Considering non-virtual elements of Open Education Practice

An extended post on the concept of Open Educational Practice and the key issues in the creation and reuse of Open Educational Resources

Within the general discourse around Open Educational Practice there is an understanding, both tacit and clearly stated, that the future of Open Education leans strongly towards digital media, virtual environments and online resources. There is a strong argument to support the benefit of developing these areas of education, however intuitively I feel nervous that the role of the physical is often not developed in the discussion. For this reason I am choosing to focus this post on how the physical elements of my teaching practice could be developed to become more open in parallel with digital developments.

As a starting point I have identified the following ‘physical’ teaching practices that I think are valuable within design education and looked at the potential opportunities that could be explored for the CSM Narrative Environments MA course:

1. Site and museum visits

The subtleties of light, material, volume, sequence, time and especially relationship to you, the audience member, in your physical body, are all valuable learning moments for my students.

Potential: Transform the immediate interaction with a space or object into a structured learning moment accessible by all.

2. Discursive tutorials, group conversations and the spoken word

Uploading online courses tends towards more solitary learning activities. By reducing contact time, the opportunities for dynamic critical feedback and external/chance influences lessens (ie positive developments occur when they are exposed to others.

Potential: Replicate the dynamic, reflective and challenging environment of tutorials and group discussions (where opinions, drawings, images, knowledge etc are exchanged) for solitary students.

3. Workshops and action research

Potential: Create a methodology so that site, material and audience specific research can be facilitated for remote students

4. Studio time

Nothing can replace the buzz and energy of good studio conditions! Virtual simulations do not create an equivalent culture and lack the same opportunities to steal ideas, share worries, swap tips, develop passions, give support, forge friendships and alliances and generally put pressure on each other to raise the standards and hit deadlines.

Potential: Redefine the studio for OEP.

5. Making and material demonstrations

Testing materials and techniques through making is key to learning and development. Instructional videos cannot fully replace having a tutor and peers around to respond to queries and give support as students take the work into more experimental areas (eg those areas that might be outside of the remit of a specific video).

Potential: Define making exercises allowing room for error, intuition exploration and, crucially, interaction.

6. Facilities

There are some physical facilities that are usually beyond a student's reach. These include workshops with tools and materials, design studios, libraries and quiet spaces dedicated to focussed study

Potential: integrate specialist facilities (and appropriate staff) with open education practices.

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On a positive note, this list is short and there are many possibilities for digital development within it. However, the challenge is to develop a series of Open Education Resources that incorporate these physical elements in an OEP context. I will now look at some opportunities and pitfalls that might arise in the creation and reuse of resources in two of the areas identified.

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1. Site and museum visits

Often these are already a fairly open education resource with an available-for-all ethic. However, to ensure that these institutions are being optimised the course could develop sub-courses giving focus to existing site/museum resources along the specific themes that we would like the students to explore (eg narratives unfolding in space). These courses could be openly available to students online and would lead them, in a structured way, towards particular learning outcomes in the spaces - effectively re-curating them to suit our specific needs.

To ensure educational quality these would have to be maintained to allow for our evolving requirements and changes in museum content and practice. Ideally the site tours would be done in student groups with structured discussions integrated to help their development.

A key issue here is the sharing of intellectual property across the institutions and the fact that free access to such courses might infringe on revenue opportunities for the museums.

Another limitation is that anything site specific is only available to those who have access to that site – reducing the openness of the resource drastically. This is resolved by designing the courses by theme (eg spatial curation) not the specific collection (eg the Elgin Marbles). The result is that students could carry out the same exercise in both the British Museum in London and the Museum of Spanners and Plugs in Timbuktu. This aligns with open education theories which place more emphasis on the form of the teaching than the content.

2. Discursive tutorials, group conversations and spoken word.

Open Education suggests a reduction in tutor time as some of their functions are transferred directly to the more empowered student (with the correct resources at their disposal).

To mirror the benefits of formal spoken word exchanges, 'scripts' could be designed to allow students to hit key learning moments through more formalised contact with their peers.

Through an understanding of the key learning moments in spoken word contexts these scripts (some more rigid, some more open) would guide the students towards moments of realisation in their projects. Combining recital and improvisation, the scripts would become a resource that is structured beyond a regular conversation.

In terms of re-use concerns, these scripts should be modifiable to let them evolve, however original versions with instructions should be retained to ensure quality and control within the MA course. This combined with a desire to restrict commercial re-use suggests they could be licensed under an international Attribution-NonCommercial Share-Alike 3.0 Unported CC license.

Another issue is quality control and the craft of writing the scripts and creating appropriate access. These would require a specialised understanding of the processes at work in conversations in education and also optimum formats for remote usage.

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To conclude, Open Education Practices and Resources are in their infancy and there seems great potential to reconsider our physical environments to suit them. Crucially, these elements should not be an add-on but should be integrated into the strategic thinking from the outset.