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Conversations on Open Education for Language Learning

Welcome to Open Education Week 2020

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March 2-6, 2020 is Open Education Week, an international event to build awareness of open education and show its impact on teaching and learning. Open education encompasses resources, tools and practices that employ a framework of open sharing to improve educational access and effectiveness.* Read below to learn how to get involved during Open Ed Week.

Attend COERLL’s Open Ed Week OER Hangout Webinar

Celebrate Open Education Week by attending this discussion-based webinar on Wednesday March 4 at 6:00pm CST, where you will have a chance to chat with three instructors who have adopted OER and creatively adapted the content for their language classes.

  • Alexandra Gouirand is a French faculty member at South Puget Sound Community College. She uses Français interactif as the main textbook in her French 1 class, as well as ancillary books and online resources including YouTube videos.
  • Dawn Michael has been teaching French since 1991, and is currently a high school French teacher in Ohio. She uses the open curriculum Français interactif to teach blended French 1 and 2 courses and creates her own supplements to accompany the resources.
  • Valérie Morgan is a French lecturer. She uses the open curriculum Français interactif to teach Levels 1, 2, and 3 French. To supplement the textbook she uses Google Classroom, Google Tools, Flipgrid, and Padlet.

Since Français interactif is the most widely-used OER published by COERLL, it was easier for us to find French teachers to present here, but we hope teachers of all languages will join.

There will be 20 minutes of presentation time, and the rest of the hour will be dedicated to your questions and to conversation between participants and panelists. We want to hear from you!

Be featured on COERLL’s Language OER Network

Have you taught with openly licensed resources, created your own openly licensed resources, or helped others learn about OER? If so, we want to give you a digital badge and feature you on the Language OER Network! 102 faculty, teachers, librarians, graduate and undergraduate students are already listed there.

Visit the LOERN page to join

Find other events and resources for Open Education Week

You can discover other events around the world on the Open Education Week website. Here’s just a sample:

And check out these resources:

Learn more about OER for language learning in our introductory guide

Last year, we launched the Introduction to OER for Language Teachers, a series of modules on topics related to creating and using open educational resources and practices. We have been updating the guide ever since based on our conversations with teachers – it’s OER, so it continues to evolve!

If you are already a user or creator of OER, or are planning on becoming one, please take a look at the guide, and let us know what you think!

Try licensing your work

If you are already sharing activities, lesson plans, or other resources with colleagues, you might want to consider adding a Creative Commons license, so people know how they are allowed to use it and remember to give you credit. Here’s how…

  1. Somewhere in your document, write “This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License” (or whichever other license you choose). This page can help you choose a license (that is, choose how people are allowed to use your resource).
  2. Add an image of the license if you have it.
  3. Don’t forget to include your name as the author!

 

*Definition from the Open Education Consortium’s Open Education Week website, licensed under CC BY.

Virtual Reality: Innovation in Open Education

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Photo by mentatdgt from Pexels, Public Domain

Editor’s note: This is a guest blog post by Margherita Berti, a doctoral student in Second Language Acquisition and Teaching (SLAT) at the University of Arizona, and the creator of the open educational resource website Italian Open Education.

As the awareness about open educational resources, tools, and practices increases, instructors, researchers, and educational technologists are exploring innovative ways to promote language education. This is especially the case for Italian Open Education, a website that offers a collection of openly-licensed and free-to-use 360-degree virtual reality videos for Italian learners and teachers.

As a researcher and language educator, I chose to develop Italian Open Education to support the Open Education Movement and to supplement current foreign language textbooks with innovative and dynamic pedagogical materials. Today’s technological advances have made virtual reality extremely accessible, allowing language learners to be immersed in three-dimensional and seemingly real environments generated by the use of special electronic equipment (e.g., smartphones, viewers, headsets, etc.).

To create such resources, I first recorded 360-degree videos in Italian locations that represent everyday environments which students might encounter, however not critically reflect on, in the language textbook. Some examples include a plaza, a street, a coffee shop, a restaurant, a mall, etc. (permission to record the videos was granted by owners of inside spaces). After the recordings took place, I uploaded the videos to YouTube and licensed them under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 license. The Italian Open Education platform was then developed on WordPress, where all the 360-degree virtual reality videos are gathered and can be used freely.

The objective of this project is to offer new cutting-edge pedagogical resources which allow Italian language learners to be virtually placed in various Italian settings that might be inaccessible due to financial or geographical constraints. Since most students are not able to study abroad, the use of openly-licensed 360-degree virtual reality videos in the language classroom gives learners equal access to authentic environments representing the target country.

By sharing free-to-use, high-quality and innovative pedagogical materials with teachers and learners, I advocate for the Open Education Movement and aim to encourage administrators and language educators to implement new and dynamic open educational resources in their own language classrooms.

