Openness and praxis: Exploring the use of open educational practices in higher education
Cronin, Catherine

PublishedAugust 2017
JournalThe International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning
Volume 18, Issue 5, Pages 15-34
CountryIreland, Europe

ABSTRACT
Open educational practices (OEP) is a broad descriptor of practices that include the creation, use, and reuse of open educational resources (OER) as well as open pedagogies and open sharing of teaching practices. As compared with OER, there has been little empirical research on individual educators’ use of OEP for teaching in higher education. This research study addresses that gap, exploring the digital and pedagogical strategies of a diverse group of university educators, focusing on whether, why, and how they use OEP for teaching. The study was conducted at one Irish university; semi-structured interviews were carried out with educators across multiple disciplines. Only a minority of educators used OEP. Using constructivist grounded theory, a model of the concept “Using OEP for teaching” was constructed showing four dimensions shared by open educators: balancing privacy and openness, developing digital literacies, valuing social learning, and challenging traditional teaching role expectations. The use of OEP by educators is complex, personal, and contextual; it is also continually negotiated. These findings suggest that research-informed policies and collaborative and critical approaches to openness are required to support staff, students, and learning in an increasingly complex higher education environment.

Keywords higher education · OEP · open education · open educational practices · Open Educational Resources

Published atAthabasca, AB
ISSN1492-3831
Other number5
RefereedYes
Rightsby/4.0
URLhttp://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/3096
Export optionsBibTex · EndNote · Tagged XML · Google Scholar



AVAILABLE FILES
3096-24538-1-PB.pdf · 940.4KB26 downloads



Viewed by 167 distinct readers




CLOUD COMMUNITY REVIEWS

The evaluations below represent the judgements of our readers and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the Cloud editors.

Click a star to be the first to rate this document


POST A COMMENT
SIMILAR RECORDS

Conceptualising OEP: A review of theoretical and empirical literature in Open Educational Practices
Cronin, Catherine; MacLaren, Iain
Conceptualisations of open educational practices (OEP) vary widely, ranging from those centred primarily on the creation and use of open educational resources (OER) to broader definitions of OEP, inclusive of but not ...
Match: cronin, catherine; practices; oep; open education; open educational practices; europe

Framing Open Educational Practices from a Social Justice Perspective
Bali, Maha; Cronin, Catherine; Jhangiani, Rajiv S.
OEP (open educational practices), inclusive of open pedagogy, is often understood with respect to the use of OER (open educational resources) but can be conceived with more expansive conceptualisations (see Cronin & ...
Match: cronin, catherine; practices; open education; open educational practices

Factors influencing open educational practices and OER in the Global South: Meta-synthesis of the ROER4D project
Hodgkinson-Williams, Cheryl; Arinto, Patricia; Cartmill, Tess; King, Thomas; et al.
This chapter provides a meta-synthesis of the findings from the Research on Open Educational Resources for Development (ROER4D) empirical studies based on the 13 sub-project chapters in this volume as well as other ...
Match: practices; oep; open education; open educational practices; open educational resources

Impact of integrating OER in teacher education at the Open University of Sri Lanka
Karunanayaka, Shironica P.; Naidu, Som; Hodgkinson-Williams, Cheryl; Arinto, Patricia B.
This chapter reports on a research project implemented in the Faculty of Education at the Open University of Sri Lanka (OUSL) which investigated the impact of integrating Open Educational Resources (OER) in the ...
Match: oep; open education; open educational practices; open educational resources

Extending the territory: From open educational resources to open educational practices
Ehlers, Ulf-Daniel
This article examines the findings of the recent OPAL report Beyond OER: Shifting Focus from Resources to Practices. In doing so, it defines current understanding of open educational resources and open educational ...
Match: practices; open education; open educational practices; open educational resources

Open practices in public higher education in Portugal: Faculty perspectives
Cardoso, Paula; Morgado, Lina; Teixeira, António
In recent years, the Open Educational Resources (OER) and Open Access (OA) movements have been essential in creating opportunities in all scholarly activities, within the context of higher education. The main purpose of ...
Match: practices; open education; open educational practices; open educational resources; europe

Open educational practices for curriculum enhancement
Armellini, Alejandro; Nie, Ming
Open educational resources (OER) and open educational practices (OEP) are relatively new areas in educational research. How OER and OEP can help practitioners enhance curricula is one of a number of under-researched ...
Match: practices; higher education; open educational practices; open educational resources

Learning from the innovative open practices of three international health projects: IACAPAP, VCPH and Physiopedia
Coughlan, Tony; Perryman, L -A.; Gil-Jaurena, Inés
Open educational resources and open educational practices are being increasingly used around the globe to train and support professionals in areas where funding and resources are scarce. This paper evaluates the open ...
Match: practices; oep; open educational practices; open educational resources

Meeting the challenges of higher education in India through open educational resources: policies, practices, and implications.
Thakran, Archana; Sharma, Ramesh C.
Over the past two decades, the education sector in India has undergone a substantial transformation. Recent advances in technology have provided access to high quality educational resources and information on the ...
Match: practices; higher education; open education

Open Educational Resources and Practices in China: A Systematic Literature Review
Tlili, Ahmed; Huang, Ronghuai; Chang, Ting-Wen; Nascimbeni, Fabio; Burgos, Daniel
The concepts of Open Educational Resources (OER) and Open Educational Practices (OEP), regarded as two pillars of the broader open education movement, have been evolving since the concept of OER was first coined in the ...
Match: practices; open education; open educational practices; open educational resources