In partnership with the PASCAL SC Affordable Learning initiative and other SC institutions, the University of South Carolina is celebrating Open Education Week 2021 with a series of webinars on open education, active learning, copyright, and more. This year we welcome keynote speaker Dr. Karen Cangialosi, Professor of Biology at Keene State College. The sessions below are offered at no cost, but registration is required and seats are limited.
Explore the world of open educational resources throughout of week of events.
Introduction to Open Educational Resources (OER)
Monday, March 1, 12 p.m.
Speaker: Amie Freeman, University of South Carolina Libraries
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Learn how OER can save your students money and boost student success! Open Educational Resources (OER) are teaching tools that can be customized by faculty and freely accessed by students. This webinar will provide an overview of OER and other affordable course materials. Participants will learn to locate and evaluate OER and to interpret re-use permissions. In addition, attendees will discover techniques and resources for modifying and creating open course content.
Audience: UofSC
KEYNOTE Open Pedagogy and the Empowerment of STEM Learners
Monday, March 1, 1 p.m.
Speaker: Dr. Karen Cangialosi, Biology, Keene State University
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Dr. Karen Cangialosi, Professor of Biology at Keene State College introduces an innovative strategy to STEM teaching that involves having students learn through creating and sharing scientific knowledge online. Students do so using blogs, openly licensed web publishing, and in communications with each other on Twitter. A creative application of Open Pedagogy, her approach creates a refereshing alternative to tests and structured lab activities. It offers the instructors the opportunity to contextualize learning in a larger world outside of the classroom, and make education more relevant, inclusive, equitable and accessible. Integrating open pedagogical practices into teaching also builds trust and community with students, engaging them more fully in course content and design and promotes their agency as learners. It encourages student engagement in the most potent way: to not just be consumers of, but contributors to knowledge. Applicable to a variety of disciplines and well suited for face-to-face, online, hybrid and blended teaching, open pedagogy can utilize the web for boundless discovery, creativity and analysis, and as a venue for dialogue with the wider public. Join Dr. Cangialosi for a discussion of her teaching activities, and she will also ask you a larger question: How can your role as a teacher in higher education have a greater impact in influencing our larger culture?
Audience: Statewide
TruWriter for Classroom Engagement: Collaborative Student Publishing 101
Tuesday, March 2, 2 p.m.
Speaker: Amie Freeman
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In this workshop, we will demonstrate how you can engage students through collaborative publishing projects. We'll showcase practical examples and walk you through how this can be accomplished by using TruWriter, a simple multi-user web publishing platform.
Audience: UofSC
Introducing WeBWorK (Open Source Homework Systems)
Wednesday, March 3, 1 p.m.
Speaker: Matthew Macauley, Clemson University
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Are you concerned about the high cost of homework systems for students in STEM subjects? Would you like to learn about free and low-cost options that you and your institution can use to alleviate their financial burdens? These alternative homework systems not only provide students cost savings, but they also allow instructors flexibility in designing practice exercises and assignments. Join Dr. Matthew Macauley from Clemson's School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences for a demonstration of WeBWorK, the school’s experimental open-source homework system, and a discussion on low-cost homework alternatives for students.
Audience: Statewide
Copyright and Course Materials: A Chat with the Experts
Thursday, March 4, 2 p.m.
Speakers: Tucker Taylor, Library Futures; Dr. Dick Kawooya, University of South Carolina
School of Information Science; Dr. John Morgenstern, Clemson University Press
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Copyright and course materials are frequent topics of discussion in higher education. And no wonder: how can you provide your students access to the books, articles, and cases studies that they need without infringing copyright? Perhaps you’re concerned with protecting the content that you have created for your course. And how do open educational resources (OER) and Creative Commons licenses fit in?
Join three expert panelists as they discuss copyright and answer your burning copyright questions surrounding OER, course materials, fair use, and open licensing.
Audience: Statewide
Using Open Textbook Writing to Engage Freshmen and Sophomore Students During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Friday, March 5, 11 a.m.
Speakers: Yang Wu, Open Resources Librarian; Anne Grant, Instruction Coordinator;
Megan Palmer, Assessment Librarian, Clemson University
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The switch to hybrid and online teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic has created many difficulties for instructors in directing and motivating students. For freshmen and sophomore students, the sudden change in the mode of instruction has created more emphasis on them to self-learn, something that many are not familiar with. Three librarians at Clemson University have developed an approach to address this problem. Combining open pedagogy and active learning, their teaching strategy asks students to work together to write an open textbook on their class subject. Students write the book through number of scaffolded assignments aimed at making them more self-directed, creative, and confident in learning on their own. This presentation highlights their experiences and insights in applying the approach to STS 1010, a course on information literacy in the fall of 2020.
Audience: Statewide