Implications of Open Access Repositories Quality Criteria and Features For Teachers' TPACK Development

SPRINGER BRIEFS IN EDUC ATION
Rita Tavares
António Moreira
Implications
of Open Access
Repositories Quality
Criteria and Features
for Teachers’ TPACK
Development
123
SpringerBriefs in Education
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/8914
Rita Tavares • António Moreira
Implications of Open Access

Repositories Quality Criteria
and Features for Teachers’
TPACK Development
Rita Tavares António Moreira
University of Aveiro University of Aveiro
Aveiro, Baixo Vouga, Portugal Aveiro, Baixo Vouga, Portugal
ISSN 2211-1921 ISSN 2211-193X (electronic)

SpringerBriefs in Education
ISBN 978-3-319-57915-3 ISBN 978-3-319-57916-0 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-57916-0
Library of Congress Control Number: 2017940636
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Foreword
Being asked to write a foreword to a publication is almost always considered a

double-edged task. In one of those edges you should have the impartiality of the
review, the objectivity of the text and its overall scientific or literature contribution
to a given field. On the other edge, you have the authors, your personal connection
(and admiration for, in this particular instance) with them and with their work.
Weighing in these often-conflicting forces is often a heavy load. However, in this
case, this foreword came easy and pleasant.
Putting it simply, what you will find in this brief is a thorough review of European
science education main open access repositories, its features and contributions and,
finally, an interesting connection to an important question: how can these environ-
ments contribute to improve teachers’ knowledge in the pedagogical, scientific and
technological combinations of their practices. More into it you will also find very
interesting insights regarding e-Research, a qualitative research methodology for
dealing with Internet-driven data and instruments. And this is definitely the kind of
work that is interesting both to academics and practitioners, teachers and research-
ers, students and parents.
When talking about the integration of technology in everyday practices one
seems to forget that, in educational contexts, this largely depends on the utility that
the teachers can envision in doing it. Overall, teachers are not lazy professionals,
nor are stuck in ancient methods and strategies because it is easier. Teachers are
pragmatic. Teachers change their practices when they believe they are doing it for
better preparing their students. They do not do it just because it is fancy or because
they mind what others are going to think of them if they do not join the
bandwagon.
One of the strategies to show them that these open resources are valuable is to
invite them to look at them, to discuss them with their peers, to give teachers the
opportunity to appropriate them, to change them taking into account their contexts,
their students and their communities. And that is what this brief is all about: appro-
priation, collaboration, sharing. In one word, it is about networks.
In the hype of social media, many times one forgets that social networks existed
before technology. Being, in the beginning, a sociological concept, nowadays it is
v
vi Foreword
almost impossible to mention it without mentioning technology. But these (profes-

sional) social networks existed back in the day when teachers met to jointly plan
their classes, their resources, their strategies and to openly share their ideas and their
pedagogical uptakes on the scientific contents.
This is not the place to discuss how our lives evolved to a point where, profes-
sionally, we seldom can find the time or place to do it face-to-face and we now
prefer (or should we say, have) to technologically mediate these contacts and these
collaborations. However, with this brief, we will understand some of the ways
teachers are coping with open technology and resources and also adapting their
professional practices to this era. Mostly, you will find that they are still open to the
innovation that matters to our schools though there is still much to do and a long
way to go.
To talk about the authors of this brief is the other part of this task. And, by the
way, also simple to do. Both António and Rita are brilliant scholars, although they
have different ages, experiences and professional paths. António has dedicated
much of his life to teaching and research in the Educational Technology field. He is
a revered and celebrated teacher in the Department of Education and Psychology of
the University of Aveiro and a brilliant supervisor and researcher. Moreover, he is a
dear friend, to whom I will always find the time to meet, discuss new and old ideas
or merely talk about soccer matches, our beloved Sporting or the weather. Rita is a
committed and talented Ph.D. student in the Multimedia in Education Doctoral
Programme where she is completing a thesis about a model of development of digi-
tal educational resources using educational data mining. She is a dedicated and
intelligent student that makes the task of co-supervising her a simple one. Rita has
also the experience of working in companies as an Educational Coordinator, and
that is a major advantage she brings to the table when discussing the practicalities
of much of the issues that are discussed in this brief.
Most of all, they are brilliant people to get along with and to discuss what they
have to share resulting from their studies, hard work and diverse experiences. This
is why this is a must-read book and this is why I am so privileged to write this
foreword.
Aveiro, Portugal Luís Pedro

