The Open/Technology in Education, Society, and Scholarship Association Conference

Critical Change in the Educational Landscape: Reimagining, Reengineering, and Redesigning a Better Future

Aras Bozkurt, Terry Greene, Valerie Irvine — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

Undoubtedly, the entire globe is in the middle of a transition process owing to the forced impact of the COVID-19 pandemic that has urged us to change radically and critically. Motivated by the need to understand ongoing changes, this editorial intends to surface crucial issues that can possibly impact and shape the educational landscape and its future. In this sense, this editorial sees the COVID-19 pandemic as a triggering event and explores issues that are significant for educational systems. In essence, the normal as we knew it was problematic and the crisis that emerged with the COVID-19 pandemic can be an opportunity to transform the educational systems that were accustomed to rigid structures.

Inclusive Teaching Practices in College Education during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Did Online and Blended Learning Bring Some Change?

Géraldine Heilporn, Simon Larose, Catherine Beaulieu — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

The implementation of inclusive teaching practices in postsecondary education has depended, up until now, on individual faculty initiatives. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has caused teachers to rethink their practices and to move their courses online. The purpose of this exploratory study is to analyze the evolution of inclusive teaching practices in college education, following the transition from face-to-face to blended and online courses during the pandemic. Qualitative data was collected from 25 interviews with students with disabilities. Results show a progression in the accessibility of course materials and in the use of technological tools to diversify content presentation formats. Assessments also showed some diversification. However, the results suggest that opportunities for student engagement and participation in online and blended courses were quite restricted. Teaching was also perceived as less inclusive and less structured by students, except in courses where teachers set aside specific time for questions and to summarize important points. The results are discussed considering principles and practices to support learning and engagement for all students, recognizing the variability of their needs and preferences.

Online or Remote Learning and Mental Health

Stephanie Moore, Michael Barbour, George Veletsianos — Mon, 09 Jan 2023 00:00:00 -0800

While there has been a great deal of debate over the impact of online and remote learning on mental health and well-being, there has been no systematic syntheses or reviews of the research on this particular issue. In this session, we will present a review of research on mental health / well-being and online or remote learning. Our preliminary analyses suggest that little scholarship existed prior to 2020 and that most of these studies have been conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic. We report three findings: (a) it’s very difficult, if not impossible, to control for pandemic effects in the data, (b) studies present a very mixed picture, with variability around how mental health and well-being are measured and how / whether any causal inferences are made in relation to online and remote learning, and (c) results across these studies are extremely mixed. Based on this study, we suggest that researchers, policymakers, practitioners, and administrators exercise extreme caution around making generalizable assertions with respect to the impacts of online/remote learning and mental health.

Decolonization of Digital Learning Spaces: It’s Not About Knowing More but Knowing Better

Marguerite Koole, John Traxler, Shri Footring — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

Working alongside members of communities who are remote and/or marginalized from the dominant socio-economic powers, the long-term goal of the Decolonisation of Digital Learning Spaces project is to empower communities in choosing, adopting, developing, and/or appropriating culturally appropriate and sustainable digital learning technologies. Before we can co-envision useful options, however, we must first know what questions to ask and how to ask. It is necessary, therefore, to find appropriate, efficient, and innovative approaches to better understand community needs and values. This paper describes the preliminary planning of the research project in creating an international network of community members, activists, and researchers, and in identifying and testing methods for eliciting needs, values, and ways of understanding the world. Selected methods must allow the researchers to step outside their own pre-conceived understandings to avoid dominating or imposing meaning upon the participants’ understandings. In this presentation, we describe: a) the goals and concerns that were the impetus for the project, b) the nascent network, c) potential knowledge elicitation methods, and d) the repeated single-criterion card sort method as the first method that will be piloted. This deceptively simple method allows research participants to use their own words to express their conceptualizations thereby reducing the influence of the researcher upon participants’ mental model and values.

