Open Teaching

I have not posted for a while. But these questions intrigued me:

How would you redesign open online courses, if you could? What should I do to improve this course? (Don't be bashful - I want to make this course as good as I can!)

Being an instructional designer, redesigning a course to be an open online course is an interesting thought. I would have to immerse myself in a course re-design to really come up with the answer, but I did like saylor.org layout of their free courses.

Besides just listing readings or videos, they asked you to journal, reflect, and answer questions. It was more than just a multiple choice quiz. I would add these higher level thinking questions to my open online course.

The only thing lacking from this course as well as the open online courses I viewed was a space for community. David encouraged us to blog and tweet, but I really like the discussion board inside a course to build the community. An example of a community I like is the Educause LinkedIn group. There are many interesting conversations where we learn from each other.

OER - Music

We are currently designing a introduction to music class. We are trying to use all open education resources instead of buying a book.

I used the advance search in Google to find free resources.  Here are a few of my finds:

From Connexions (Rice University)(cnx.org)
Pitch: http://cnx.org/content/m10943/latest/

P2PU.org---this is about rhythm (notes and rests and creating a 4/4 time piece):
https://p2pu.org/nl/groups/music-theory-101/content/rhythm/

And my favorite is Free Music Archive. This site has all genre of music for your listening pleasure (I enjoy classical music): http://freemusicarchive.org/genre/Classical/

Language of Sharing

"Think back to a time when you learned something you really value from someone."

This happens a lot in our lives. The times this has happened in my life is usually through storytelling. Some visits with my dad over the holidays includes a few hours of telling me things of his past, usually in a story format. You know, not just telling the facts, but describing the place and the smells. I don't think he means to teach me anything, but reflecting on the stories later that evening I realize I know more about a time period in history, and I have more insight to why I think the way I do.

We are all teachers, learners, and doers.

To be open or not to be open....

I am beginning a MOOC about open education. I am taking this because:

•  I've read a lot of David Wiley and would like the opportunity to learn from and interact with him 
•  I want to experience a MOOC 
• my department is looking at non-traditional opportunities for students to get a community college education.

Many faculty get uneasy when open education is mentioned in conversation. I would like to give them more background on the pros (and cons) of open education.

Now I begin my pondering.....