June 2016
Preface
This book was motivated by the will of the authors to understand how open access
repositories are being developed and maintained and to provide, disseminate and
promote the development of digital educational resources. It is also our will to
understand how these technological environments can enhance the development of
teachers’ new skills and new pedagogical and didactic approaches. Thus, the main
objective of this brief is to analyse open access repositories quality criteria and fea-
tures, and how these can improve teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content
Knowledge (TPACK) development.
This book is organized in six major sections. Section one, Open Access
Repositories and Digital Educational Resources, addresses an historical overview
of open access repositories, presenting some recommendations for their develop-
ment and maintenance, namely regarding digital educational resources (re) use.
Given that this brief is research driven, in section two the authors present the objec-
tives and the methodology used in the present study. Sections three, four and five
analyse namely (1) the prevalence of European Science Education open access
repositories and teachers’ perceptions of those same repositories, (2) the most com-
mon European Science Education open access repositories features and their impli-
cations, and (3) the impact of open access repositories usage on teachers’ TPACK
development. The last section, Results and discussion, focuses on the analyses of a
selected open access repository [House of Sciences (originally Casa das Ciências)],
addressing its characteristics and features, the impact of social media features in
digital educational resources (re) use, and the relationship between repository qual-
ity criteria and teachers’ TPACK development. For this study, the authors collected,
crossed and analysed data from different sources, namely the relevant literature in
the field, information available in open access repository and their social networks,
and information provided by repository stakeholders, adopting mostly a qualitative
e-Research methodology.
This study allowed to stress that Science Education open access repositories
development and availability represent an important tool to increase digital educa-
tional resources (re) use and the adoption of new pedagogical and didactic
approaches. Based on the comprehensive analysis of the selected open access
vii
viii Preface
r epository and attempting to underline availability, maintenance and updating, and

enhancement requirements for the importance of digital educational resources
usage, the authors present a set of proposals to be taken into consideration in (future)
Science Education open access repositories, having in mind a set of keywords that
underlie the whole text: Digital Educational Resources, Open Access Repositories,
Science Education, Social Media, TPACK and e-Research.
Aveiro, Portugal Rita Tavares

June 2016 António Moreira
Acknowledgements
The brief Implications of Open Access Repositories Quality Criteria and Features
for Teachers’ TPACK Development would not exist without the effort of many peo-
ple, the reason why we would like to express our gratitude to those who, either
institutionally or personally, helped shape this book.
Firstly, the authors of this book sincerely thank Springer for having accepted to
publish this brief.
Furthermore, the existence of this book and the study conducted was only pos-
sible thanks to the Foundation for Science and Technology. The authors wish to
express their deep appreciation to this institution for the financial support to the
study, under the form of two Research Fellowships: the first one within the
Technology Enhanced Learning and Societal Challenges Doctoral Program (with
reference PD/BI/113557/2015), and the second one within the Human Capital
Operational Program, supported by the European Social Fund and national funds
of the Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education (with reference SFRH/
BD/107808/2015).
The study was also only possible thanks to the broad cooperation of open access
repositories stakeholders, in particular House of Sciences (originally Casa das
Ciências). The authors would like to express their many thanks to the staff of House
of Sciences for their support throughout this study, especially to Guilherme
Monteiro, House of Sciences Webmaster, for his invaluable availability and inputs
for this research.
Finally, we would also like to leave a warm word of thanks to Dr. Luís Pedro for
the foreword he so thoughtfully prepared for the book.
ix
Contents
Implications of Open Access Repositories Quality Criteria

and Features for Teachers’ TPACK Development�� 1
Open Access Repositories and Digital Educational Resources �� 1
Study Objectives and Methodology. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Analysis of the Prevalence of European Science Education OAR
and Teachers’ Perceptions About Their Usage�� 5
Analysis of the Most Common OAR Features and Their Implications
on Teachers’ Usage and of the Existence of Social Features
and Their Impacts�� 5
Analysis of the Implications of OAR Usage and Quality Criteria
on Teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge
(TPACK) Development�� 6
Prevalence of European Science Education OAR and Teachers’
Perceptions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Summary of Findings�� 10
Most Common European Science Education OAR Features
and Their Implications �� 11
The Impact of OAR Usage in Teachers’ TPACK Development�� 14
Results and Discussion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
OAR Selection and Characterization �� 20
Impact of OAR Social Media Features on DER (re) use�� 24
Relationship Between OAR Quality Criteria and Teachers’
TPACK Development�� 41
Considerations�� 46
Final Remarks�� 48
References �� 51
xi
List of Figures
Fig. 1 TPACK©—reproduced with permission of the publisher,

