Open Educational Resources (OER’s) consist of an array of on-line educational resources which consist (for example) of PowerPoint presentations, lecture notes, seminar work and Blog-based activities (and increasingly resources such as iTunesU which in turn can be distributed freely to the wider academic community, in the creation and development of their delivery styles and new material. The easy and wide availability of these resources can also assist students with their specific learning requirements, and, if done effectively wider ‘inspired’ (or inquisitive) learning.
I think that OER’s are a rich source of new material, which can be used to cross disciplinary boundaries, and so enable a fruitful cross-fertilisation of new ideas and material. They also contain the potential to nurture student-centred interaction and the exchange of ideas surrounding assessment; with this in mind, students can be empowered to take a more active role in the conception and development of the curriculum. The ‘anti-corporate’ ethos of some areas of the materials and modes available (as part of the development of OER) will certainly appeal to many colleagues who feel stifled by the increasingly constricting tendencies of centralised bureaucracy.
As far as the specific production of curriculum specific materials, I would be interested in developing materials that could be utilised within the OER framework – incorporating materials such as visual and sound recordings (iTunesU), and so, encourage students and colleagues to also incorporate and maybe begin to develop their own OER materials.
