resources can help. Open resources that are licensed appropriately can be edited and changed and modified. In this way they can be adapted to meet the needs of very diverse contexts. In fact, it was interesting for me to realize how open resources “fix” one of the “broken” metaphors for learning objects: the brick and mortar metaphor.

Being familiar somewhat with the brick laying profession I know how a brick is modified to fit into a particular position, such as a corner. The brick layer will cut the piece to the appropriate dimensions, sometimes using a saw to make a very precise cut, and other times using a trowel to strike the brick at the right spot, making a rougher cut. These “alterations” to the brick relate to changes that could be made to content that was open. The changes made to the content might be very precise, requiring a trained instructional designer. Or they might be rougher, requiring less expertise. In either case the ability to change the brick to fit a desired context allows the brick to be used for multiple purposes; i.e. the brick can be used for both a side wall and a corner.

Likewise, with open resources, the barrier that prevented many from modifying “bricks” to suit their own needs in the past is getting smaller. The mortar, or context, that hold the bricks together can now be combined with alterations to the content itself. The external environment, and the internal object can both be adapted to accommodate learning needs that arise.

However, the analogy still is incomplete. When bricks are purchased in bulk they are uniform size and dimension from the outset. This is very different from the definitions given of learning objects. In fact, part of the problem with learning objects is how different they can be from one another. The interesting piece about the urinal as a learning object illustrates that point quite effectively. Looking at different OER repositories, it is apparent that the objects available rarely meet such a uniform standard.

Yet, brick laying is but one skill within the much wider field of masonry. I once saw a highly skilled mason building a fireplace out of rocks that had been dug up during a building project. At times, he used the rocks that he retrieved “as is” without any change beyond washing them off. At other times the rocks would have to be broken and sanded down to fit into the right position. Most open resources, in my mind, are much closer to the field of rubble masonry than they are to bricklaying.

In conclusion, yes, I think that OER does much to fix the field of learning objects. It does so by opening up the possibility of modifying content (a concept which the field of learning objects has struggled with). It also helps us to refine our definitions, and our metaphors, of what a learning object is.

I read Coase’s for my book last week and so I first checked other blogs that covered this book.

Yu-Chun brought up an interesting point related to the question of granularity:

But what if there are a series of scientific concepts which will be edited in different units? Since each concept is related to each other, I wonder if each segment is consistent with each other. If related contents are not consistent, learners must feel confused during learning. Hence, to decrease this problem, participants who take charge of the consistency for some contents are necessary.

Interesting. Even if there is granularity at a level that encourages people to contribute, the project will still have problems if there isn’t a means to facilitate a very specific type of communication among group members. It is the type of communication that allows group members to determine where the piece they are working on fits. It is quite certain that various projects handle this problem very differently. For some projects this communication is part of the software itself, part of the environment. For others the individual is required to find the information him/herself.

Allesandro focuses the attention on the role of the learner in the peer-production model.

Peer production didn’t happen in the first case - I believe - because all participants or almost all hadn’t switched from the role of mere-learner to the role of learner-for-letting-other-learn.

This is an interesting point because it is true that some peer-production environments never take off, because nobody shows up. What is the difference between some peer-production projects that generate a lot of support and others that do not? As Allesandro suggests, some of it has to do with a group of people buying into the ideas. Certainly, an ideal environment can be set up to encourage users to participate and then because of the dynamics of the group, or because of a lack of buy in, or because of not being able to get the word out, the effort fails. In designing the structure of the environment we must be careful not to overlook those issues (from a very practical standpoint) that will attract group members. Good thoughts Allesandro.

Catia humorously considers one aspect of the peer-production model.

Is there a better thing than not having a boss or a supervisor (who might ultimately know less than you?)

Ha, ha, Catia…I totally agree though. In fact, to me this seems like one of the perks of this model. Production is not based on being told what to do. People participate because they want to, and if they don’t they stay away. What other benefits come from creating a production environment (the peer-production model) where people are motivate to be there?

Antonio has an interesting blog post comparing several of the OERs that we have looked against the concept of peer-production models. Certainly we have a long way to go on this. Several of the OER projects that we looked at earlier in the course were still trying to replicate the old ways of doing things by storing and creating all the content themselves. It is a change in mindset that needs to happen (very related to Allesandro’s post as well).