OEN Offers Freely Available Resources in Open Pedagogy & Open Educational Practices

In October the Open Education Network (OEN) celebrated International Open Access Week 2023 with the release of two new openly licensed resources. Developed collaboratively by the OEN community and team, the Open Pedagogy Student Toolkit and Certificate in Open Educational Practices (public version) are now freely available to adopt, adapt, and share.

The Open Pedagogy Student Toolkit is a guidebook for a student audience authored by Jamie Witman, OEN Open Educational Practices Specialist. Published last month, the open educational resource (OER) is available on Pressbooks and Google Drive for students interested in developing foundational knowledge of open pedagogy. The book offers basic definitions, examines student benefits, and delves into student rights and responsibilities as co-creators. 

“One of the key components of open pedagogy is having students be co-creators with their instructors and with their peers,” Witman said. “I wanted to be sure to cover students as creators and go over their rights in terms of intellectual property and copyright, as well as their responsibilities to make sure everybody can access their work and that it’s inclusive.”

The Toolkit idea originated from Amy Hofer (Open Oregon Educational Resources) within the spring 2023 OEN Train-the-Trainer Learning Circle. That summer, as Witman began researching and drafting, she was surprised that she could find very little written specifically for students. Although she was able to adapt content for a few sections, Witman wrote most of the Toolkit content from scratch, a process she found enlightening.

“It really helped me think about open pedagogy from the student perspective,” she reflects. “Writing led me to internalize my own thoughts about open pedagogy, how to do it, and how to be effective with it. So, I hope this book leads students to think, ‘Okay, this is something I can do. This is something I want to do.’”

The seven-chapter Toolkit takes a conversational approach as it clarifies open pedagogy and encourages student self-reflection. The depth and breadth of information is intentionally suited to students. It also offers students a glossary, sample documents, and additional resources. 

Open Pedagogy Student Toolkit reviewers include Cheryl Casey of the University of Arizona; Tanya Grosz, Open Education Network; Amy Hofer of Open Oregon; Amanda Larson of The Ohio State University; and Heather Miceli of the American Association of Colleges and Universities.

The OEN has also released curriculum for the Certificate in Open Educational Practices. Both the team-based certificate and the publicly available curriculum provide actionable pathways for higher education faculty and librarians to design and implement open educational practices.

Available on Canvas through the University of Minnesota, the public curriculum is freely available to those interested in independent study of accessible, inclusive, student-centered pedagogy. Public participants can access the course syllabus along with self-paced modules addressing:

Note that in order to earn the certification, enrollment in the team-based certificate is required.

Tanya Grosz, OEN Director of Educational Programs, says she’s impressed by the team of OEN members who dedicated their time and expertise to create the program and revise the curriculum for public release.

“Their generosity and spirit of sharing is certainly in keeping with our ethos at the Open Education Network,” said Grosz. “It feels good to be able to say, ‘Okay, here’s what we did. Take it, use it, adapt it as you wish.’ I’m hoping that people will take what we’ve offered and make it even better for their context.”

The scaffolded, thoughtfully designed public curriculum is one of several outcomes from OEN strategic planning. Grosz considers it “a beautiful piece of the puzzle,” well complemented by other OEN resources including the Open Pedagogy Student Toolkit, Open Pedagogy Portal, Open Pedagogy Learning Circle curriculum, and Introduction to Open Pedagogy workshops.

“There’ll always be things to change and to build, but now there are these beautiful resources around open pedagogy that have been filtered through so many thoughtful, strategic lenses,” Grosz concludes. “It just feels very affirming to the planning process and gratifying that we can work together to create something others can use.”

The OEN thanks and acknowledges the team who created the Certificate in Open Educational Practices: Racheal Brooks of North Carolina Central University, Michael Cawdery of Leeward Community College, Will Cross of North Carolina Central University, Hannah Davidson of Plymouth State University, Tanya Grosz of the Open Education Network, Lindsey Gwozdz of Roger Williams University, Heather Miceli of the American Association of Colleges and Universities, and Jasmine Roberts-Crews of The Ohio State University. In addition, we are very grateful to Abbey Elder of Iowa State University for revising the course and joining the instructional team.

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If you would like more information on the Open Pedagogy Student Toolkit or the Certificate in Open Educational Practices curriculum, please contact Tanya Grosz, OEN Director of Educational Programs.