Open Curriculum and Textbook Development: some initial ideas

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Open Curriculum and Textbook Development some
initial ideas

• V Balaji
• ICRISAT

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Open Educational Resources-UNESCO 2002

• Operating Definition the open provision of
  educational resources, enabled by ICTs, for
  consultataion, use and adaptation by a community
  of users for non-commercial purposes
• Wikipedia-linked Wikiversity is just emerging
• Two examples
• The OCW Consortium
• The OpenLearn-UK

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Wider Use of ICT Inspired Open Course Sharing

• MITs OCW in 2002
• Only syllabus and lecture notes
• MITs OCW now
• An international consortium- includes over 75
  universities in 21 countries
• MIT Courses can be modified by a consortium
  member
• Delivery/credits entirely administered by the
  member

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OpenLearn Initiative of the UKOU

• Launched in 2005
• Currently has 5000 hours of study material equal
  size in LabSpace
• Creative Commons licensing
• Key Learning
• Allow re-mixing for more effective use globally
• This needs to be offered ab initio, upfront, not
  later

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A few more ongoing efforts..

• Rice University Connexions
• The Sakai Project
• The BCcampus
• The Freecourseware Project, South Africa
• The NPTEL Project in Engineering Education, India

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What is in it for Agriculture?

• The Positives First
• Sharing of courses is highly feasible, despite
  persistence of IP issues
• re-mixes, playlists of content are emerging
  into educational practice
• Quality control of re-purposing can be a
  community-facilitated process

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The Limitations

• Internet Access from a PC Essential for Learning
• Tight Binding to a Learning Management System,
  however Open or Proprietary
• Suits formal education requirements but not the
  Open Learning Requirements always

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Towards a Rural Agriculture-influenced Perspective

• Separate Content Creation and Validation
  Processes from Access, Delivery and Exchange
  Processes
• Facilitate content generation in a granular
  form compatible with Learning Objects practice
• Former can be in mostly digital realm use Web
  2.0 tools with Semantic Web techniques

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Perspective Ideas Continued

• Access need not be limited to PC-based Internet
• Accept mobile telephones and similar devices as
  key access methods by learners
• Enable re-purposing for highly contextualised
  use community radio, local cable TV scripting,
  short pieces in print or video

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VASAT content generation model (IIT-Kanpur)
Outputs can be in Different Formats!
Whether employing physical or electronic devices
for output, the process of LO creation does NOT
change!

• Posters, Brochures, flyers
• Conventional print products
• Mobile
• Web
• Radio
• Television
• Performances

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Semantic VASAT Wiki Ingredients



Semantic VASAT Wiki
Semantic Tool
MediaWiki S/w
FAOs AGROVOC
FAOs AGROVOC provides the Ontology to link
information objects in the Wiki facilitated by
OntoWorlds Semantic Tool
http//vasatwiki.icrisat.org
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External Website
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Wiki Article
Content Aggregation from different sources using
eXe
Aggregate Content
Export Content
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NGOs
VICs
DoA
SAUs
QA activities log
Content Organization Ontology, Wiki-like
interface
NARS
K-Base
Intl. agencies
Pvt NARS agencies
Commodity Markets
Dynamic Data
Weather / Meteorology
Imagery/ Maps
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Multi-modal Delivery Services
T.V / Radio
OA Repository
Print
VKCs
Interfaces
Knowledge Organization
Smart interfaces
Call centers
LMS e-Learning
Fixed / mobile Phones
Users
Stakeholders
Collaboration and Capacity Building processes act
as the glue to various components here
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The Opportunities Are Many

• Communities of content producers will play a
  critical role that is where Web 2.0 and Social
  Networking need to be brought in
• Wiki-like content creation, validation,
  maintenance essential
• New semantic tools should be considered for ease
  of search, navigation and aggregation
• Quite some engineering work pending but lets not
  wait..