Flipped Learning in Grade 7 and 9 Mathematics

Barbara Brown, Nadia Delanoy, Mark Webster — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

This design-based study focused on supporting students in grade 7 and 9 math classes by implementing a flipped learning model. In this study the researchers explored the perceptions of teachers and students about the benefits and challenges of a technology-enhanced pedagogy such as flipped learning. The study was conducted from January to June 2021 with two junior high math classes in a charter school in Alberta with a specialization in English language learning, and at a time when classes were shifting between in-person and online learning frequently due to COVID-19. Through a design-based approach, teachers engaged in reflective conversations and journaling, students were surveyed about their experiences with the flipped learning approach, and data analytics were reviewed from the videos and embedded quizzes assigned as pre-learning activities. The Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) framework was used to explore the relationship between technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge for designing flipped learning activities. The results from this study demonstrated the efficacy of the procedures, instruments, and value in extending the study to involve more classes and subject areas. Participants were satisfied with using the flipped learning approach for improving students’ engagement, agency, and mathematical understanding. Research in flipped learning can help inform teachers and schools in any teaching scenario whether in person, when teaching online, in blended learning environments, and when employing emergency remote learning.

Feedback Generation through Artificial Intelligence

Okan Bulut, Tarid Wongvorachan — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

Feedback is an essential part of the educational assessment that improves student learning. As education changes with the advancement of technology, educational assessment has also adapted to the advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Despite the increasing use of online assessments during the last decade, a limited number of studies have discussed the feedback generation process as implemented through AI. To address this gap, we propose a conceptual paper to organize and discuss the application of AI in the feedback generation and delivery processes. Among different branches of AI, Natural Language Processing (NLP), Educational Data Mining (EDM), and Learning Analytics (LA) play the most critical roles in the feedback generation process. The process begins with analyzing students’ data from educational assessments to build a predictive machine learning model with additional features such as students’ interaction with course material using EDM methods to predict students’ learning outcomes. Written feedback can be generated from a model with NLP-based algorithms before being delivered, along with non-verbal feedback via a LA dashboard or a digital score report. Also, ethical recommendations for using AI for feedback generation are discussed. This paper contributes to understanding the feedback generation process to serve as a venue for the future development of digital feedback.

Incorporating Open Educational Practices in Graduate Education: A Collaborative Autoethnographic Study

Cindy Ives, Beth Perry, Pamela Walsh — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

In this paper we describe the early steps of our journey through a collaborative autoethnographic research project and share preliminary findings. As distance educators who work at an open, online university, we embrace a philosophy of openness, drawing on open educational practices to facilitate collaborative and flexible learning. As faculty members who support masters and doctoral students, we conceptualize our virtual learning environments as spaces where reciprocal learning takes place between and among learners and professors in a form of co-mentorship. We chose collaborative autoethnography because it is an approach that allows us to interrogate our practice using experiences, archival data, and artifacts as accessible and reliable sources of information. Collaborative autoethnography, which permits us to both individually and collectively critique our practice, requires us to consider our personal experiences in relation to our identities as distance educators within the cultural context of an open and online research university in Canada. The initial data analysis process has uncovered three emergent themes to date. These themes include values linking open educational practices with student engagement and facilitating effective open educational practice through learning design. This research project enables us to experience the power of collaborative autoethnography as a research approach and to further our understanding of the potential of open educational practices in graduate education.

Indigenizing Internationalization and Internationalizing Indigenization: Insights From a Virtual Study Abroad to Ireland, Jamaica, and Aotearoa/New Zealand

Michael Cottrell, Kristine Dreaver-Charles — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

