{"title":"Exploring Initiatives for Open Educational Practices at an Australian and a Brazilian University","authors":"Carina Bossu, Marineli Joaquim Méier","doi":"10.5334/JIME.475","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5334/JIME.475","url":null,"abstract":"This paper explores some key developments in Open Educational Practices (OEP) in higher education in Australia and in Brazil. More specifically, it focuses on the analysis of two individual universities: the University of Tasmania, in Australia; and the Federal University of Parana, in Brazil. They are both public and mostly face-to-face universities trying to engage with OEP to enhance their blended learning offerings, and more generally learning and teaching. However, these institutions are distinctive in terms of their student numbers, their blended learning approaches, their role within their own communities, and their OEP strategies and initiatives. We will present some of the key policies and strategies adopted by these universities to support OEP, as well as the impact and the opportunities at present. The discussion in this paper will then attempt to make some recommendations for future directions of OEP adoption not only in these two countries, but also elsewhere.","PeriodicalId":45406,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Interactive Media in Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2018-12-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47627952","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Latin American Special Issue","authors":"M. Weller","doi":"10.5334/JIME.496","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5334/JIME.496","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":45406,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Interactive Media in Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2018-12-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48438090","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Equipping the Next Generation for Responsible Research and Innovation with Open Educational Resources, Open Courses, Open Communities and Open Schooling: An Impact Case Study in Brazil","authors":"A. Okada, T. Sherborne","doi":"10.5334/JIME.482","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5334/JIME.482","url":null,"abstract":"There has been an increasing number of projects and institutions promoting open education at scale through Open Educational Resources (OER) and Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) to broaden learning opportunities for all. However, there are still many challenges in relation to sustainability, effective implementation and evidence-based impact to support educational policies. To explore this gap, this paper focuses on an integrated model that combines OER, MOOC, Communities of Practice (CoP) and Open Schooling to promote open education and foster inquiry skills for Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI), a key approach coined by the European Commission. This study focuses on the ENGAGE Project, with 14 partners in Europe who produced more than 300 OER, 60 MOOC in ten languages and supported 27 CoP with more than 17,000 members in the world including more than 2,000 from Brazil. Through a novel framework on impact assessment of OER for RRI underpinned by a mixed method approach, this study examines the influence of open education on academic and non-academic groups and the correlation between the outputs developed in the project with the outcomes reported by the Brazilian communities. Qualitative and quantitative data from the ENGAGE platform, journal articles produced by the Brazilian participants and interviews with authors were analysed. Findings report the different ways that the community developed open schooling projects, the changes in their practices to foster digital scientific literacy, and outcomes with implications for society.","PeriodicalId":45406,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Interactive Media in Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2018-12-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41560576","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
D. Barreiro, Leticia Barzilai, Luciana Canuti, Fernando Carpani, L. D. Arco, C. Luna, Clara Raimondi
{"title":"OpenFING: A Project based on a Digital Library of Recorded Courses","authors":"D. Barreiro, Leticia Barzilai, Luciana Canuti, Fernando Carpani, L. D. Arco, C. Luna, Clara Raimondi","doi":"10.5334/JIME.477","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5334/JIME.477","url":null,"abstract":"The OpenFING Project is an initiative by students for students, based on the creation and use of a digital video library of higher education courses, where students record video from standard lectures. The project attempts to address issues such as overcrowded lecture halls and students who work full time and thus cannot attend normal lectures. Today OpenFING seeks its consolidation along with an undergraduate introductory course on audiovisual and multimedia production. The project must be considered as a basis on which professors and students can develop teaching and learning innovations respectively, including different computer tools to support teaching and learning. In this article we describe the current status of OpenFING, six years after its creation; we describe the first study of how students and teachers perceive the initiative; and we conclude suggesting further developments.","PeriodicalId":45406,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Interactive Media in Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2018-12-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49021710","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Book Reviews – 2018","authors":"Clare Lee, Tim Coughlan, C. Douce","doi":"10.5334/JIME.495","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5334/JIME.495","url":null,"abstract":"The following publication contains book reviews of these titles: D. Randy Garrison, (2015) Thinking Collaboratively: Learning in a Community of Inquiry. London and New York: Routledge. 