Making and Sharing OERs that Facilitate Successful Transition into Higher Education for Flexible Lea Home : #OER16

Public Group Active 7 years, 12 months ago

Wed, Apr 20 2016, 11:45am – 1:00pm

Authors: James Brunton, Mark Brown, Eamon Costello, Lorraine Delaney, and Seamus Fox

Room: Pentland (West)

Theme: Hacking, making and sharing

Type: Presentation

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Description

This paper reports on a project that has sought, through the production of OERs, to address the problem of effective transitions and the foundations for student success during initial stages of the study lifecycle, with a specific focus on flexible learners. Drawing on the literature, the experience of major international providers, and a set of overarching guiding principles, this project adopted a design-based methodology (Reeves, 2006; Wany & Hannafin, 2005) to develop eight digital readiness/preparation OERs, along with a guide to supporting new flexible learners, which will inform institutions/discipline teams on how to effectively augment and deploy these OERs. The tools were developed by taking tools that already existed in this space and: taking inspiration from them; augmenting them; and improving upon them in order to produce this project’s set of tools. This project’s OERs are available under the most open Creative Commons License. Enhancing retention and completion rates of flexible learners, defined here as undergraduate adult, part-time and online/distance students, is a significant problem. In the Irish context undergraduate part-time students represent 17% of all undergraduates (HEA 2012). Gallie (2005) notes that some reports put student attrition in online distance education delivery to be as high as 80%. This tallies with the UK Open University’s reported completion/graduation rate of around 22% (Woodley and Simpson 2014), as compared to a (British) national graduation rate of 39% for part-time students. A premise of the project is that the foundations for student success are laid early in the study lifecycle (Armstrong, 2015), and that insufficient attention has been given in the literature and within institutions to the importance of the period before learners formally commence their studies. A related underlying assumption is that this crucial transition period may be enhanced by the availability of appropriately designed digital readiness and preparation OERs, which help to scaffold prospective students and those about to embark on part time or online/distance study for the first time. This project is funded by the (Irish) National Forum for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education (http://teachingandlearning.ie), and involves four Irish Higher Education partners.

Armstrong, C. (2015). An evaluation of initiatives implemented to support undergraduate students’ transition into Higher Education at one post-1992 university. Journal of Huddersfield student research, 1 (1).

Gallie, K. (2005). Student attrition before and after modifications in distance course delivery. Studies in Learning, Evaluation, Innovation and Development, 2(3), pp. 69-76.

Higher Education Authority (2012). Part-time and flexible higher education in Ireland: Policy, practice and recommendations for the future. Available from: https://www.dkit.ie/system/files/HEA%20Report%20on%20Lifelong%20Learning%202013.pdf

Reeves, T. (2006). Design research from a technology perspective. In J. V. D. Akker, K. Gravemeijer, S. McKenney & N. Nieveen (Eds.), Educational design research (pp. 52–66). New York: Routledge.

Torraco, R.J. (2005). Writing Integrative Literature Reviews: Guidelines and Examples. Human Resource Development Review, 4 (3), pp 356-367.

Wang, F. & Hannafin, M. (2005). Design-based research and technology-enhanced learning environments. Educational Technology Research and Development, 53(4), 5-23.

Woodley, A., & Simpson, O. (2014). Student dropout: The elephant in the room. Online distance education: Towards a research agenda, pp. 459-484.

Gallie, K. (2005). Student attrition before and after modifications in distance course delivery. Studies in Learning, Evaluation, Innovation and Development, 2(3), pp. 69-76.

Reeves, T. (2006). Design research from a technology perspective. In J. V. D. Akker, K. Gravemeijer, S. McKenney & N. Nieveen (Eds.), Educational design research (pp. 52–66). New York: Routledge.

Torraco, R.J. (2005). Writing Integrative Literature Reviews: Guidelines and Examples. Human Resource Development Review, 4 (3), pp 356-367.

Wang, F. & Hannafin, M. (2005). Design-based research and technology-enhanced learning environments. Educational Technology Research and Development, 53(4), 5-23.

Woodley, A., & Simpson, O. (2014). Student dropout: The elephant in the room. Online distance education: Towards a research agenda, pp. 459-484.

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