The document discusses the cultural appropriation of open educational resources (OER) in different contexts. It makes three key points:
1) OER need to be fully integrated and adapted to local contexts and educational cultures in order to be effectively utilized. Resources may remain unexplored if the adaptation is not appropriate for the end users' teaching beliefs, values, and philosophy.
2) Various pedagogical dimensions like assessment, teacher-learner roles, and epistemological beliefs can be interpreted differently across cultures. An approach seen as central in one culture may seem inappropriate in another.
3) Facilitators of OER adaptation played an active role in linguistically, organizationally, pedagogically,
7. Quality of OER emerges in the relation between a
particular type of material and the way in which it is
appropriated and integrated in a given educational
context (Conole & Ehlers, 2010; King, 2013).
8. Key concepts: Open Educational Resources
OER are regarded to be fully shared if they are integrated into local
contexts.
Teaching resources may remain unexplored if the adaptation is not
appropriate (Rivens & Guichon, 2013).
If not congruent with end-users' teaching beliefs, values and the local
prevailing philosophy of teaching, the novel content or instruction is likely
to remain alien and unproductive (Parrish & Linder-VanBerschot, 2010).
Culturally relevant modification assists users in the gradual acceptance of
novel practices (Parrish & Linder-VanBerschot, 2010).
9. Addressing educational cultures
Various pedagogical dimensions can be interpreted and
realised differently in culturally different communities (e.g.
assessment, teacher-learner roles, epistemological beliefs, task
design).
Pedagogical values, which are seen as central to one culture,
may seem culturally inappropriate in another (Reeves &
Reeves, 1997).
12. „Our educational system is in transition from teacher-centred to learner-
oriented approaches"(Facilitator F).
"English is truly a foreign language here. Very few teachers know it well.”
(Facilitators F)
"Adaptation is definitely not common practice, nor is redistribution.
Teachers tend to keep materials for themselves or, perhaps, share them
with friends” (Facilitator A)
„Most of the teachers [in my country] are overwhelmed with course offers
which they can join for free (…) and they get the financial compensation for
the hours they could spend on their jobs. (…) while with this project, the
only tool we had was to trigger their enthusiasm and curiosity” (Facilitator
B)
13. Appropriation strategies used by facilitators
Linguistic (translation, subtitling, replacement);
Organisational (balancing the ratio of F2F and online activity,
diversifying communication channels);
Pedagogical (replacing, adjusting tasks, instructions, and
proportions between different types of activities, replacing
content);
Technical (replacing tools, providing additional tutorials)
14.
15. Conclusions:
Appropriation to local contexts is not free from cultural meanings
and, thus, cannot be approached as an automatic procedure.
Cultural appropriation should embrace not only the cultural flavour
of local settings, but also to the pedagogical realities, practices and
priorities of end-users.
Educational cultures should be accounted for in task appropriation
and instruction delivery so that recipients feel assisted in their
gradual adaptation of new practices.
Facilitators play an active role in the process of adapting resources –
they should be autonomous in their judgments and decisions about
which modifications respond best to their local contexts.
17. Kurek, M. (2016) Addressing cultural diversity in
preparing teachers for openness: culturally sensitive
appropriation of open content », Alsic Vol. 19 , URL :
http://alsic.revues.org/2904
18. What are the main difficulties with the OER uptake in
your local context?
Notas del editor
The main context – popularising the use of OER in less used languages.
ENHANCE TEACHING AND LEARNING OF LESS USED LANGUAGES THROUGH OER/OEP
Objectives:
Materials created for the course have been published on open licences with the background assumption that they will be reused and modified by course facilitators
Based on the idea that when educating about opennes the instructional content needs to be open, too.
Quality adaptation seen as the greatest challenge in the education movement.
Educational content is to be exported to other educational cultures.
Not a set of single objects but a full - blowncomplete instructional set ( content, tasks,
Online technologies extend the reach of instructional design. With potential for modification being the underlying principle of open educational content, attention needs to be given to situations in which resources created for one cultural context are to be used in another–culturally, pedagogically, technically or even politically different one.
Mere openness of educational content does not guarantee its smooth replication in other, culturally distinct contexts,
it is reasonable to see the promise and quality of OER not as residing inherently in the resources themselves but emerging in the relation between a particular type of material and the way in which it is appropriated and integrated in a given educational context (Conole & Ehlers, 2010; Bateman, Lane & Moon, 2012; King, 2013). Indeed, quality adaptation of OER for local contexts is currently seen as the greatest challenge in the openness movement (Wolfenden, Buckler & Keraro, 2012).
Content is usually created in developed countries and transferred top-down to those in need of pedagogical innovation (see Buckler et al., 2014; Perryman, Buckler & Seal, 2014).
Content creators are not imune from their own cultural blinders
Pedagogical appropriation should embrace not only to the cultural flavour of local settings, but also to the pedagogical realities, practices and priorities of end-users.
Based on the idea that when educating about opennes the instructional content needs to be open, too.
Quality adaptation seen as the greatest challenge in the education movement.
Educational content is to be exported to other educational cultures.
Not a set of single objects but a full - blowncomplete instructional set ( content, tasks,
The results confirm the initial hypothesis that despite the relative proximity of the cultures and their seemingly uniform European provenience, each of the local contexts for appropriation represents a distinctly different educational culture. The biggest disparities can be seen for learner centredness, with each of the cultures representing it to a different degree.
llow the adaptation strategies to be slotted into four major categories: linguistic (eg translation or subtitling),organisational (manipulating the ratio between face-to-face and online sessions), pedagogical (replacing, adjusting tasks and their instructions and replacing content) and technical (eg replacing tools or providing additional tutorials). The instructors were free to choose from these categories depending on their local conditions and their specific affordances and constraints.
This specifically applies to projects promoting transfer of innovation which disseminate mainstream practices and philosophies of learning. As I will argue, in order to maximise the appropriateness of the OER and reduce confusion resulting from how various pedagogical dimensions are interpreted and realised in culturally different communities, educators and content developers need to play an active role in the process of creating and adapting instructional content (Buckler, Perryman, Seal & Musafir, 2014) and should be autonomous in their judgements and decisions about which modifications respond best to their unique contexts.