147 pages ISBN-1138824313, ISBN-9781138824317. Elizabeth Losh (ed.), 2017. MOOCs and Their Afterlives: Experiments in Scale and Access in Higher Education. Chicago, IL and London: The University of Chicago Press. 384 pages. ISBN-9780226469591. Mona Engvig (2017) Online Education: Practical, Theory-Based Advice for the Instructor. San Diego, CA: Cognella Academic Publishing. 172 pages ISBN-10:1516515455, ISBN-13:9781516515455.","PeriodicalId":45406,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Interactive Media in Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2018-12-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42930787","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
M. Lancho, Mauro Hernández, Á. S. Paniagua, José María Luzón Encabo, Guillermo Jorge-Botana
{"title":"Using Semantic Technologies for Formative Assessment and Scoring in Large Courses and MOOCs","authors":"M. Lancho, Mauro Hernández, Á. S. Paniagua, José María Luzón Encabo, Guillermo Jorge-Botana","doi":"10.5334/JIME.468","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5334/JIME.468","url":null,"abstract":"Formative assessment and personalised feedback are commonly recognised as key factors both for improving students’ performance and increasing their motivation and engagement (Gibbs and Simpson, 2005). Currently, in large and massive open online courses (MOOCs), technological solutions to give feedback are often limited to quizzes of different kinds. At present, one of our challenges is to provide feedback for open-ended questions through semantic technologies in a sustainable way. To face such a challenge, our academic team decided to use a test based on latent semantic analysis (LSA) and chose an automatic assessment tool named G-Rubric. G-Rubric was developed by researchers at the Developmental and Educational Psychology Department of UNED (Spanish national distance education university). By using G-Rubric, automated formative and iterative feedback was provided to students for different types of open-ended questions (70–800 words). This feedback allowed students to improve their answers and writing skills, thus contributing both to a better grasp of concepts and to the building of knowledge. In this paper, we present the promising results of our first experiences with UNED business degree students along three academic courses (2014–15, 2015–16 and 2016–17). These experiences show to what extent assessment software such as G-Rubric is mature enough to be used with students. It offers them enriched and personalised feedback that proved entirely satisfactory. Furthermore, G-Rubric could help to deal with the problems related to manual grading, even though our final goal is not to replace tutors by semantic tools, but to give support to tutors who are grading assignments.","PeriodicalId":45406,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Interactive Media in Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2018-08-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45942686","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Interdisciplinarity in Technology Enhanced Learning: An Interview Study","authors":"E. Scanlon, G. Conole","doi":"10.5334/JIME.476","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5334/JIME.476","url":null,"abstract":"This paper explores the influence of the concept of interdisciplinarity on the work of educational technologists and others involved in technology-enhanced learning (TEL) research. There is a growing recognition of the need for interdisciplinarity in solving complex research problems in many areas of science. Technology-enhanced learning is a relatively young area of research adopting a multidisciplinary approach to investigating the use of technologies for learning. This makes it a field that is worthy of exploration in terms of how the ways of working developed by its practitioners inform our understanding of the challenges of the field as well as its benefits. This paper reporting on work commissioned by the Joint Research Councils’ programme on Technology Enhanced Learning provides a discussion of the growing literature on this topic, and a study of the working practices of academics in TEL research. An interview study of 18 participants was conducted as part of the project. The paper reports on the key findings from the interviews and concludes with some practical suggestions to help participants deal with the challenges posed by interdisciplinary working in TEL research.","PeriodicalId":45406,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Interactive Media in Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2018-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44368304","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Students’ emotional engagement, motivation and behaviour over the life of an online course: reflections on two market research case studies","authors":"Edmund R. F. Hewson","doi":"10.5334/JIME.472","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5334/JIME.472","url":null,"abstract":"Since 2013, Leeds Beckett University has carried out two studies, working with market researchers, into students’ feelings and perceptions of online courses and their learning context. This work has been conducted outside routine data collection for statistical reporting to regulatory agencies, as these exercises do not explore a student’s engagement or behaviour in a rich enough way to assist practitioners in the design of learning products, services and experiences. The unstated philosophy of