This paper aligns with the themes found in “The Transitions of Online Learning and Teaching” and “Sustaining Positive Change,” and reports on the collaborative work of a faculty member and an instructional designer from the University of Saskatchewan, Canada, where Indigenization and internationalization are leading institutional priorities. Here we consider possibilities for greater collaboration between these disciplinary and programmatic imperatives for mutual benefit, which the shift to virtual learning during the Covid pandemic enabled. We explore the capacity of Virtual Study Abroad course design to synthesize Indigenous and Western pedagogies and methodologies to conceive of innovative curriculum consistent with the negotiation of epistemological third spaces through the design of a Virtual Study Abroad course focusing on educational systems in Ireland, Jamaica, and New Zealand. Major themes emerging from the data include the capacity of virtual learning to enhance the democratization of knowledge and the potential of participatory pedagogies and innovative assessment approaches to decolonize postsecondary curriculum. Ultimately, we hope that this work will serve to inform new institutional models and approaches, whereby Indigenization strategies serve to decolonize internationalization programs, and Indigenization efforts benefit from innovative programming emanating from internationalization initiatives. Such a reconceptualization holds the promise of mobilizing Higher Education in the service of social justice and the ‘global good.’

Investigating the Effects of Computer-Generated Contextual Landmarks on Short-Term Recall of E-Texts

Jon Dron, Rory McGreal, Vive Kumar, Jennifer D. Davies — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

E-texts have many advantages over their paper counterparts, especially when they are reflowable and available as open educational resources (OERs). Unfortunately, research suggests that e-texts are, on the whole, less memorable than p-texts, in part due to their relative lack of visual navigational landmarks that help to anchor recall. The Landmarks project team is, therefore, building an application that inserts computer-generated artificial imperfections – abstract or representational landmarks – into the display of e-texts, that remain consistently associated with text passages even when documents are reflowed or reformatted. We hypothesize that it may consequently be easier to recall the associated contents. The application is designed to provide the means to present modified open texts using a range of generated landmarks and variations on them, and to test recall of the content. In this initial pilot study, results of tests for readers receiving different landmarks will be compared, with the intent of identifying promising approaches to use for future studies.

Open Education: Looking at Canadian Higher Education through a Critical Research Lens

Mara Bordignon — Mon, 31 Oct 2022 00:00:00 -0700

Open education (OE), as the sharing, use, and reuse of resources, pedagogies, and teaching practices, is an evolving phenomenon globally. OE has gained momentum by challenging, transforming, and even displacing systems which exclude, disenfranchise, and marginalize members of both the public and academic communities. Traditional, dominant systems are problematic because they create barriers that restrict access, agency, ownership, participation, and experience. OE approaches represent a wide range of solutions from free open educational resources to open access of scholarly research. A complex open and closed ecosystem, coupled with flaws and weaknesses in OE practices and approaches themselves, create issues and tensions needing closer interrogation.

This paper provides a brief literature review on OE, with an emphasis on how meaning has evolved from being content focused to practice focused, alongside with the progression in an aim towards social justice and equity. A look at how OE is constituted within international and Canadian policy discourse also informs how conceptualizations form under social and political contexts. It is argued that critical theoretical frameworks can interrogate the OE phenomenon, particularly within Canadian higher education. A critical research lens can be beneficial in providing understandings of power relations as they affect social justice and equity.

The Integration of Technology with UDL and RTI in Inclusive Classrooms

Diane Montgomery, Kathy Snow — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

The transition to inclusive classrooms in Ontario meant classroom environments had to adapt to the needs of students instead of students being expected to adapt to a standardized curriculum (Parekh, 2018). Although challenges existed in the implementation of this student-centered approach, some teachers addressed these obstacles through the use of technology, Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and the Response to Intervention (RTI) frameworks. This paper combined two studies which included both teachers' and students' perspectives of inclusive classrooms. The primary study examined the instructional practices of eight elementary school teachers who experienced successful transitions to inclusion in bricks and mortar and virtual classrooms. The second study explored the experiences of students with and without disabilities who participated in virtual learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. Through online interviews and classroom observations, the teachers demonstrated how technology could increase student engagement, differentiate instruction, and provide students with alternative instruction and assessment methods. However, inconsistencies were revealed in screening approaches to identify the needs of students and monitor students' progress. The students engaged in multiple options of learning with some experiences more positive than others. The paper concludes with a summary of technology-based inclusive practices shared by teachers and students.

