JISC

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The aim of this project was to reuse and repurpose learning materials, created by the University of Glamorgan as part of an online Foundation Degree in e-Commerce, in 3 different curriculum areas and by 3 different institutions. A further aim was to evaluate the learner response to the repurposed materials and make recommendations about effective repurposing practice.

Executive Summary

The project objectives included:

• Repurposing and reusing a 10 credit ICT module, developed at the University of Glamorgan as part of an on-line Foundation Degree, in programmes delivered by Swansea Metropolitan University, Swansea College and Coleg Sir Gâr
• Assessing the quality assurance requirements of the repurposed modules through the formal validation processes used by each of the partner institutions
• Using institutional content and creating new content, where appropriate, to augment the external content and complete the re-contextualisation in the new curriculum areas
• Piloting the repurposed modules with learners at each of the three institutions and complete a formal evaluation of the outcomes
• Reporting on the outcomes of the repurposing outcomes and making recommendations about effective practice

The project created a generic version of the Glamorgan ICT module by removing the assessment activities and creating generic versions of the learning activities. It then packaged the generic module so that it met international content interoperability standards and would run on whatever online learning environment the new institutions used.

The ICT module was repurposed by Swansea Metropolitan University as a core skills module for their degree students, by Coleg Sir Gâr for students on their Law HNC and by Swansea College for their work-based learners taking NVQ4 management modules.

The new modules were piloted with cohorts of students at each of the institutions and their experiences evaluated. The evaluation showed that the modules were valued by the learners and provided the ICT skills intended.

The work of the ReCITE project has demonstrated that online content from one curriculum area can be repurposed for use in another curriculum area and deliver an effective learning experience.

The key lessons learned were:

1. Modules with common learning outcomes can be shared between curriculum areas by de-contextualising and then re-contextualising in the new curriculum area
2. The creation of generic versions of modules that cover skills relevant to a number of curriculum areas mean that repurposing only needs re-contextualisation
3. The generic modules need to be content interoperability compliant if they are to upload seamlessly to different institutional learning environments
4. All modules need regular updating and new content to remain current, particularly rapidly changing subjects such as ICT
5. Repurposing of online educational content is a skill for academics that will become ever more important as the growing affordances of the internet make global resources more available and their use in educational programmes more common

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