For more information:

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Margherita Berti is a doctoral student in Second Language Acquisition and Teaching (SLAT) at the University of Arizona and holds a master’s degree in Linguistics/Teaching English as a Second Language from Indiana State University. She teaches undergraduate Italian courses and has over three years of experience in language teaching at the university level in Italian, Spanish and ESL. Her research specialization resides at the intersection of intercultural competence, educational technology, and curriculum and L2 content development..

Availability of Foreign Language materials in OER repositories

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Photo credit: flickr user gotcredit.com Creative Commons License

Here at COERLL, we encourage teachers to use Open Educational Resources (OER) and Open Educational Practices (OEP) in their classes. One way to begin using OER and OEP is to search for and use pedagogical materials (lessons, activities, and courses) that other teachers have posted online in OER repositories. To help navigate through the many options, we’ve gone through all of the OER repositories we know of to see what the benefits are of each one, and how much language content is available. This is a summary of what we found, we hope after you read this you will want to either search on some of these sites, or upload your own materials for sharing! And please let us know in the comments if you know of other repositories not included here!

Criteria for evaluating repositories

This criteria was loosely based on Atenas and Havemann’s key OER repository themes of searching, sharing, reusing, and collaborating, set out in their 2013 article ‘Quality Assurance in the Open: An Evaluation of OER Repositories’, which can be found online here.1

  • availability of language content – does the repository have at least some content for language learning, and is it easy to find?
  • tools for vetting – does the platform provide for peer reviews or some other vetting/editorial process to assure teachers access to quality content?
  • ease of remixing – does the platform encourage teachers to edit materials and personalize them for their students?
  • licensing information – are licenses clearly marked? do licenses allow for fair attribution, sharing, and remixing of content? are Creative Commons licenses encouraged?
  • metadata quality – does metadata facilitate searches using different criteria (e.g. languages, proficiency level, etc.)?
  • any other qualities that create an engaging and creative space for sharing materials and ideas,such as tools to help teachers communicate and interact with each other

Repositories with language materials

MERLOT

A well respected and mature (started in 1997) repository for lessons and activities. There are lots of options for collaboration and communication, so that it’s not just a repository but a community around sharing resources.

  • Lots of language content
  • Peer reviews are available for many of the entries and Merlot’s editorial board selects their favorites
  • Teachers can discuss the materials with each other in a comments section.
  • Easy to create a learning exercise around the materials.
  • Licensing information is clearly marked (not all content is Creative Commons licensed)
  • The longevity of the platform has allowed the best materials to emerge over time – here’s a list of some award winning ones

Open Textbook Library

The best part about this textbook repository is the elaborate rating system and emphasis on peer reviews and the vetting process.

  • There is a detailed list of criteria to guide users in reviewing materials.
  • Licensing information is clearly marked.
  • Some COERLL textbooks have just been added to the language page!

OER Commons

OER Commons is a large repository for any kind of materials (lessons, activities, textbooks, etc.). It has tools in place for thorough evaluation, remixing, creation, and licensing.

  • About 700 language materials and language support for resources and metadata
  • Users can evaluate materials based on Common Core standards and an extensive rubric. There is also a general rating available (out of 5 stars).
  • The system guides users in choosing a Creative Commons license upon upload
  • The lesson builder allows teachers to create new materials or reuse existing.

Carnegie Mellon Open Learning Initiative

Full courses available from Carnegie Mellon, for teachers looking for structured and complete courses.

  • Chinese, Spanish, French, Arabic
  • Plentiful guides and resources for teachers.
  • Licensed with a CC-BY-NC-ND license.
  • Users can add content but can’t remove or revise content from a course.
  • Free for instructors and independent learners, $50 for enrolled students.
  • Compatible with LMS.
  • Statistics about student use help teachers track progress and help Carnegie Mellon research education theories.

Open Course Library

Professionally laid out materials are easy to find and edit in this library of courses from the Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges.

  • 3 levels each of Spanish, French, and Sign Language
  • All materials are in google docs which makes them easy to modify.
  • All content is clearly marked as Creative Commons licensed.

Language Resource Centers (LRC) portal

The website for the 16 national Language Resource Centers (of which COERLL is one), where you can search a list of over 800 classroom and professional development materials.

  • Language content only (there are materials for LCTLs too)
  • Lots of criteria to help users narrow searches down
  • Materials have been vetted by language specialists

Curriki

Curriki does a good job of emphasizing community, and its wide range of review options helps users to sift through a lot of activities and other content.

  • 2765 entries under “World Language” content, but not all are for language teaching
  • Review options are plentiful: Members can give ratings and reviews, Curriki reviews some content based on Technical Completeness, Content Accuracy, and Appropriate Pedagogy, and there are collections curated by Curriki (no curated language collections yet though)
  • There is a separate community for teachers to discuss how to use materials.
  • Choosing a license is a prerequisite for uploading materials
  • Users can align materials with standards.

