Output 3: Social networking and gaming capacities of OER

First ExplOERer meeting, Thessaloniki, 3-4 November 2014

#explOERer

Output leader: Katerina Zourou

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This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication

reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

Scope

• Better understand the role of social networking and gaming in ΟEPas it is materialized in ROER and digital learning spaces in general

• Provide evidence regarding the potential of incentivized models of learning (gaming/social networking mechanisms) in OEP

• Develop, implement and test a set of social networking and gaming features in two existing ROER (action research approach)

• Customize 2 ROER (OER repositories: LORO http://loro.open.ac.ukand KlasCement http://klascement.net/ )

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Who is concerned

Mainly:

(W2L) Katerina and Giulia(OUUK) Anna(KC) Bram and Hans(UGOT) Linda and Sylvi

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Activities and timeline#O3/A1: Completion of the desktop research and technical specifications

# O3/A2: Development of prototype

# O3/A3: Publication of results

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How O3 activities link to those of other Outputs

O3 complements O1 and O2 as it approaches OER reuse from a design perspective

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Period of intensive work and milestones

OUUK, KC and W2L to invest heavily in O3.UGOT to contribute. Very low involvement of GCU and CCPL.

Period of intensive work: December 2014-February 2015: planning and development of the prototypes for the two ROER (cooperation between developers of the 2 ROER and ExplOERer researchers).

Publication of results (after November 15): least intensive stage.

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First deliverable in the row#O3/A1: Completion of the desktop research and technical specifications• Collection of papers on social networking and gaming mechanisms in Open

learning settings (broader than OEP)

• Insights into incentivized models in OEP (even MOOCs): rewards, badges and other recognition mechanics=> analysis of types of mechanics by type of learning context

• Contacting developers of ROER or MOOCs who designed and tested social networking or gaming features - explore their added value for learning => feasibility audit to elaborate a list of features appropriate to each context

• Collection of readings facilitated by Mendeley reference management tool

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Social networked game mechanics analyzed in the context of web 2.0 language learning communities2013 paper by Zourou & Lamy. Overview of gaming mechanisms: • Scoring systems

• Learner score• Teacher score

• Badges• Challenges• Rating systems

• Rating of learner input• Rating of learner input followed by feedback• Rating of tutor feedback• Intra-native speaker feedback

• Leaderboards

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Zourou, K., Lamy, M.-N. 2013. “Social networked game dynamics in web 2.0 language learning communities”, Alsic, Vol. 16, retrieved from http://alsic.revues.org/2642

Some preliminary discussions on badges: contacts with OERRH…. to be followed up

Bea de los Arcos, OERRH, UK

From a recent email exchange regarding the “Open Research” course:“As you know we used the P2PU School of Open platform to set up the OERRH's course on Open Research. Participants could earn a badge by completing all non-optional activities and contribute to forum discussions during the facilitated version of the course. The School of Open platform sets it all up for you, really (for instance, it's easy to review applicants' contributions to the forums as they are pulled out in one single page) so it hasn't been terribly complicated”.

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# O3/A2: Development of prototype• 2 prototypes, one for each ROER to be embedded and tested

• Some of the features will include: badges, milestones, feedback, rewards, leaderboards, etc.

• Objective :• build loyalty, reward users with the aim of fostering OEP and enhancing OER

uptake in new learning/teaching contexts

• See whether and how open learning occurs with the help of social networking and gaming mechanics

• Testing the new features: analysis of user activity (quantitative data) and interviews/surveys w/ users (qualitative data)

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# O3/A3: Development of prototype

# O3/A4: Dissemination of results

Mendeley desktop-ExplOERer group and its resources so far

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Project website

ExpOERers voted for and against an independent website (not part of Wikieducator despite the fact that this was in the proposal)=>

Ioannis and Katerina decided to set up an independent website as main website hosted by UGOT (indicative URL: exploerer.gu.se) and to have also a Wikieducator website fed by the main one (as secondary site)

Wikieducator’s site is ready for content to be added http://wikieducator.org/ExplOERer

The main site will be built on wordpress.com and will then migrate to UGOT servers=> the URL of the project website is still unknown (approval by UGOT technicians)

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