Pan European Portals Conference

1
A Portal for Learning Content Developers
Robert Stephenson Wayne State University, Detroit
Pan European Portals Conference Nottingham,
England, July 20, 2004
2
Big Picture

• e-Learning
• Open Course
• Zope and Plone
• OpenCourse.org Portal demo

3
Exam

• How To Save Civilization (time 100 years)
• Reinvent Industry to be Sustainable (e.g. no oil,
  no toxic wastes).
• Reach Population Soft Landing.
• Increase Productivity (inverted age pyramid).
• Avoid Resource Wars, Genocide.
• Reduce Inequity.
• hint the answer involves education and e-learning

4
E-LearningGood Materials are Hard to Develop

• Need to be pedagogically effective, scholarly
  accurate and technically sound.
• Require a variety of disparate skills.
• Require large amounts of time to develop.
• Quality materials can be hard to locate.

5
e-Learning and Reuse

• Most content available on the Web now is free to
  use (Merlot, MIT OpenCourseware, CMU Open
  Learning Initiative, etc.).
• Data on reuse are scarce and disappointing.
• Courses need to be adapted to their learners.
• They also need to evolve and grow as they are
  taught.

6
The e-Learning Ecosystem
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The Open Course Principles

• Sharing and cross-pollination
• Content needs to be free
• Content can be modified and improved
• Focused collaboration and community

8
The Open Course Community
Information is a relationship that exists in
the space between two minds or many minds. - John
Perry Barlow, Electronic Frontier Foundation

• Nurturing Communities are those in which we
• Expect everyone to contribute Enable everyone
  to grow.
• Learn by teaching Grow by giving.
• Respect everyones needs, skills, and wisdom.
• Steve Gilbert, TLT Group

9
Open Source vs. Open Course
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Open Course Advantages

• Content is adaptable to local needs.
• Collaboration provides mentoring.
• Content is free most labor is volunteered.
• Low friction means more miles per gallon!

11
OpenCourse.org provides Portal(s) for
Collaboration

• Collaboration services for content developers
• Free Web hosting for open course collaborations
• Tools for joint work at a distance
• From concept to collaboration in lt30 minutes
• Open to users since March.
• Funded by National Science Foundation, hosted by
  AcrossWorld Communications.

12
OpenCourse.org Projects so far

• Harvey Project (Physiology)
• Chem Collective (CREATE_at_Carnegie Mellon)
• Hyperscope (joint class, CSUMB IU East)
• GROW (Civil Engineering)
• eTech COLLAB (global ESL training)
• ESSE 21 (Earth Sciences education)
• LeARNING Collaboration (text project)
• 140 members

13
OpenCourse.org Architecture
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Zope and Plone

• Plone, a content management enhancement and skin
  for
• Zope an open source application server, written
  in
• Python, an open source language

15
Lets Get Started
Human history becomes more and more a race
between education and catastrophe. - H.G. Wells
It is not necessary to learn. Survival is not
mandatory. - W.Edwards Deming (misquoted)
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Take Home

• Everything is about learning.
• Try OpenCourse.org for developing content.
• Recommend it to your colleagues.
• Collaborate and share.
• Peace!

17
Contact Points

• Dr. Robert Stephenson
• Assoc. Professor of Biological Sciences
• Wayne State University
• rstephe_at_sun.science.wayne.edu
• Principal Investigator
• OpenCourse.org
• Chief Architect
• Harvey Project
• Community Leader
• Java Education Learning Community
• on Java.net

18

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  Attribution License. To view a copy of this
  license, visit http//creativecommons.org/licenses
  /by/2.0 or send a letter to Creative Commons,
  559 Nathan Abbott Way, Stanford, California
  94305, USA.