2012 by tpack.org�� 15
Fig. 2 Most downloaded ever introduction to Science DER:
Relationship between downloads, ratings, votes and users’
comments�� 25
Fig. 3 We the fantastic living things—a brief history of Evolution:
Relationship between downloads, ratings, votes, users’
comments and YouTube views�� 26
Fig. 4 Most downloaded ever Biology DER: Relationship
between downloads, ratings, votes and users’ comments �� 26
Fig. 5 Mitosis, chromosomes and kinetochores: Relationship
between downloads, ratings, votes, users’ comments and
YouTube views�� 27
Fig. 6 Most downloaded ever Physics DER: Relationship
between downloads, ratings, votes and users’ comments.�� 28
Fig. 7 3D static magnetic field: relationship between
downloads, ratings, votes and users’ comments.�� 28
Fig. 8 Most downloaded ever Geology DER: relationship
Fig. 9 Volcanoes—the positive side: relationship between
downloads, ratings, votes and users’ comments �� 29
Fig. 10 Most downloaded ever Mathematics DER: Relationship
Fig. 11 Sections in the cube: relationship between downloads, ratings,
votes and users’ comments �� 30
Fig. 12 Most downloaded ever Chemistry DER: relationship
Fig. 13 The table (is really) periodic!: relationship between downloads,
ratings, votes, users’ comments and YouTube views�� 32
Fig. 14 Annual House of Sciences Award: DER submissions and
teachers’ participations �� 36
Fig. 15 Followers and views of social networks linked to the OAR �� 36
xiii
List of Tables
Table 1 OAR evaluation criteria adopted, TPACK forms of knowledge

and indicators considered....................................................................... 7
Table 2 Open Access Repository features and possibilities......................... 23
Table 3 Relationship between OAR visibility dimension data collected
and teachers’ TPACK development................................................. 34
Table 4 Relationship between OAR policies dimension data collected
Table 5 Relationship between OAR legal aspects dimension data
collected and teachers’ TPACK development................................. 39
Table 6 Relationship between OAR metadata dimension data collected
Table 7 Relationship between OAR logs and statistics dimension
data collected and teachers’ TPACK development.......................... 42
xv
Abbreviations
CK Content knowledge
DER Digital educational resource(s)
GERII Guía para la Evaluación de Repositorios Institucionales de Investigación
(Guide for the Evaluation of Institutional Research Repositories)
ICT Information and communications technology
ILS Inquiry learning space(s)
LO Learning object(s)
OAR Open access repository(ies)
OER Open educational resource(s)
PCK Pedagogical content knowledge
PK Pedagogical knowledge
STEM Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths
TCK Technological content knowledge
TK Technological knowledge
TPACK Technological pedagogical content knowledge
TPK Technological pedagogical knowledge
xvii
Abstract
In the last few years, open access repositories have gained importance in the educational
field, stressed by the easier access and dissemination of a wide range of relevant digital
educational resources, simplifying its search and teachers’ design of pedagogical and
didactic approaches. According to this, the present study aims to analyse (a) the preva-
lence of European Science Education open access repositories and teachers’ perceptions
about their usage; (b) the most common open access repositories features and their
implications on teachers’ usage; (c) the existence of social features in open access repos-
itories and their impact; and (d) the implications of open access repositories usage and
quality criteria on teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK)
development. Thus, the authors collected, crossed and analysed data from different
sources, namely Literature Review, information available in different open access repos-
itories and their social networks, and information provided by open access repositories
stakeholders, adopting a qualitative e-Research methodology to carry out this study. This
study revealed several aspects that must be reflected upon and explored in future studies,
allowing to stress that Science Education open access repositories development and
availability, especially when involving teachers in evaluation and validation processes,
represent an important tool to increase digital educational resources (re) use and the
adoption of new pedagogical and didactic approaches. Based on the comprehensive
analysis of the selected open access repository and attempting to underline availability,
maintenance and updating, and enhancement requirements for the importance of digital
educational resources usage, the authors also present a set of proposals to be taken into
consideration in (future) Science Education open access repositories.
Keywords Digital educational resources • Open access repositories • Science edu-

