Welcome to Revise, Remix, Redesign, the PreK-12 Open Educational Resources (OER) Podcast from the Education Policy Program at New America hosted by Kristina Ishmael.
Open Educational Resources are freely available educational materials that can be downloaded, customized, and shared without worrying about copyright. They can take many different forms, from comprehensive curriculum, similar to traditional series we know and use, to supplemental resources like individual learning objects that can be used on their own or curated into units for teaching and learning.
In each episode, Kristina interviews someone in the OER community to discuss everything from how states and districts started this work, along what it looks like in practice; the role teachers and school librarians play in curating and implementing; and even how content is developed.
Check this page each week on Monday for new episodes.
In this episode, Dan McDowell, Director of Learning & Innovation with Grossmont Union High School District in San Diego, California discusses the ways PreK-12 OER has transformed teaching and learning in his district.
For the second episode of Revise, Remix, Redesign, Kristina Ishmael interviews Andrew Giannakakis, Director of K-12 at Openstax out of Rice University in Houston, Texas. His background as a classroom teacher and curriculum writer is the perfect combination for his work at Openstax. Like several of our other episodes with content specialists, Andrew talks about OER, its importance in education, and how Openstax is supporting more content in K-12.
Kristina's main takeaway from this interview goes back to OpenStax’s mission that all students should have access to the resources they need. While this may look different in a higher education setting where the onus of purchasing materials is on the students, it’s still critical to consider this in K-12, as well. Access to resources for both K-12 students and educators is important and OpenStax is doing just that.
In episode three, Kristina interviews Lynn Kleinmeyer, a Digital Learning Specialist at an education service agency in eastern Iowa called Grant Wood AEA. Her background as a literacy teacher and teacher librarian afford her a unique perspective when it comes to OER and instructional materials. She has quickly become a go-to for many educators in and out of the state of Iowa for her work on OER, copyright and Creative Commons, and a deep understanding of why school librarians are so important.
Kristina's main takeaway in this interview is about the shifting role of the school librarian around the development and support of literacy in both traditional and non-traditional ways, access to curated resources for students and educators, including OER, and honoring learners at every age, level, ability, and population and ensuring materials are inclusive and representative. Our school librarians are allies in this OER work and we need to make sure that we’re including them from the very beginning.
In episode 4, Kristina interviews Rebecca Morales, the Secondary Science Instructional Specialist at Broken Arrow Public Schools in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. Her background as a science teacher, content specialist, and doctoral student trying to further understand OER affords her unique perspective in the work that she leads in her district. She chats with Rebecca about the work that she started several years ago when their district decided to not pursue a traditional textbook in science and how that has created a ripple effect throughout other content areas.
For Kristina, the main takeaway from this interview was around the benefit that Rebecca has seen in the district regarding content: OER serves as a tangible object that teachers can use to start professional discussions around quality, rigor, reflection, and more. These types of professional conversations may never have happened in Broken Arrow without the district’s commitment to transition away from traditional instructional materials.
In this episode, Kristina interviews Dr. Brittan Wilson who is the Science Department Chair and science teacher at Liberty North High School in Liberty Public Schools, just outside of Kansas City, Missouri. Brittan has taught almost every science course there is and has a deep level of expertise and experience in the secondary classroom. Several years ago when her team was given the choice of new curriculum, they opted to go with OER and supplement the resources with more tools that got students “being scientists” instead of just reading about it. Her love of science and the work she does is evident in this interview and it’s one of the main reasons I wanted to hear directly from a teacher using OER.
Kristina's main takeaway from this conversation is the ways in which OER has changed Brittan as a practitioner and where she sees her role as a facilitator of learning and now gets to share and pay it forward to her own students, and other educators everywhere.
In this episode, Kristina interviews Caroline Gambell who is the Middle School ELA Curriculum Director from Match Fishtank in Boston, Massachusetts. Her background as a teacher and content developer make her role at Match Fishtank a perfect fit. Match Fishtank is a relatively new openly-licensed curriculum that’s available to anyone and everyone, so I wanted to hear how it started, why it was important to openly share it, and how listening to users like the Match Charter teachers, as well as teachers across the country, help shape what is ultimately created.
Kristina's main takeaway in this interview goes back to the importance of making content culturally-relevant for students. Traditional textbooks and curriculum often present a singular Eurocentric narrative without multiple perspectives to provide a comprehensive view of subjects. Match Fishtank has been very intentional in including diverse texts and topics, which is evident in the work that Caroline has led and the team continues to develop.
In this episode, Kristina interviews Anthony Gabriele who is the Director of Learning and Innovation at Centennial School District just outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This new position is the perfect fit for Anthony after his success starting and growing the OER work in his former school district Garnet Valley. Kristina wanted to talk to Anthony because he understands the importance of giving students voice and choice in their learning experiences and knows the role that instructional materials like OER can play in their learning.
Kristina's main takeaway from this interview was the idea of manufactured time. She mentions that she had never heard of that term and wants to use it from now on. Schools are so often short on time – no matter what the task – and hearing how pedagogical shifts powered by OER gave teachers AND students time, makes it all worth it. While it may not in fact be real minutes added to the day, it is definitely something worth considering and would not have happened if it weren’t for Anthony’s leadership at Garnet Valley to create student-centered learning with OER as the backbone.
In this episode, Kristina interviews Gina Loveless who is the Educational Technology Consultant overseeing the #GoOpenMichigan project at the Michigan Department of Education. #GoOpenMichigan is a joint effort between the Michigan Department of Education, educational service agencies, K-12 school districts, community colleges, and universities in the state of Michigan. This work didn’t happen overnight, so I wanted to talk to Gina about how it came to be, what her work looks like on a daily basis, and how she supports educators across the entire state of Michigan when it comes to OER.
Kristina's main takeaway from this interview is a reminder that the perfect curriculum does not exist, but the benefit of using content that is openly-licensed is one way districts can meet the needs of students and get to the point where it is a better fit. Michigan’s work on OER continues to grow and I’m hopeful that more districts will get involved with the department to bring OER into their respective school systems.
In this episode, Kristina interviews Mark Ray, a Teacher Librarian and Free Range Educator in Vancouver, Washington, just outside of Portland, Oregon. His extensive school library background within schools and at the district level make him the perfect person to talk about the role of school librarians in this OER work. Since the role of librarian is largely one of curation and he has quite a bit of experience with this, I wanted to hear from Mark how he helps content teachers search and discover resources to use, why school librarians are critical to have in curriculum work, and what school librarian work looks like in 2020.
Kristina's main takeaway from this interview is the idea that curation is a human skill and should not necessarily be outsourced to the algorithms that the internet provides. Teacher librarians are trained as curators and have the incredible skillset to train teachers and students how to curate and further analyze information. As Mark says, teacher librarians are often overlooked resources hiding in plain sight and we should tap into their expertise for all things instructional materials, particularly OER.
In this episode, Kristina interviews Kate Nowak who is the Director K-12 Curriculum Strategy with Illustrative Mathematics. Illustrative Mathematics was one of the first comprehensive OER math series made available to anyone and everyone. Their 6-8 math curriculum has seen great success in schools across the country, and they are working on expanding into high school math, as well as elementary math. All of this work has taken several years to pull together, so I wanted to talk with Kate about how it came to be and how Illustrative continues to grow their offerings.
Kristina's main takeaway from this interview is how Illustrative Mathematics decided to offer their content for free and then provide high-quality professional learning to accompany the materials versus the traditional model where districts pay for the curriculum and may get some professional learning thrown in on the side.
Senior Research Fellow, Teaching, Learning, & Tech Program
