(UK) and the project is supported by four partner universities: the University of Reading, Brunel University, the University of Cambridge and London South Bank University.

Our aim is to develop and implement a methodology for learning design composed of tools, practice and other innovation that both builds upon, and contributes to, existing academic and practitioner research. We are interested in providing support for the entire design process: from gathering initial ideas, throughconsolidating, producing and using designs, to sharing, reuse and community engagement. Theseare complex and challenging processes that involvea range of stakeholders with different interests; issues and representations are different depending on whether design occurs at the level of individual activity, course or curriculum. Our vision is of a learning design methodology and suite of practicaltools and resources that bridge good pedagogic practice and effective use of new technologies.

The project is supported by strategic development funding from the Open University and by JISC as part of the new Curriculum Design programme. The OULDI project focuses on three aspects of design:

·Collaboration & dialogue - mechanisms to encourage the sharing, discussion and reuse of learning and teaching ideas. ·Representation - the identification of different types of design representation and use of a range of tools to help visualise and represent designs. ·Theoretical approaches - the development of a body of empirical research and conceptual tools to help guide the design decision-making process and to provide a shared language to enable comparisons to be made between different designs.

The OULDI team are based at The Open University

Open University Learning Design Initiative (OULDI)

Collaboration & dialogue

Overview Gráinne Conole (Project Leader)Andrew BrasherRebecca Galley

Simon CrossJuliette CulverPaul MundinPaul Clark

Martin Weller

The Open University Learning Design Initiative applies a design approach to teaching and learning processes with the aim of enabling practitioners to make more informed choices about their creation of learning interventions and better use of good pedagogy and new technologies. An approach which:

Utilises a shared design language to both generate designs and as a mechanism for interpreting and discussing Uses a notational system which helps us remember and navigate designs, enables designs to take form and be shared, and helps us sharpen and multiply abstract design categories And recognises that different representations of a design are needed to articulate certain elements of the design, while ignoring others.

It sees design as a conscious process which involves a dialogue both with and about the materials. It is seen as a creative and communicative process and an essentially social activity.

From the outset we felt it important that our development of a learning design methodology and tools should be informed by empirical research and evidence gathered from within the university, in addition to drawing on the wider literature. Our methodology consists of four interconnected facets: understanding design - through gathering empirical evidence about design; visualising design - as a means of articulation and representation; guiding design - through appropriate scaffolds and support; and sharing design - to inspire and encourage uptake and reuse.

Empirical evidence has included: The collection of user requirements, In-depth interviews (12) with teachers/designers to gain a better understanding of the ways in which they go about designing learning activities. These have focussed on the process of design: How do teachers go about the process of design? How do they generate ideas and what kinds of support do they use? How do they share their designs with others? What are the barriers to design? How do they evaluate their designs? from workshops and events Around fifty questionnaire responses to various surveys about aspects of learning design Records of comments and discussion at many events including three focus groups (Cloudfests) held in Autumn 2008 involving 15 staff. Participant observation, co-working and support in several course settings Expert evaluation of software tools

Theoretical approachesRepresentation

Further information about the Initiative

Website: http://ouldi.open.ac.uk

Gráinne Conole (Project Leader) blog: http://e4innovation.com

CompendiumLD is a specialised version of the mindmapping and argumentation software Compendium, developed by the Knowledge Media Institute(KMi) at the OU.

CompendiumLDCompendiumLD is a software tool for designing learning activities using a flexible visual interface. It is being developed as a tool to support lecturers, teachers and others involved in education to help them articulate their ideas and map out a design or learning sequence. Feedback from users suggests the process of visualising design makes design ideas more explicit and highlights issues that they might not have noticed otherwise. It also provides a useful means of representing their designs so that they can be shared with others. CompendiumLD provides a set of icons to represent the components of learning activities; these icons may be dragged and dropped, then connected to form a map representing a learning activity.

One of the OULDI project’s key aspirations is to enable teachers to shift away from a focus on content and subject matter to thinking more holistically and laterally about the design process. We have developed a set of conceptual representations designed to promote thinking and dialogue about different pedagogical approaches and the effective use of technologies. These representations, or ‘views’ have been developed in collaboration with the institutional ‘Course Business Models’ project at the Open University:

The Course Map ViewThe Course Dimensions viewThe Pedagogy ProfileThe Learning Outcomes viewThe Task Swimlane view

In addition, two data-driven views have been produced, one giving an indication of the cost effectiveness of the course, derived from finance data about the course and one giving an indication of the course performance, derived from student and tutor survey data and information on course retention and progression.

Cloudworkshttp://cloudworks.ac.uk

One of the overarching findings from analysis of the empirical evidence we have gathered to date into how practitioners currently design their teaching interventions, and what would help improve their practice, is the desire to have examples from others and to have access to a network of practitioners to share and discuss ideas. The Cloudworks site was developed with the intention of addressing this need. We wanted to harness the best of social media practice for use in a learning and teaching context. Cloudworks now

a great number of UK based and international communities with an interest in education.

In August 2010 the code that powers Cloudworks ‘CloudEngine’ was released on a GNU General Public Licence. The software enables people to easily set up their own CloudEngine-powered site with loads of features.

has (May 2011) over 4,000 registered users and is regularly used by