Abstract

Open and Distance Learning (ODL) is an opportunity for students who are excluded from tertiary education due to age barriers, prior- qualifications, distance and other socio economic issues. It is a form of education through the usage of telecommunication and other digital technologies to learn in distance. One of the ways of achieving ODL is to use Open Educational Resources (OER) which are free technologies and enable extended classroom learning experience. These teaching, learning and research materials are available in any digital or non-digital medium and are available as public domain. These materials have been released under an open license that grants no-cost access, use, adaptation and redistribution by others with no or limited restrictions. The term “Open Educational Resources” is used synonymously with open courseware and open learning content (Geser et al, 2007). OERs have removed many barriers to teaching, learning and research development by facilitating more equitable access to social, financial and cultural circumstances. It has made high quality educational materials to be freely available which increases the understanding levels and stimulate the use (Hammond, 2019).OERs are being considered as the open segment of the educational resources and it is supported by the information communication technology, for discussion, consume and adopt by people for non-commercial purposes (UNESCO, 2002). The idea of OER is simple and powerful. The world’s knowledge is a public welfare and that technology in general and the World Wide Web in particular provide an extraordinary chance for everyone to share, use, and reuse it (Smith & Casserly,2006). Distance education has made use of new technologies and OERs in catering productive distance learning. The revolution of ICT during 1990s made distance education popular and conventional universities also started practicing free technologies and OERs. But yet the positive outcome of OER are to be gained. However, ODL fashion education rarely use OER as a popular method of teaching. The Open University Sri Lanka (OUSL) took major steps in 2017 to develop lesson materials aligned with the trends in global open and distance education. For instance, the ongoing lesson material developments are mainly based on available OERs. To support this process necessary guidelines and check-lists have been prepared and approved by the Council. Also, the OUSL library has started a special project to catalogue OER availability worldwide to make them searchable and accessible to the students, staff and to the general public (OUSL annual report, 2017). Though OERs and FOS can offer potential for increasing access to quality educational resources in ODL, it is uncertain to what extent students use OER and OSS. This study investigate the students’ awareness on OER and its impact on their studies. It is based on two research questions.

1. To what extent are students aware of OERs and FOS?

2. Is there a relationship between student performance and awareness of OER/FOS?

The theoretical framework for this study is based on (Harasim,2012) Online Collaborative learning (OCL) theory which is originally generated from a theory called competent-mediated communication (CMC).I chose this theoretical framework as the participants of this study are ODL learners in Sri Lanka. Moreover, this OCL theoretical framework accentuate the role of peer discourse as the main source of learning and explain learning as intellectual convergence which can be gained through these progressive stages of group discourse. They are:

1.    Idea generating

2.    Idea organizing and

 3.    Intellectual convergence                (Harasim,2012)

A mixed method was taken using both qualitative and quantitative approaches. The main assumption of this sort of inquiry is that the combination of qualitative and quantitative gives a complete understanding about the research problem than either approach alone (Creswell, 2012). Group interviews were conducted with fashion design students of The Open University Sri Lanka who were in between level 3-6 in their studies. The interviews were mainly to understand the willingness of the students’ for new digital learning resources and what the university recommended for OERs. As a part of quantitative research a survey questionnaire was circulated among randomly selected 100 fashion design students. Among them 79 students turned up with their responses. Social media were used as a method of sharing the questionnaire because students were frequently responding to their social media platforms rather than e-mails. The questionnaire consisted of both open and closed ended questions where closed ended questions were always followed by an open ended question. The data collected through the survey questionnaire were analyzed using SPSS tool to analyze the level of OER awareness as well as the correlation between the OER awareness and students’ performance. The collected numerical data were analyzed to figure out how the awareness levels differ with the level of study and how student based learning is practiced in each level of study. As student based learning (SBL) practice directly related with OERs in open and distance education it was further analysed how the awareness levels on SBL remain in each level of study. At the end of the analysis it was checked how both OER awareness and SBL practices co relate with students’ performance.

The outcome of the study found that OER awareness among ODL fashion designing students. In terms of first research question, it was found that the average students’ understanding on OERs and free technologies was rated as 5.86 in a 1-10 scale while level 3 students showed the highest average level of awareness. It is decided that the university’s decision to launch the EfiL (Empowering for independent Learning) program as a compulsory program at the beginning of the studies has positively impact on students’ awareness on OER. The average level of OER awareness has grown only from 4.45-5.86 in a 1-10 scale before and after starting their studies at OUSL. However, the recent curriculum developments for Sri Lankan Quality Framework (SLQF) have created some space for OER to play a vital role in OUSL teaching and learning process. Through the analysis it was not noticed that there is a co-relationship between existing students’ performance and OER awareness. However, the large number of dropout rates might have caused by this less awareness on OER. Though OER movement has been funded from a range of foundations, the OER initiatives should be seamlessly integrated with institutional policies, structure, procedures and should always supported by the academics. Openness can be interrupted by bureaucratic hurdles which have the potential to fragile OER .However, it should be emphasized that language capabilities should also be increased parallel to OER expansion as many OERs are available in English medium. Increasing the accompanying resources such as tests, quizzes and homework assignments is also a remedy to increase OER and free technology awareness. The interaction of multimedia approach should also be increased which allows students to access using a variety of digital devices and engaging activities and open ended questions that stimulate critical thinking as students prepare for a virtual classroom.

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