Scaling up Open CPD for Teachers in Higher Education: A Snowballing Approach

Abstract

In this paper, we explore the snowballing approach developed for the openly licensed course Bring Your Own Device for Learning (BYOD4L) and the opportunities this presents to open cross-institutional CPD and open course development more generally. BYOD4L is a course for teachers and students in higher education which aims to help them gain both a better understanding of and develop their knowledge and skills in using their own smart devices for learning, teaching and professional development. BYOD4L has been developed by the authors and offered three times since 2014 with colleagues and students, participating Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) from the UK and Australia and further collaborators in the US and Germany. The development of the snowballing approach is shared using an action research methodology. We propose a rethink of current CPD practices. We invite course designers, academic developers and the wider academic community to explore new and emerging models of CPD that capitalise on scalable collaborative open educational practices.