TES

TES is a repository where teachers share activities. Some activities cost a small fee but the World Languages section and the remixing tools make this site worth looking through.

  • American Sign Language, Ancient Greek, Arabic, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Latin, Mandarin, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, etc.
  • Teachers can review materials
  • All content is labeled with a license, either Creative Commons or the TES teaching resource license
  • Their related site, Blendspace, encourages remixing and is easily accessible from TES
  • Share My Lesson allows users to build a lesson plan around TES materials

MIT OpenCourseWare

MIT OpenCourseWare (OCW) makes course materials from MIT classes available for the public.

  • A good range of languages represented.
  • All instructor created materials share a CC BY NC SA license
  • Course materials includes any combination of syllabus, calendar, list of readings, assignments, online/related resources, study materials, instructor insights, and sometimes even course videos.
  • Though the instructor created materials are free and openly licensed, some of the course materials referenced are not free or open.

Wikibooks and Wikiversity

Wikibooks and Wikiversity are both run by Wikimedia. There are currently a lot of incomplete materials there but with the ease of editing, options to add auxiliary materials, and discussion tools, these platforms could be a rich resource.

  • Many languages (mostly reference grammars) on Wikibooks, some on Wikiversity
  • Discussion tabs encourage community and collaboration
  • There’s an option to add exercises on Wikibooks
  • Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License

LORO

LORO is all language content! It contains mostly activities rather than whole textbooks or collections. It’s supported by The Univesity of Southhampton and the Open University.

  • Exclusively for languages
  • Users can comment on or “like” materials
  • All content is CC licensed.

Repositories with fewer language options but with a unique angle on OER

Some other repositories are set up well but have little or no language offerings. I’d like to mention them anyways as examples of all the ways a repository can encourage sharing and collaboration.

  • Portland State University Open Text offers a carefully curated set of textbooks with a growing number of language books
  • BC Campus Open Ed has all the right tools for building a community of collaboration around the available CC licensed textbooks, including detailed criteria for peer review and resources for adopting and modifying texts.
  • The Orange Grove is the state of Florida’s repository. One of its best features is its detailed metadata which makes it easy to search for content.
  • Gooru offers CC licensed collections of materials, and many other features such as games and tools for remixing content and measuring student progress.
  • OpenStax CNX offers fully vetted, modularized textbooks, and an option for sharing activities and lessons.
  • The Sofia Project is a smaller repository, but it’s interesting to look through because of the large amount of auxiliary materials, like syllabi, rubrics, schedules, assignments, projects, exams, and even sample student assignments.
  • The Global Text Project is a grassroots approach to textbooks and encourages teachers to adopt books and work with their students to make them better.
  • The Saylor Foundation provides well organized and complete CC licensed courses with a lot of auxiliary material, and peer review and feedback are encouraged.
  • Storyweaver is not quite a repository but it offers a good model for collaborative language work… anyone can upload storybooks in any language (41 languages represented so far), and members of the community can comment on stories, share on social media, translate them or edit them for different levels of readers.

Other repositories

Areas for improvement

  • Tagging: Some repositories appear to have more language content than they do because content in a foreign language is tagged under the same category as content for teaching foreign languages. So for example, a Portuguese lesson about biology for Portuguese speakers could be in the same category as a Portuguese learning lesson for English speakers.
  • Use cases: Most repositories don’t specifically encourage a teacher who uploads a resource to explain how they used the the resource in their classroom. This information could help other teachers save time and give them new ideas about teaching methods.
  • Remixing: Editing materials is a key aspect of OER, but some sites do not encourage it. Some repositories do encourage edits in their platforms, but the resulting new material is not usable outside of the platform.
  • Popular tools: Some of the most widely used platforms (for example, YouTube) offer free resources for education, but don’t always provide important tools: peer review options, search terms compatible with educational criteria, and open licenses.

1Atenas, Javiera and Havemann, Leo (2013) ‘Quality Assurance in the Open: An Evaluation of OER Repositories.’ INNOQUAL – International Journal for Innovation and Quality in Learning , 1 (2). pp. 22-34.

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Department of Education proposes OER initiatives to directly impact teachers

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Photo credit: flickr user opensource.com Creative Commons License

We at the Center for Open Educational Resources and Language Learning (COERLL) could not be happier about two new Department of Education initiatives that not only reinforce the work we do to create and disseminate high quality open instructional materials for language learning but also expand government support for Open Educational Resources (OER) across disciplines.

