Blog Post 5, thank you everyone!

Introduction to Open Education:

Open education is an educational movement that focuses on openness. Historically the idea of it can be traced back to the early 17th century when the idea of universal education was promoted by a bohemian bishop. Fast forward a couple of hundred years and open learning is finally starting to reach a form as it was first proposed. Today open education aims to make educational resources and opportunities freely accessible to everyone. There is a significant drive to remove barriers such as cost, and access to allow all learners an equal opportunity to access a quality education.

Open learning is critical because education has historically been only accessible to the wealthy and privileged. By allowing everyone access to educational tools and resources, individuals are empowered to learn what they want when they want. The access fosters a more educated and equal society.

Understanding Open Pedagogy:

The principles of sharing and collaboration inherent in Open Pedagogy can transform traditional educational practices by promoting a culture of openness and mutual respect between educators and students. This collaborative approach can lead to more engaging and meaningful learning experiences, as students are not just passive recipients of information but active contributors to the learning process. Moreover, it can redefine the relationships between educators and students, fostering a partnership where both parties learn and grow together.

Defining pedagogy is easy it is the practice or act of teaching. However, defining open pedagogy can be more challenging, as open education is much less teacher centric as compared to traditional English. Instead, open pedagogy is a set of learning practices centered around experiences, collaboration, sharing and active participation when engaging with open educational materials. Students and educators are encouraged to create and share tools, educational material and techniques and use open licensing to foster more growth of the open education systems.

The collaborative approach of open pedagogy is meant to foster engaging educational experiences for both the student and the instructor.

The Roles of Open Educational Resources (OERs):

OER's are the foundation of open education. They are the teaching, learning and research materials that are free and available for anyone to use modify and distribute. By having these resources freely available and with open permissions to adapt students and educators can use the resources to fit their unique situations. Personally, as someone who almost failed high school math due to not being able to afford the textbooks, I think the role of OERs in education should eventually be to replace paid education materials entirely.

Open Licensing Explained:

Open licencing is the legal framework that allows creators to give permission such that anyone can use, modify and distribute their works freely. Common licenses include Creative Commons licenses which can be tailored to different permissions. MIT License, ISC, and Apache 2.0. It is important to understand that having a license is incredibly important. If you want your material to be collaborated on, shared or freely distributed not having a license makes that incredibly difficult and dicey as collaborators can claim rights to your well intended free project.

Challenges and Solutions:

There are four big challenges facing open education at this moment in my opinion.

1. Resistance from industry stakeholders: There are many large companies which benefit greatly from charging for educational materials. Pearson education is one such culprit. They have increased the price of college textbooks by over 1000% and seek to have timed limits to paid for educational resources.

2. Quality and Relevance: There is often concern about the quality of OER's. Producing certification or licensing obtained from an open-source educational resource can come with attached stigmas and preconceived beliefs surrounding free education.

3. Technological Barriers: As many OER's are accessed through computers and the internet technology savvy and internet access can present barriers to those seeking to access them. Providing access to necessary technology and infrastructure, as well as technical support, can help mitigate this issue.

4. Sustainability: Libraries are one of the greatest open education resources in the world however more and more politicians are pushing to decrease funding to libraries. Other open education is similarly threatened by lack of volunteers or financial difficulties.

Thank you everyone for the great semester and course I loved reading everyones blogs!