Fostering Pedagogical Alignment During a Distance Learning Migration: A SoTL Approach

Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the program team for an undergraduate university certificate in occupational health and safety began a migration to distance learning affecting all courses. The approach aimed, among other things, to respond to the diversity and needs of student cohorts in continuing education. The integration activities, particularly the INT110 educational activity, posed certain challenges: various issues (e.g. absenteeism, demotivation, disengagement and low success rate) were reported by the teacher in charge. A Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) process was carried out to reflect on and document these issues, to improve teaching practices and student learning. The SoTL approach has six iterative phases: analysis, appropriation, design, implementation, evaluation and dissemination. The analysis phase highlighted issues related to pedagogical alignment. The experiential approach and project-based learning have been retained. The educational activity was completely reviewed in the design phase to maximize educational alignment based on recognized theoretical frameworks that were explored during the appropriation phase. The educational activity has been refocused around the planning of an intervention in a company. The implementation of the new learning project was done in two stages (2020 and 2021). The evaluation phase has been postponed to the spring of 2022. The preliminary analysis of the results obtained suggests the positive effects of the educational innovation implemented.

Co-Designing OER with Learners: A Replacement to Traditional College Level Assessments

Kimberlee Carter, Camila Redondo — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

Academic integrity issues in higher education have been reported as increasing as the pandemic and need to learn remotely continues. The use of homework sites like Chegg, that provide learners with answers to tests and assignments increased significantly through 2019 and 2020 (Walsh et al., 2021). Open advocates have been espousing the benefits of open educational resource assignments co-constructed with learners and published in the open prior to the pandemic. These have largely been writing assignments taking the form of blogs with a focus on teaching practices. An example of this phenomenon is the Open Learner Patchbook where learners write blog posts to share in the open (Open Education Global, 2019). A faculty involved in two projects that co-designed Open Education Resources (OER) with learners was curious to know what processes learned could be applied to co-designing OER assignments in their own teaching practice as an alternative to traditional assessments where answers can be found on homework sites. Easton et al. (2019) propose that original assignments encourage learners to complete their own work. This presentation focuses on what was learned in the co-design process with learners and what can be applied to teaching practices in college diploma and certificate courses.

Community-Led Infrastructures for Open Access Books: A Sustainable Model and Platform

Judith Fathallah, Martin Eve, Tom Grady — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

This paper introduces two major outputs of the Community-led Open Publication Infrastructures for Monographs project, the Open Book Collective (OBC) and platform and the Opening the Future publishing model. The OBC, a charitable entity, will host an infrastructure and revenue management platform for the support, access, distribution, and promotion of open access (OA) books beyond models relying on book processing models. I then discuss a revenue model for publishers who wish to flip to an OA model without book processing charges. This ‘Opening the Future’ model has already been successfully implemented by two publishers, the Central European University Press and Liverpool University Press.

This paper relates to the conference theme of sustaining positive change. The international move towards OA book publishing must be approached through models that render OA books equitable and accessible to the widest variety of international readers and authors. This necessitates thinking beyond book processing charges and the potential monopolisation of the OA landscape by major publishers, supporting a diversity of approaches in a networked model we call ‘scaling small.’

Design Strategy Plus Pandemic Serendipity: Technology-Enhanced Entrepreneurship Education Using Open Learning and Micro-Credentials

Sonja Johnston, Michele Jacobsen — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

In a recent pilot for a redesign of an undergraduate entrepreneurship course, factors for consideration included: materials and resource costs, ability for work-integrated learning, and responding to the contemporary needs of the workplace outside of the post-secondary institution. The utilization of an industry leader’s open learning platform and the implementation of micro-credential certificates supported students’ learning experiences that bridged theory to experience and work-integrated learning. The use of multiple credentials (in addition to course grading) provided additional dimensions of learning and experience. This redesign was developed through 2019 and launched in January prior to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the 2020 winter semester. The intentional strategy in this course design was to build student competencies through theory and content, developing an application with micro-credential certificates, and utilizing work-integrated learning with students creating an ecommerce website to service an existing business or start-up plan. Serendipitously, as businesses and the ecommerce platform were forced to quickly adjust in response to the impacts of the pandemic, undergraduate students were able to learn and design in authentic circumstances and applications. Critical questions are raised concerning equitable access to technology and the reciprocity of gains in the open learning platform between students, institutions, and profitable businesses.

