Use of Digital Reusable Assignments to Supplement and Support OER Adoption and Increase Student Engagement in a Human Physiology Course

Adoption of OER materials presents unique challenges for courses that rely heavily on images and videos for the conveyance of complex concepts, as these materials may be lacking in these areas. A challenge that is not unique to this course is increasing student engagement. In order to tackle these challenges simultaneously, we sought to implement the use of two types of digital reusable assignments in the Principles of Human Physiology course.

The initial assignments were designed, in part, to have the students identify videos and images under a Creative Commons (CC) license that illustrate major course themes. Specifically, core topics that students typically struggle with and are difficult to convey without visual aids. In the second digital reusable assignment, students worked in groups to generate their own media resource on a specific topic. Students were allowed to choose the format of their resource. Media modalities included, songs, comics, graphics, posters, podcasts, videos, etc.. For both assignments, these media could be pooled and used to augment the teaching resources provided with the OER textbook. We hoped that this would improve the available teaching resources and give students a feeling of investment in the course and permanence to their work.

To educate students about copyright and their rights as authors, the librarian assigned to the course visited the class at the beginning of the semester to share an online guide explaining how to find and identify open access resources, including videos. Later on, the librarian offered a required workshop where students rights as authors were discussed and where they were offered the opportunity to sign a release form for their final exercise assigning a CC license to their work. Students’ decisions were kept in sealed envelopes until grading was finished, and only then shared with the professor. Links to the course guide and release form will be shared during the presentation, as well as examples of student work with assigned CC licenses.

Learning Outcomes:

• Create an assignment that allows students to identify open access images and videos that facilitate understanding of complex topics.
• Create an assignment that allows students to create open educational resources that could be incorporated into future iterations of the course.
• Plan how to address authors rights and FERPA permissions with students. Access examples of students work and an example FERPA permission form.

Rapid Open Adoption: Co-Constructing an Open, Active STEM Textbook with Students

Presenters: Peter Wallis, Jennifer White

In Spring of 2020 the University of Washington moved all courses to emergency remote. Many struggled, or doubled-down on existing, closed practices. Many further closed their courses through proprietary software, or proctored exams.

We tell a different story. Dr. Jennifer White opened her Endocrinology course to co-constructing an open textbook with students, starting from course materials and notes created by Dr. Moon Draper, the previous teacher of the course. Dr. White made the transition to open pedagogy and open textbooks with very little prior experience. After the Spring Quarter, her course transition was rated by students as being the best rapid transition to online in the UW Biology department.

In the Summer Quarter, Dr. White ran the course again, with Peter Wallis joining her as a researcher. Together we ran several open pedagogy design experiments. Our goal was to develop assignments teachers can use to make a rapid transition to open pedagogy, co-constructing open textbooks with students, in keeping with what we already know about high structure active learning.

We are in the process of writing up our research, drawn from assignment data, focus group feedback, and student surveys. We would like to tell you the story of our course, strengthen the evidence that it’s possible for teachers with little background to rapidly transition to open pedagogical and open educational practices, and share assignment and course designs you can use in your context, to open education to all.

Learning Outcomes:

• Review challenges & opportunities moving from in-person teaching to co-constructing an open textbook online in the COVID-19 crisis
• Explore the possibility of rapid open education transformation through a real life case study
• Analyze assignment designs & review student feedback
• Select specific assignment designs participants can use to help students co-create Open Educational Resources

An Open Annotated Bibliography Case Study

Presenter: Colby Moorberg