The C-SAP OER project worked with a small cluster of academic staff (6 partners across 6 different HEIs and across 4 social science subject areas), within the aegis of a Communities of Practice model, in order to explore processes around the release and sharing of modular teaching content. While the application of this model will be fully articulated in the publications arising from the project, we would like to offer a brief overview below,

Our approach was to work closely with six project partners, supported by a project consultant and iterative evaluation. We combined face to face meetings with other means of support and communication, and our central workspace area was based around this wiki, which became a holding space for the partners’ modular content and also a workspace to carry out activities set by the project team, including peer supported review of materials, discussion around pedagogical frameworks.

The ‘raw’ materials from this project (the modular content offered by our partners at the outset of the project) were discussed with the project coordinator in the early stages of the project during the auditing process. These discussions began to outline a narrative or history around the materials, such as the length of time the module had been offered, what kinds of changes had been made in light of feedback and review, what kinds of student cohort took the module and how it was delivered.The project partners then had a chance to take part in a peer-supported development activity, where they reflected on issues pertinent to Open Educational Resources and ways in which their own teaching materials could move towards being open and shareable.These reflexive discussions in turn informed our thinking in terms of creating a ‘mapping’ framework which can help to expose and reveal pedagogical decisions about the creation and potentials for (re)-using the materials. The issues raised through the reflexive review and mapping activities were then explored further in developing a case study around each partner and their own experience of the process.  Following these discussions around the materials, and any interventions due to copyright and formatting, the materials were released into JORUM Open, as well as the MERLOT repository (see here for a breakdown of these materials and the links).