cation • Social media • TPACK • e-Research
xix
About the Authors
Rita Tavares Born in Aveiro in 1982, Rita Tavares holds a degree in Basic
Education from the University of Aveiro and is an accredited Trainer in Educational
Technologies. Currently attending the Doctoral Program in Multimedia in Education
at the University of Aveiro, she works in this institution as a Researcher under the
Research Centre for Didactics and Technology in Teacher Training, Department of
Education and Psychology—University of Aveiro, for the Foundation for Science
and Technology, the national funding agency that supports science, technology and
innovation, under the responsibility of the Ministry for Science and Technology.
Member of the Open Laboratory for Science Education, an integrated infrastructure
of the Research Centre Didactics and Technology in Teacher Education, located in
the Department of Education and Psychology of the University of Aveiro, she devel-
ops several activities such as Web Copywriter and Monitor of the laboratory and of
the Science Garden, an outdoor educational space designed for children aged 4–12
years, that promotes non-formal Science Education activities. She is also a member
of the Iberian-American Association of Science, Technology and Society (STS) in
Science Education (a private non-profit Scientific Association); she has participated
as Member of the Secretariat in the V Iberian-American Seminar on STS/9th edition
of the Seminar on STS. Rita Tavares has professional experience as a Primary School
Teacher, having taught from 2006 to 2010 in several public Portuguese schools. In
2011, she started to work at a software development company as Educational
Coordinator, managing projects related to digital educational resources and educa-
tional games. Simultaneously, she was also an Editorial Reviewer, Author and
Instructional Designer. From 2012 to 2014 Rita Tavares managed the Education
Unit of the company as Director, designing and managing several research projects
(R&ID and R&TD) related to edutainment, affective computing, educational virtual
worlds, immersive learning environments and contents for next generation net-
works. With articles published in Portuguese journals and national and international
conferences proceedings, her main research interests are Digital Educational
Resources, Open Access Repositories, Science Education, Inquiry-Based Science
Education, Universal Design (for Learning), Web 2.0, M-Learning, TPACK, Student
Assessment in Online Learning and Educational Data Mining.
xxi
xxii About the Authors
António Moreira Born in Aveiro in 1957, António Moreira holds a Ph.D. from the
University of Aveiro, where he develops teaching activities and research. With sev-
eral books and articles published in Portugal and abroad, he coordinated the ICT
Competence Centre of the University of Aveiro, the Digital Contents Lab, which he
founded, the Department of Education and Psychology at the same university as
well as the Specialization Training Courses and Master in Multimedia in Education.
He also coordinated the Internet@eb1 programs and CBTIC@EB1 for the Aveiro
district. With his main activity in post-graduation courses, he has already concluded
the supervision of 64 Pre-Bologna Master Dissertations, 44 Ph.D. theses and 4 post-
doctoral projects. He is presently the Director of the Doctoral Program in Multimedia
in Education and an elected member of the Scientific Council of the Doctoral School
of the University of Aveiro. He was the Director of the Department under nomina-
tion and appointment by the Rector from 2010 to 2015. He founded the online
journal Indagatio Didactica, under the Research Centre for Didactics and
Technology in Teacher Training, of which he has been the Chief Editor from its
inception until 2010, and presently a member of the editorial board of this and other
12 international journals. His main research interests are Hypertext Cognitive
Flexibility in Learning Communities and Practice, Random Access Instruction,
Cognitive Architectures, Web 2.0 tools, PLE and social networks, and Digital
Identities and Storytelling.
Implications of Open Access Repositories
Quality Criteria and Features for Teachers’
TPACK Development
Open Access Repositories and Digital Educational Resources
Today’s Internet possibilities, namely Web 2.0 features such as easy information
access, production, share, and (re) use, have contributed to significant changes in the
way teachers access information through other people’s contributions. Arising from
Web 2.0 tools diversity, new kinds of possibilities and resources are available nowa-
days, as well as new online environments that are cropping up in teachers’ practices,
allowing for the emergence of a culture of sharing and participation (Brown, 2008).
In 2012 the first World Congress on OER [Open Educational Resources (OER)]
resulted in the 2012 Paris OER Declaration (UNESCO, 2012), based on interna-
tional declarations such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, namely
Article 26 (1) that determines that “Everyone has the right to education. Education
shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary educa-
tion shall be compulsory” (United Nations, 1948). The 2012 Paris OER Declaration
referred to the above established recommendations in terms like: (a) promote and use
OER to improve access to Education (formal and non-formal) at all levels and in a
lifelong learning perspective; (b) promote cost-efficiency and quality of teaching and
learning process through OER usage; and (c) promote research on the development,
use, evaluation and impact measurement of OER in teaching and learning process in
order to strengthen the evidence basis for public investment (UNESCO, 2012).
In line with the exposed and in order to promote OAR and Digital Educational
Resources1 (DER) usage in educational contexts, the European Commission (2013)
underlines the urgency to promote national and European actions to (a) help learning
institutions, teachers and learners acquire digital skills and learning methods; (b)
support the development and availability of DER; and (c) mobilize stakeholders to
To avoid readers’ “jumping” between the abbreviations OAR [Open Access Repository(ies)] and
1
OER [Open Access Resource(s)], the authors adopted the terminology Digital Educational
Resource(s) (abbreviated as DER), instead of OER.
© The Author(s) 2017 1

