Hellman, L. (2009) An Evaluation of the Open Education Resources for the Open Schools’ Project SAIDE Newsletter, Vol. 15. No. 3
SAIDE is currently conducting a phased evaluation of a Commonwealth of Learning (COL) Open Educational Resources (OERs) project implemented in six countries: Namibia, Botswana, India, Lesotho, Trinidad & Tobago and Seychelles.
The project has as its main aim the training of a 100 master teachers in the development of high quality, self-instructional, learning materials.
Materials to support independent study in twenty selected secondary schooling subjects will be developed and made available electronically as open education resources (OERs). In this case this means that the materials will be freely available on a website to download, use and adapt, provided the author is acknowledged. Basecamp software (together with the COL instructional design template) has been used to facilitate a collaborative, online approach to materials development and as a tool for managing the process. It is intended that the materials developed will, with some contextual adaptation, be suitable for use across the six countries, thus maximising their usage.
In this article, Liora Hellmann reports on the first stage of the evaluation. Note though that this is another project that is creating OERs, rather than using existing OERs.
Dr. Tony Bates is the author of eleven books in the field of online learning and distance education. He has provided consulting services specializing in training in the planning and management of online learning and distance education, working with over 40 organizations in 25 countries. Tony is a Research Associate with Contact North | Contact Nord, Ontario’s Distance Education & Training Network.
