Sharing information should be, for an educator or a teacher, a normal thing to do. Even though how much information we share or how many students we educate, the information and knowledge will not disappear or vanish from ourselves. (Wiley.2010)Even though Dr. Wileys speech is from 2010, it is very needed today, as well.

In March 2021 the EU strategy for digital targets was announced. In the strategy it is stated what digital citizenship includes. For example the rights and principals for Europeans, where one of the rights are “Freedom of expression, including access to diverse, trustworthy and transparent information” and one of the principals are “Universal digital education and skills”. (EU. 9.3.2021)

Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said:” The pandemic has exposed how crucial digital technologies and skills are to work, study and engage – and where we need to get better. We must now make this Europe’s Digital Decade so that all citizens and businesses can access the very best the digital world can offer. Today’s Digital Compass gives us a clear view of how to get there.” (European Commision. 9.3.2021)

On-line, open teaching and learning is very topical issue, and opening up a course there is a lot to think about. The idea, of digging in to open learning, came from the ONL course and being one of the topic leaders for topic 2, which was openness and sharing, pushed me to find out more about sharing and openess. Google is very useful for finding information and tips on how to proceed. The website: https://elearningindustry.com/subjects/elearning-articles/elearning-best-practices gives good advice. A form of MOOC worldwide this year is COVID-19 Contact Tracing,(ranking in 6th place on the list of most popular MOOC´s) and this particular course we also have in Finland. The course in Finland is produced by the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare together with two Universities in Finland.

The MOOC`s are Massive Open Online Courses that aims at unlimited participation and open access via the internet. The MOOC´s suffer from high rates of attrition, which is attributed to learner isolation and lack of motivation to complete the courses. The pressure for trying different pedagogical approaches to increase motivation is high. In Greece they succeeded with a Big Open Online Course (BOOC), where they used 3D- virtual immersive learning environment using instructional approach based on Problem-Focused Education (PFE) and Game-Based Learning (GBL). During this course the participants achieved their learning goals, experienced a community of practice atmosphere and the participants also appreciated the variety of active learning modes. The motivation was increased by an open publication mode of several learning activities. (Stylianos et.al 2017)

The need for a pre-screening of students like asking their expectations, skills, motivation and preferences and building the course with personalized learning paths according to the pre-requisites, using a series of processes might increase the motivation of completing a MOOC. (Mystakidis et al, 2016)

There is a lot to think about when making an open network course, and in our PBL group we are trying to make a checklist of things that you need to consider before or while planning your course. Do we suffer from fear of sharing or is it the universities policy and institutional culture that prevents us from going “open”. Do we think that the university is donating knowledge for free, and then the question arises: Do we need universities in the future if everything is free on-line for everybody?

Openness and sharing is about a global distribution of knowledge, the question is how open is open for you? What is the definition of open? I think the first step for me will be this blog.

References:

European Commission. 9.3.2021. Europe’s Digital Decade: Commission sets the course towards a digitally empowered Europe by 2030. https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/IP_21_983

European Commission. 9.3.2021. Europe’s Digital Decade: digital targets for 2030. https://ec.europa.eu/info/strategy/priorities-2019-2024/europe-fit-digital-age/europes-digital-decade-digital-targets-2030_en

Mystakidis, Stylianos; Berki, Eleni; Valtanen, Juri (2017). Designing and Implementing a Big Open
Online Course by Using a 3D Virtual Immersive Environment : Lessons Learned. In Chova, L.
Gómez; Martínez, A. López; Torres, I. Candel (Eds.) EDULEARN17 Proceedings. 9th International
Conference on Education and New Learning Technologies, EDULEARN Proceedings. IATED
Academy, 8070-8079. DOI: 10.21125/edulearn.2017.0487

Mystakidis, Stylianos; Herodotou, Christothea (2016). OpenQuest : Designing a Motivational
Framework for MOOCs Instruction. In Jansen, Darco; Konings, Lizzie (Eds.) MOOCs in Europe :
Overview of papers representing a collective European response on MOOCs as presented during
the HOME conference in Rome November 2015. Maastricht: European Association of Distance
Teaching Universities.
http://eadtu.eu/images/publicaties/MOOCs_in_Europe_November_2015.pdf

Wiley, David. 2010. TedTalk. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rb0syrgsH6M