At the #pcf11bw in Gaborone, educators and education leaders from nine countries came together for a pre-conference workshop on openness in teacher education. This meeting was instrumental in advancing collaboration under COL’s Network for Open Teacher Education in Sub-Saharan Africa (NOTES) project.
The workshop, also attended by the Minister for Training and Tertiary Education for Barbados, Hon. Sandra V. Husbands, explored the transformative potential of openness and co-creation in teacher education.
Participants actively engaged with the OER Teacher Education Framework, dedicating time to refining its six domains. This refinement aims to guide teacher educators and teachers in effectively integrating Open Educational Resources (OER) in teacher preparation and practice, especially in the era of Generative AI.
KEY OUTCOMES AND COMMITMENTS
- Scaling Open Practices: Commitment by participants to scale up OER co-creation and embed open practices in curricula and policy.
- Strengthening Partnerships: Stronger institutional and cross-country partnerships through the NOTES network, including commitment to a shared research agenda on openness in teacher education.
- Framework Agility: Refinement of the OER Teacher Education Framework, ensuring it is agile and adaptable to diverse contexts.
- Capacity Building: Identification of capacity-building priorities, including digital literacy, cybersecurity, and responsible use of AI.
- Cross-Continental Engagement: Opportunities for cross-continental engagement for knowledge and policy exchange in the evolving network of practice.
The workshop reaffirmed COL’s commitment to advancing open, agile, and collaborative approaches to teacher development across the Commonwealth.
