Roman Soldier, Paul Hudson. CC-BY 2.0 https://flic.kr/p/bB4ahr

Newcastle University isn’t particularly known for its innovative work the open education arena – apart from the work I have been involved in through the #ukoer programme with colleagues from MEDEV which was focused on clinical education, any work that has gone on with open education and open practice has been in small pockets. Individuals ploughing their own furrow, without the support of institutional systems and processes.

I think we are starting to see a change.

In the past week I have had fascinating conversations with several members of academic staff here at Newcastle University, about how their experiences with MOOCs and/or OER is beginning to change how they think about their own campus based teaching.

I won’t name them or their subject areas yet, since I haven’t yet checked with them if they are happy for me to do that here, but I felt compelled to note my thoughts in a short post to remind me to go back and capture the transformative power of the work we are undertaking.

We haven’t even publicly announced out first course on the FutureLearn platform yet, and already people are telling me that their experiences with developing learning designs, thinking about content and stimulating discussion with course participants, or their experiences with doing a number of MOOCs, is changing how they think about their teaching and their students.

And I’m not talking about online teaching, blended or elearning here. I’m talking about academic staff who are thinking in fresh ways about their encounters with students on campus based programmes, about how they use their face to face time, and how to make best use of that time by thinking differently about content delivery.

Phrases like ‘making every second count’ and ‘getting to the essence of the message’ are cropping up and I have to say it is making our jobs in the FutureLearn Project Office rather interesting.  I find it fascinating to see how conversations about learning and teaching with colleagues can have such an effect. Some are bravely putting themselves in the position of their students who roll up on day one of their undergraduate programme. By deciding to dip their toes in the waters of a subject they know little about and become novices, experiencing an online course through the eyes of the participant, academic colleagues are telling us that they are getting insight, and experiencing different approaches to teaching and encouraging learning. There seems to be genuine excitement about the possibilities opening up.

Newcastle University recently hosted the OER14 conference together with Leeds Metropolitan University at the Centre for Life, and 5 places were subsidised for non OER folks to go along.  One of the conditions for taking up a free place for them was to write a blog post about what they thought about it and what they think they got out their attendance there. I can’t wait to read their thoughts, since the short exchanges I’ve had with those who attended were equally stimulating.

Exciting times ahead….