SOLSTICE Seminar Series:
Creating and Sharing Digital Content: Promises and Pitfalls
Thursday 16th July, 10am - 3.45pm
The hot topic of creating and sharing digital content was presented at this seminar, hosted by SOLSTICE. Alison Mackenzie, SOLSTICE CETL Director and Dean of Learning Services at Edge Hill University opened the day placing the seminar in the context of current research and recent publications:
- DEMOS report on the Edgeless University
- Open educational resources
- RePRODUCE
- online innovation in HE
- improving the evidence base
- and learning literacies in the digital age
Five speakers with considerable involvement in sharing digital content presented experiences from their own work. The first keynote speaker was Professor Tom Boyle from the CETL for RLO (Reusable Learning Objects) who demonstrated how to develop open educational resources using GLO Maker 2 (Generative Learning Objects). Tom emphasised the importance of the pedagogical design underlying the GLOs which provides the basis for reuse. The audience showed tremendous interest in GLO Maker 2 which is due for release on 21 August 2009.
The second keynote speaker was Melissa Highton from Oxford University who presented the development of open educational resources through the Open Spires project. This project follows on from earlier projects, such as iTunes U and Steeple.
Three presenters were from the JISC RePRODUCE programme. Dr. Carmel de Nahlik, Coventry University, shared her work from the JISC ROCOCO project on setting up a re-usable common core to research methods modules. The module is delivered online, to diverse groups, at three different academic levels and can be presented within a subject-specific ‘wrapper’.
Dr. Peter McKenna from Manchester Metropolitan University presented the promises and pitfalls of re-usability using his experiences from the Q-ROLO project (Quality – Re-aggregation of Learning Objects), and resources. The pitfalls include IPR and legal aspects, quality, issues with repositories and lack of tracking of downloads or re-use.
Peter Reed, Edge Hill University, presented ‘is this a sustainable future?’ sharing his experiences from the ReFORM project which involved repurposing of suitable digital objects
The delegates’ thoughts about what is working well and the next steps regarding reuse and sharing of digital content were summarised by Lindsey Martin, E-Learning Strategy and Development Manager (SOLSTICE CETL) to round off the day.
The success of the day is shown in feedback from delegates, for example:
‘left with plenty to think about’
‘found presentations valuable – real reactions that relate to the future of the re-using agenda’
‘already have emails of people who have RLOs I can potentially use’
‘interesting speakers’
‘valuable day’
‘valuable information’
‘excellent SOLSTICE once again’
‘very informative and thought provoking’
‘honest presentation of both the pros and cons’