Open Access Resource Site
Design Pattern Tags : Community of Practice
Open Access Resource Site December 2015
The open access site accommodates educational resources with relevant news feeds, original content and aggregations of relevant third party material and acts as an external facing knowledge hub under a common-pool resource (CPR) for the benefit of students.
Rationale The open access site enables students to recognise educational resources relevant to their course and enables the development of their lifelong learning as the site becomes one of the nodes in their professional network.
Learners/Context The open access site enables students to freely access course specific resources and reuse the resources in their lifelong learning.
Alignment The open access site gives students the opportunity to access course specific resources.
Instructions/Processes Create a site RMIT Google Sites and follow instructions. Remember that the site created will by default be closed access, and settings will need to be adjusted for it to be accessible for an external audience, such as external peers or alumni.
The added advantage of using these services is that it will let you pick a subdomain name, such as oureconblog.wordpress.com or econdiagramming.tumblr.com. This will immediately let you establish your brand.
Process of setting up a site
In establishing a site, consider the following:
Contributors: Consider using other lecturers or tutors on your course, or collaborating with lecturers in other locations. You may even choose to involve current students or alumni. Agree with your collaborators on an initial strategy:and adjust as you start to get feedback from your students and other reader
Name of site: it also helps if the name can convey the site’s purpose: is it a “hub” or a “community”?
Purpose of site: What is the aim of your website? This can be any of the uses below or a mix:
Publish lesson plans or other open educational resources.
Publish resources on specific topics such as digital literacy, essay writing, or other common skills students will need.
Collect additional resources for students such as instruction videos.
Collect videos and podcasts by industry experts.
Collect newsfeeds from industry.
Publish opportunities for industry events or networking.
Communicate recent publications by staff.
Showcase student work.
Design: use design themes from the services and view some of the examples in the resource section.
Check the RMIT social media policy guidelines for branding instructions.
EXTENSION
Another option can be to choose a particular topic or theme for the website. For example, to collect case studies in various media. Or to focus on digital literacy skills.
In using the site to host new original content licensed with a creative commons license it is possible to enhance the reputation of the academic staff member and the institution by showcasing quality learning content and acting as a leader in the provision of open educational resources and in the collection of other resources.
Another benefit of an external site maintained by a group of lecturers is that it allows a group of lecturers to form a digital space where they can collaborate, even if they are in dispersed locations.
Conditions/Critical Success Factors Awareness of copyright issues when posting or republishing third-party materials or RMIT materials for external use. If in doubt, seek consultation with your teaching support team.
Resources/ Technology
