Open pedagogy takes Open Educational Resources as a jumping-off point to rethink the relationship between teachers, students, and knowledge. When teachers and students are able to modify their own textbooks and learning materials, we shift the student emphasis toward contribution to knowledge rather than simple consumption of knowledge. 

USask students have contributed to textbooks and other projects that allowed them to share the knowledge they gained with others. 

Learn more about Open Educational Practices (OEP).

Tools and Funding

USask supports several tools that can be used for open pedagogy including the USask OER Repository, Pressbooks and WordPress. There is also funding available to support open pedagogy projects.

Examples of Open Pedagogy

Open pedagogy can be integrated into courses at any level and by instructors with varying degrees of knowledge and comfort with open educational practices, learning technologies, and active learning. Several courses across USask have been integrating open pedagogy into courses including:

  • In a Kinesiology course, for group projects, students work with a community member to develop a personalized physical activity program. Each group also completes a land audit to identify accessible physical activity locations in and around Saskatoon, with those materials released under open licenses and shared with local organizations that promote physical activity.
  • In a Nutrition course, students created openly licensed brochures for use by community organizations.
  • A graduate course in Educational Technologies, students studying instructional design collaborated to revise an open textbook on instructional design to improve it and create a Canadian edition (https://openpress.usask.ca/pm4id/).

The table below uses a modified version of the 3E framework for the implementation of learning technologies to describe examples of open pedagogy activities across a variety of disciplines. The framework is based on a continuum which includes the following elements:

  1. Enhance - Integrate basic open pedagogy concepts and activities that are simple and effective ways to actively support students and increase role as knowledge contributors instead of just consumers.
  2. Extend - Further use of open pedagogy that facilitates key aspects of student’s individual and collaborative learning and assessment through increasing their choice and control.
  3. Empower - Developed use of open pedagogy that requires higher order individual and collaborative learning that reflects how knowledge is created and used in the professional environment.

Activity*

Enhance

Extend

Empower

Make an ongoing project out of improving existing Canadian History open textbooks to better reflect the history and contributions of groups often excluded from history texts.[1]

Students will review open resources, such as an open textbook or Wikipedia, to determine existing gaps related to a specific topic or inclusion of particular voices.

Students will adapt existing open resources such as an open textbook or Wikipedia, to improve the coverage of missing or incorrect topics or to include voices often left out of such materials.

Students will create new open resources that can be used by other learners to provide needed coverage on specific topics or to include voices often left out, including their own.

Have students create and publicly share marketing campaigns around raising awareness of one or more pressing issues.[2]

Students will create or adapt materials on a topic of the instructor’s choice that would address a current societal problem

Students will create or adapt materials on a topic of their choice that would address a current societal problem and could be used by students in other classes

Students will create or adapt materials on a topic of their choice that would address a current societal problem and could be used to educate and / or improve life within their communities and beyond

Have students create plain language tip sheets or brochures (openly licensed and freely downloadable) for those who are  just getting started growing food in their own yards or community gardens.

Students will create or adapt existing open materials that they can share with each other to have ongoing resources for planting and maintaining a vegetable garden.

Students will create or adapt existing open materials that they can share with their members of the university community who would like to plant and maintain a vegetable garden.

Students will create or adapt existing open materials that they can publicly for use by people who would like to plant and maintain a vegetable garden, or adapt the materials for use by communities in other climate regions.

Have students create and publicly share resources for teachers and students on how to teach / learn remotely, addressing concerns around access and time management.

Students will research, discuss, and share ideas in a collaborative document for themselves and fellow students at the U of S with tips on how to learn in a remote setting, including addressing issues around access and time management.

Students will research, discuss, and share ideas in a collaborative document for themselves and fellow students at the U of S and beyond with tips on how to learn in a remote setting, including addressing issues around access and time management.

Students will research, discuss, and share ideas in a collaborative document for themselves, fellow students, and educators with tips on how to teach and learn in a remote setting, including addressing issues around access and time management.

Have students revise existing or create new open resources on taking patient histories when needing to do patient intake through virtual means OR have students revise such resources to be more culturally inclusive.

Students will review existing materials both open and copyrighted works to determine how they can be improved to address taking patient histories at a distance or to make such resources more culturally inclusive.

Students will revise existing open works for use taking patient histories at a distance and / or to make such resources more culturally inclusive, and share these revised materials publicly with an open license.

Students will create open resources for use taking patient histories both face-to-face and at a distance The resources will be culturally inclusive and shared publicly with an open license.

 

Have students create or improve articles on Wikipedia related to individuals within your discipline who have historically been overlooked.

Students will review existing articles in Wikipedia, to determine existing gaps related to a specific topic for inclusion of particular voices such as women, people of colour, LGBTQ individuals, etc.

Students will adapt existing articles in Wikipedia, to address existing gaps related to a specific topic for inclusion of particular voices such as women, people of colour, LGBTQ individuals, etc. in the given discipline.

 

Students will create new articles in Wikipedia or another collaborative and publicly available platform, to address existing gaps related to a specific topic or inclusion of particular voices such as women, people of colour, LGBTQ individuals, etc. in the given discipline.

Have students translate existing open resources in literature that are currently in other languages

Students will work collaboratively to translate existing open resources currently in other languages.

Students will work collaboratively to translate existing open resources currently in other languages that will be shared publicly with an open license.

Students will work collaboratively to translate existing open resources, currently in other languages, modifying to improve content and include non-dominant perspectives

Have students create a shared annotated bibliography on a given topic[3]

Have students create a shared annotated bibliography on a topic chosen by the instructor.

Have students create a publicly available and openly licensed annotated bibliography on a topic chosen

Have students create a publicly available and openly licensed annotated bibliography on a topic chosen by the class or smaller groups.

*Note: These are examples from specific disciplines, but can be modified to be integrated into courses in other subjects.


[1] A similar project has been done at UBC, but involved students creating and modifying articles on Wikipedia

[2] Such a project was done in Kwantlen Polytechnic University in British Columbia to create a plan to raise awareness about the United Nations Climate Action Campaign.

[3] A similar project was done at Keene State College in New Hampshire - http://openpedagogy.org/assignment/students-creating-a-shared-annotated-bibliography/