both studies has been to ground learning behaviour, and hence engagement, in the whole life of the individual student, taking place – in the case of the second study – over an extended time period. These whole-life studies have included research into the students’ emotional lives, as the role of emotions in learning is of interest not only to researchers but also to practitioners, who engage with students in a real-life context rather than an experimental one. This paper describes these two studies, their findings and their value in developing and delivering online courses. The first study (2014) was entirely qualitative, covering a small sample over a narrow time window, but it provided rich, nuanced insights into learning context and motivation. The second study (2016) was a longitudinal study of a much larger sample of students, using a mix of qualitative research and quantitative data collection. Both studies help to contextualise the ‘online student’, whose presence and activities online are subject to institutional measurement, in the ‘whole person’ of the student.","PeriodicalId":45406,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Interactive Media in Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2018-07-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44576770","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Developing Student Support for Open and Distance Learning: The EMPOWER Project","authors":"Á. S. Paniagua, O. Simpson","doi":"10.5334/JIME.470","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5334/JIME.470","url":null,"abstract":"European universities face great challenges dealing with twenty-first century world changes. Deep transformations are required to a wide range of life-long learning scenarios, which are replacing traditional modes of university study and giving access to students in more flexible ways. To address the transformation in learning, the European Association of Distance Teaching Universities (EADTU) launched the EMPOWER project in 2015 so that the EADTU could share expertise of distance education universities in the field. The EMPOWER project is organised in 12 areas. One is student support, as the central area for students’ success. The project’s goal is to empower students to become life-long, self-directed learners in open, online and blended-learning environments. The plan was to increase student retention and enhance academic performance, integration and satisfaction. This article summarises the work that has been done during the past two years to offer different tools and resources, such as webinars and reports. These can help institutions and academics in their understanding of what underlies student engagement and motivation versus student drop-out. We aim to share expertise about how effective, or not, technology has been for developing innovative, advanced and quality student support services to large and small groups of students. It is too early to judge the success of the student support group of the EMPOWER project. This paper looks at what has been achieved so far. In particular it outlines the reasons for focusing on the problem of student drop-out and how student support may help to ameliorate the problem.","PeriodicalId":45406,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Interactive Media in Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2018-07-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45945710","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A Learning Design Methodology for Developing Short Learning Programmes in Further and Continuing Education","authors":"Lillian Buus, M. Georgsen","doi":"10.5334/JIME.469","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5334/JIME.469","url":null,"abstract":"Over the past 5 years, teaching staff at the School of Continuing Education, VIA University College, Denmark, has been designing digitally supported teaching within diploma programmes and tailor-made courses in the fields of health, education, social sciences and management. More and more of these programmes and courses are designed as blended learning and are characterised by a short time cycle of design, delivery and completion. Despite a recent addition of learning design expertise to the organisation, there is a predominant tendency in design processes to focus on the technical setup, the content and the participants, and very little on the role of the teachers. The teachers’ role is challenged by a number of issues in relation to the growing use of blended and online learning, e.g. the task of facilitating the learning processes of the participants in new ways; a higher degree of exposure as the teacher often becomes the sole point of contact in online environments; communication skills needed to facilitate dialogue and collaboration in an online environment; etc. Furthermore, involvement of teaching staff in co-creation of new learning designs require skills which many lecturers do not have when they enter the design team for the first time, among others skills to articulate their pedagogical principles and technological imagination. Over time, we in our roles as learning designers in the School of Continuing Education have developed, tested and refined a technique for user involvement in the design work, and teachers now work with our professional learning designer and course producer on redesigning courses or creating new module or courses. In these collaborative design processes, we have identified a number of challenges, which will be dealt with in our paper.","PeriodicalId":45406,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Interactive Media in Education","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2018-05-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49351583","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}