R. Tavares, A. Moreira, Implications of Open Access Repositories Quality
Criteria and Features for Teachers’ TPACK Development, SpringerBriefs in
Education, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-57916-0_1
2 Implications of Open Access Repositories Quality Criteria and Features for Teachers’…
change the role of digital technologies at Education institutions. It also defends that
OAR are opportunities to innovate organizations and teachers’ methodologies and
that available DER are opportunities to use open knowledge for better quality and
access to Education European Commission (2013). Thus, OAR increase in formal
contexts is already considered a knowledge management manifestation, represent-
ing an important benefit in DER usage and in knowledge achievement, promoting
innovation and changes in pedagogical approaches (Francisco, 2012).
Deriving from this, the use of OAR and DER in educational contexts has been
establishing itself as a strong educational trend in the European scenario, with the
implementation of several (funding) projects of OAR development and significant
studies about OAR and DER usage impact on teachers’ practices and learning pro-
cesses. A reflection of this is the institutional growing number of OAR, nurtured by
institutional and individual contributions, such as teachers and specialists from dif-
ferent countries and knowledge areas. Several studies underline the positive impact
that OAR represent in the proliferation of organized and meaningful DER, leading,
in the past decade, to fast-growing efforts in DER organization and accessibility by
creating dedicated OAR, thereby reducing the impact of simple, direct and arbitrary
search of digital content on the Internet.
Therefore, in the last years, the use of OAR and available DER in educational con-
texts has been encouraging teachers to widen the way of planning their educational
activities (Blas, Fioreb, Mainettib, Vergallob, & Paolinia, 2014). Thus, OAR stress
their importance in the easier provision and dissemination of content by the educa-
tional community, simplifying teachers work, based on the existence of a wide range
of relevant DER (Sampson, Zervas, & Sotiriou, 2012). Atenas and Havemann (2014,
p. 1) underline that “The technological affordances of computers and the Internet have
made the production of learning resources easier, leading to a proliferation of resources
that may be shared between institutions and individuals”. Alevizou (2012) reinforces
this view by stating that this is essential for an open Education, supported by reflection
and improvement of pedagogical practices, sharing and collaboration.
Available DER in OAR, especially when developed as Learning Objects (LO),
represent high value. The Open e-Learning Content Observatory Services (OLCOS),
a transversal action funded by the European Commission under the eLearning
Programme, stresses LO usage benefits according to their specific features of reuse
and adaptation, using the RAID mnemonic: Re-usable—able to be used and modified
according to learning needs; Accessible—able to be easily found and indexed;
Interoperable—operable across various hardware, environments and tools; and
Durable—adaptable to changes in versions of system software, players and plug-ins
(Baumgartner et al., 2012). From the standpoint of teaching and learning process,
DER equally represent an enormous value given their unique characteristics of com-
bination of text with image (static or dynamic), sounds (voiceover or music) and
animation, stimulating learning processes through dual channel information process-
ing and organizing usage (Laurillard, 2012; Manches, 2012; Ramos, Teodoro, &
Ferreira, 2011; Tavares, 2016; Tavares & Vieira, 2016).
Institutional educational OAR, as monitored shared environments (DER evalua-
tion and validation by OAR institution before contributor’s submission), increase
teachers access to valuable and diversified contents, enhancing multiple scenarios and
Open Access Repositories and Digital Educational Resources 3
educational methodologies, therefore improving the quality of teaching and learning