Digital Platforms and Algorithmic Erasure: What are the Implications?

Colin Madland, Maxwell Ofosuhene — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

As technology advances, people of colour often fall victim to algorithm racial bias. This paper focuses on the problem of digital tools that misidentify, fail to recognize, or erase people of colour. On a spectrum, these issues can range from the annoyance of making people of colour invisible during online meetings, to the endangerment of falsely identifying people of colour of crimes that they did not commit. We encountered the former challenge in September 2020, during a faculty Zoom meeting. Our Zoom erasure experience and subsequent Twitter crop experience raised questions for our investigation: why do people of colour experience erasure on zoom and other digital platforms? Is this problem new? What are the outcomes of our experience? How could the problem be fixed? How is it that biases in technology seem to emulate those found in social life? In this paper we aim to raise awareness through sharing our experience and recommending the interrogation of algorithmic tools released for market, the creation of government policy and laws to hold software companies accountable, and the education about biases for IT professionals, educators, and students in the field.

The Lymphatic System of the Dog: Translating and Transitioning to an Open Textbook

Kristine Dreaver-Charles, Monique Mayer — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

This contribution is situated at the University of Saskatchewan, where Open Education Resources have been supported since 2014. During the pandemic we began the work of translating The Lymphatic System of the Dog, by Dr. Hermann Baum, into English. Originally published in 1918, Dr. Baum’s book has been transitioned into Pressbooks, with the addition of ancillary resources. Balancing the legacy of Dr. Baum’s research with our own innovations in assessment and design engages new generations of learners and practitioners. The benefits for faculty and students in designing and publishing openly must also be acknowledged. Locally designed and produced open education resources created with and by our university community is of significance to the academy. The adoption of open textbooks in university classes establishes a discourse and refinement of knowledge ensuring quality resources are designed and shared.

Practicum During the Pandemic: Zooming In

Christine Ho Younghusband — Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

Universities in British Columbia pivoted to remote online learning in March 2020 and remained online in the upcoming school year. Teacher Education Programs also pivoted to remote online learning, with exception to practicum. Teacher candidates returned to K-12 schools for practicum as of the Fall 2020 term while coursework at universities remained online. Teacher candidates were placed into schools in their home communities, if possible, for practicum. At one university, some teacher candidates were supervised and formally observed and supported by the practicum mentor remotely due to limited staffing, location of placement, and COVID safety protocols. Formal observations and pre- and post-conferences with the teacher candidate were conducted using video conferencing on Zoom. Normally, remote observations are not accepted by the regulating board but during the COVID-19 pandemic some exceptions were made. There were some advantages and disadvantages to remote observations.

Truth and Reconciliation Through Inquiry-based Collaborative Learning

Fri, 23 Dec 2022 00:00:00 -0800

This paper overviews a project conducted at Fort St. James Secondary School in the Nechako Lakes School District, which is in Northern British Columbia, Canada. Three highschool teachers from different disciplines (Social Studies, Digital Media, and Carpentry) launched a cross-curricular inquiry-based project in partnership with local knowledge holders and School District 91, focusing on truth and reconciliation, that connected the learners in their highschool and the broader community, including knowledge holders from the local Indigenous communities. Those engaged in the project examined questions around what truth and reconciliation meant to the learners and its significance. Resulting products included a legacy wall containing individual learning represented in motifs, design of the feather using wood from around the world, and a video documentary containing interviews from school and community stakeholders. We share information on how to access the video documentary.