At the end of October 2015, officials at the Department of Education and in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy welcomed school superintendents, educators, technology representatives, and non-profit leaders to an Open Education Symposium in Washington DC. At that meeting, the Department of Education announced the launch of a new #GoOpen Challenge campaign aimed at encouraging the use of openly licensed educational materials and also proposed a new policy regulation that would require all copyrighted intellectual property created with the support of Department of Education grant funds to carry an open license. In a distinct move away from traditional textbooks, the Department of Education asserted the need for all students to have access to high quality open learning resources.

Added to the recent appointment of the first Open Education Advisor, Andrew Marcinek, the new Department of Education pledge demonstrates that the government is serious about raising OER awareness. This aligns with COERLL’s mission to offer open materials for language learning at low-to-no cost. Unlike traditional course materials, OER may be adjusted and improved to meet the needs of students of all backgrounds in all districts, even the most underfunded ones.

Not surprisingly, some are wondering what the impact of #GoOpen and its support of next generation materials will be for classroom teachers. Importantly, participating districts will save money by adopting low cost OER in place of expensive traditional textbooks. Additionally, teachers will no longer have to worry that they might be breaking the law by inadvertently using copyrighted educational resources in the wrong way. Certainly, as more educators participate in OER creation and dissemination, the sharing of innovative materials and ideas will increase. Teachers will also learn more about best practices and, as they contribute their own materials, gain greater visibility and professional recognition.

If you would like to express your views on the new Department of Education OER policy proposals, you can do so here until December 18. We’d also be curious to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

An Open Assignment Bank … For Languages

By Barbara Sawhill

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From the editor: We’re happy to repost this entry with permission from Barbara Sawhill. You can catch more of her thoughts at Language Lab Unleashed. We welcome Barbara to our community of language educators for the progress of OER.

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I’m a big fan of the creative work that happens at the Division of Teaching and Learning Technologies (DTLT) at The University of Mary Washington.

Digital Storytelling 106 (ds106) is one of the many creative ideas that DTLT  has spawned, and it certainly has a presence on the web. I have been watching ds106 (and I have sometimes participated, because that is what you are expected to do) and also wondering what ds106 – a course about using media in a creative way for digital storytelling — could teach those of us who are interested in using media in a creative way  for language learning.

To be clear: I am not looking for new shiny tools or cool apps. What I am looking for is creative and fun ways for students to speak, listen, write and read in a second language. I am thinking about fun tasks to develop language skills. And I want to  integrate free, open, available tools and objects into exercises for developing languages.  And then I want to share them with everybody.

So here is my idea:  What about an open assignment bank for LANGUAGES?  I know what you are thinking, jeeez louise aren’t there enough of those out there already? True, yes there are, but many of them are tied to specific textbooks, courses and lesson plans.

I’m thinking more broadly, more generally. And yes, more open-ly.  Like ds106, I want to make it possible for anyone to suggest an assignment and for everyone to try them out.

And, rather than re-inventing the wheel, maybe there are ds106 assignments that are already in the hopper could be stolen liberated repurposed for language learning. I’m pretty sure the DTLT folks are into sharing, and wouldn’t mind seeing that happen.

So here we go.  Here’s a start. Here is a link to a rudimentarygoogle form where you can add ideas to  a language assignment bank. Please add something, please share it with others.  Please think about ways to incorporate existing open resources into the mix.

Ready?  Let’s see what we can create together.

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Barbara Sawhill portrait

Barbara Sawhill has been working for a small liberal arts college in the cornfields of Ohio for about 15 years. In addition to teaching Spanish she runs a somewhat unconventional language center. Prior to this adventure in higher ed she taught high school Spanish and loved it. She wishes she had more time in her life to write, read, swim, and watch the Red Sox. And sometimes she blogs over here and here as well.

Meet the iTunes U Language Learner

Fernando Rosell-Aguilar

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Have you ever wondered about those students who are learning foreign languages on iTunes? There are over 600 free language learning collections on iTunes. People are using them. What do you know about these students?

Earlier this year, I presented a paper at the e-Learning Symposium in Southampton University in the UK about the iTunes U language learner. I wanted to share the results with you. The findings show that most iTunes U learners have quite a different profile compared to university learners: from their age and gender to their occupation and motivations for accessing iTunes U language resources.

Before watching, think about who you think the iTunes U language learner is. Mostly male? Mostly female? How old? What do they do? Do they listen on mobile devices or on their home computers? Do they think they are learning by engaging with the language resources they download from iTunes U? And what implications do the answers to these questions have for the design and implementation of iTunes U resources from your own institution?

Now watch the presentation.

How do your answers to the questions above compare with the actual results? Feel free to comment on your impressions and implications for teaching and learning through iTunes U.

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Fernando Rosell-AguilarFernando Rosell-Aguilar is a lecturer in Spanish and coordinator of iTunes U content for the Department of Languages at the Open University, UK.

Read more about open language learning on iTunes.