Explore the dynamic world of Open Educational Resources and discover how OER Africa is driving the movement forward. This page is divided into two sections:
Articles: Our articles aim to deliver insights on OER-related themes that inform, spark conversation, and engage with the developing open education landscape, with a particular focus on Africa.
Updates: Below, the articles, you'll find updates on OER Africa’s latest initiatives, activities, and contributions to the OER community.
Articles
This section features targeted articles crafted specifically for educators, students, and the global Open Educational Resources (OER) community. The articles examine themes related to OER, offering insightful perspectives and information. The content seeks to inform, prompt discussion, and actively engage with the dynamic landscape of open education, particularly within the African context.
14 June 2021
OER Africa has been grappling with the complexities surrounding diversity promotion. We have written this article in the hope that it contributes to an ongoing conversation – within our initiative and beyond – on diversity in the OER space.
29 April 2021
The open knowledge ecosystem has seen significant growth in the last few years. This communication is about Open Science from an African perspective. It explores examples of how Open Science platforms are being constructed, together with linkages among the different forms of openness.
19 April 2021
Are you familiar with open learning as an approach to education? Are open learning and open pedagogy the same thing? What does open pedagogy look like in practice?
In this week’s article, we explore the concepts of open pedagogy and open learning. We also unpack open pedagogy using an interactive learning template.
17 March 2021
As readers will know, OER Africa is a strong proponent of open educational resources (OER) and open licensing. Creative Commons licences are the ones most frequently used when OER content is produced. There are six of them, which range from very permissive, allowing copying and modification (CC BY), to those that are more restrictive, permitting distribution of a work in its original form, but no modification (CC BY-ND).
23 February 2021
Open Education has the potential to make education more accessible, enable the creation of relevant teaching and learning materials, improve the quality of content, and empower learners to be critical thinkers and knowledge creators. Open Education Week (OE Week), held annually, is an opportunity for actively sharing and learning about the latest achievements in Open Education worldwide.
03 February 2021
Are you looking to interact with people who are interested in Open Education Resources (OER)? Do you have ideas that you want to share with a wider audience and learn more about OER? A Community of Practice (CoP) might be the right place for you.
The term ‘Community of Practice’ was created by Etienne Wenger, who offers a social theory of learning – a school of thought that proposes that humans can acquire new ideas and behaviours by observing others.
Updates
This section provides updates on OER Africa’s initiatives and activities. Stay informed about our contributions to the OER community and how we are driving the open education movement forward.
30 January 2020
This report assesses students’ access to educational materials in select institutions within Commonwealth countries. The findings indicate that learners are now engaging with a complex ecosystem of learning materials, both print and digital, in a multitude of differing forms and formats, with various terms of use and durations of sustained access.
21 November 2019
This paper demonstrates how the features and affordances of open learning have been developed in new and productive ways to provide school-based continuing professional development for teachers in Zambia.
06 November 2019
A big barrier to lifelong learning can be the cost of resources. There are worldwide initiatives to change this, though, and it’s helpful to know how to use these resources legally.
One such arrangement is Creative Commons, considered to be the global standard for open licences.
16 October 2019
The guidelines describe the whole process for designing and implementing OER policy in seven chapters, each representing a clear phase in the whole process. The chapters introduce the purpose of the phase and provide background information and references with practical examples for illustration.
23 August 2019
The UNESCO Chair on Open and Distance Learning (ODL) at UNISA organised a seminar on Open Education Resources for staff in the university, held on 12th June, 2019. Ephraim Mhlanga and Kirsty von Gogh from Saide and Neil Butcher & Associates respectively facilitated the workshop, which was attended by about 25 participants.
23 August 2019
This study by John Hilton III synthesizes results from sixteen efficacy and twenty perceptions studies involving 121,168 students or faculty that examine either (1) OER and student efficacy in higher education settings or (2) the perceptions of college students and/or instructors who have used OER.