Open Education

Compared with STEM fields, foreign language (FL) education and second language acquisition have only slowly embraced open education and the new knowledge ecologies it produces. FL educators may have been hesitant to participate in the open education movement due to a lack of research which investigates the benefits and challenges of FL learning and teaching in open environments. This book contextualizes open education in FL learning and teaching via an historical overview of the movement, along with an in-depth exploration of how the open movement affects FL education beyond the classroom context; fills the research void by exploring aspects of open second language learning and teaching across a range of educational contexts; and illustrates new ways of creating, adapting and curating FL materials that are freely shared among FL educators and students. This book is open access under a CC BY ND licence.

Online Distance Education: Towards a Research Agenda offers a systematic overview of the major issues, trends, and areas of priority in online distance education research. In each chapter, an international expert or team of experts provides an overview of one timely issue in online distance education, summarizing major research on the topic, discussing theoretical insights that guide the research, posing questions and directions for future research, and discussing the implications for distance education practice as a whole. Intended as a primary reference and guide for distance educators, researchers, and policymakers, Online Distance Education addresses aspects of distance education practice that have often been marginalized, including issues of cost and economics, concerns surrounding social justice, cultural bias, the need for faculty professional development, and the management and growth of learner communities. At once soundly empirical and thoughtfully reflective, yet also forward-looking and open to new approaches to online and distance teaching, this text is a solid resource for researchers in a rapidly expanding discipline.

Online version of MIT Press book has brief overview of book's content and provides links to open access PDF version of ebook, as well as an iPaper version and a link to the MIT Press store for buying the print version. In this collection of essays the authors who are leaders in open education, explore the potential of open education to transform the economics and ecology of education. The authors argue that we must develop not only the technical capability but also the intellectual capacity for transforming tacit pedagogical knowledge into commonly usable and visible knowledge by providing incentives for faculty to use (and contribute to) open education goods, and by looking beyond institutional boundaries to connect a variety of settings and open source entrepreneurs.

As new digital forms of formal and informal learning proliferate, there is an increasing need to better understand how people in different regions of the world are implementing massive open online courses (MOOCs) and other forms of open educational resources (OERs). Educators, researchers, politicians, and numerous other stakeholders want to grasp what the outcomes of these initiatives are and how they can be improved. Ongoing e-learning developments related to both technology and pedagogy have pushed institutions and organizations to grapple with issues of accreditation, credentialing, quality standards, innovative assessment, and learner motivation and attrition, among other areas of concern. In response, MOOCs and Open Education Around the World explores and illuminates unique implementations of MOOCs and open education across regions and nations. The book also focuses on the various opportunities as well as the dilemmas presented in this rapidly evolving age of technology-enabled learning. What are the different delivery formats, interaction possibilities, assessment schemes, and business models? What are the key controversies or issues that must be discussed and addressed? This edited collection explains MOOCs and open education trends and issues in a variety of contexts, shares key research findings, and provides practical suggestions and recommendations for the near future.

This insightful collection of essays explores the ways in which open education can democratise access to education for all. It is a rich resource that offers both research and case studies to relate the application of open technologies and approaches in education settings around the world. A must-read for practitioners, policy-makers, scholars and students in the field of education.

This book explores foundational theories that have been applied in open and distance education (ODE) research and refined to reflect advances in research and practice. In addition, it develops new theories emerging from recent developments in ODE. The book provides a unique and up-to-date source of information for ODE scholars and graduate students, enabling them to make sense of essential theory, research and practice in their field, and to comprehend the gaps in, and need for further enquiry into, theoretical approaches in the digital era. It also offers theory-based advice and guidelines for practitioners, helping them make and justify decisions and actions concerning the development, implementation, research and evaluation of ODE.

With e-learning technologies evolving and expanding at high rates, organizations and institutions around the world are integrating massive open online courses (MOOCs) and other open educational resources (OERs). MOOCs and Open Education in the Global South explores the initiatives that are leveraging these flexible systems to educate, train, and empower populations previously denied access to such opportunities. Featuring contributors leading efforts in rapidly changing nations and regions, this wide-ranging collection grapples with accreditation, credentialing, quality standards, innovative assessment, learner motivation and attrition, and numerous other issues. The provocative narratives curated in this volume demonstrate how MOOCs and OER can be effectively designed and implemented in vastly different ways in particular settings, as detailed by experts from Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, Africa, the Pacific/Oceania, and the Caribbean. This comprehensive text is an essential resource for policy makers, instructional designers, practitioners, administrators, and other MOOC and OER community stakeholders.

Education is the key to economic, social and environmental progress, and governments around the world are looking to improve their education systems.