Open Learning Network

Brief: The Teacher Education in Sub Saharan Africa (TESSA) initiative has achieved improvements in teacher education through offering support and materials that help teachers achieve their aims. TESSA has established a method of working through coordinators to reach and engage in difficult areas and widen participation and use.
As part of a continuing plan of action TESSA will work with OLnet candidates for up to four fellowships in Africa. The need to develop monitoring and impact evaluation of use of TESSA materials in existing consortium partner institutions was identified in the outcomes of the TESSA workshop in Ghana (May 2008).

Drawing on impact studies looking at changes in teachers’ classroom practices, pupil learning and cultural mediation of the core set of structured OER across different environments. These will provide evidence at several levels within OLnet and be collated to allow development of items that can be reused within the field, for example an implementation handbook offering sector specific guidance to support extended use of TESSA OER.
Outcomes on the specific OER level:

1. Evidence of use.
2. Insight into use in difficult contexts.
3. Advice for reuse.

On the network level:

1. Recruitment of Fellowships linked to development issues.
2. Linking of TESSA resources and activities into the research network.