process (Castro, Ferreira, & Andrade, 2011). In addition, OAR supports various fea-
tures that help contributors in DER searches: metadata—standard and detailed infor-
mation; hyperlinks to other locations or websites with similar DER; simple or
advanced search—language, subject, format, age range, interaction, providers; DER
upload and download; and peer evaluation (Cardoso, 2009; Seiça, 2009).
According to Baumgartner et al. (2012), educational OAR constitute a democratiza-
tion of information access, improving collaborative dynamics between peers, attending
to aspects such as: (a) the basic characteristics of DER (re-usable, accessible, interoper-
able and durable); (b) licensing OAR and DER will become easier through plug-ins for
widely used software packages and DER information standardisation; (c) OAR will
promote scientific progress, innovation, educational and lifelong learning opportunities,
cultural diversity and understanding in digital environments; and (d) OAR will be more
connected to the deep web, using web search engines to increase the number of OAR
users, allowing them “to get through the back door” (Baumgartner et al., 2012, p. 78).
However, and still following the thoughts of the same authors, OAR also present
some inhibitors that must be attended to and resolved: (a) the “Need to reinforce insti-
tutional open access policies and measures” (Baumgartner et al., 2012, p. 80); (b) rich
educational metadata will remain expensive (e.g., metadata editor and controlled
vocabulary); (c) the need to achieve an ontology-based educational semantic web so
that OAR and DER can be connected seamlessly, using common machine-processing
ontologies which are explicit models of knowledge; (d) “More cooperation between
tools developers and educators is needed” (Baumgartner et al., 2012, p. 101); (e) OAR
stakeholders will need to think more carefully about how to make OAR useful for
teachers and their practice; and (f) OAR stakeholders “will need to implement more
advanced tools and services” (Baumgartner et al., 2012, p. 104).
In the last few years, the large amount of Science Education DER available through
digital repositories, museum collections and libraries, has facilitated their sharing and
(re) use among the educational community, improving technology-enhanced Science
Education and supporting Science teachers in the teaching and learning process
(Sampson et al., 2012). DER (re) use possibilities have also uncovered connectivity
possibilities among peers and other Science Education actors, leading OAR to adopt
Web 2.0 tools to facilitate DER share and dissemination (e.g., RSS feeds, social media
plugins to automatically share DER in social networks) (Shueb & Sofi, 2014).
Therefore, among others, technology integration in Science Education has been
underlined as an opportunity to improve teaching quality approaches, as well as repre-
senting a tool to motivate not only students, but also teachers in their daily practices,
involving them in learning and sharing communities (e.g., share and (re) use DER,
share and adopt/adapt methodological approaches supported by technology) (Koper &
Olivier, 2004). Arising from this availability and possibilities, in the last few years,
teachers have been confronted with new issues, particularly related to How to integrate
and enhance technology in teaching and learning process in daily practices? To better
understand OAR potential in Science teachers’ practices, as well as DER (re) use, this
study proposes to analyse OAR quality criteria and features, and how that can improve
teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) development.
Study Objectives and Methodology
This study aims to analyse (a) the prevalence of European Science Education Open
Access Repositories (OAR) and teachers’ perceptions about their usage; (b) the
most common OAR features and their implications on teachers’ usage; (c) the exis-
tence of social features in OAR and their impacts; and (d) the implications of OAR
usage and quality criteria on teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content
Knowledge (TPACK) development.
Thus, the authors collected, crossed and analysed data from different sources,
namely Literature Review, information available in different OAR and their social
networks, and information provided by OAR stakeholders, adopting a qualitative
e-Research methodology to carry out this study (Kilburn & Earley, 2015). The
term e-Research (also written eResearch), as a methodological approach, was
firstly used by Terry Anderson and Heather Kanuka in 2002 (Anderson & Kanuka,
2002). The term was used to address research based on Internet data, including
log file analysis, online surveys and interviews, and analysis of social behaviour
in digital environments. Beaulieu and Wouters (2009, p. 57) consider “the devel-
opment of e-research in the humanities and social sciences as an intervention in
the practice of knowledge creation”. Among others, e-Research focuses on the
analysis of web tracking tools for measurement and synthesis of online activities
and on the analysis of text transcripts of learning or social activities (Anderson &
Kanuka, 2002). This approach stems from the “emergence of Web 2.0 tools that
enable people to collaborate, create and share information online” (Wishart &
Thomas, 2015, p. 223) leading to significant challenges and changes in the cre-
ation, co-production and dissemination of knowledge. In fact, the concept of
e-Research is very much rooted in the South East (namely New Zealand and
Australia2) and refers to the use, in its broadest sense, of Information and
Communications Technologies (ICT) as tools to support research in virtually all
areas of knowledge, from the so called hard sciences, to the most human and
social natured ones. The more marked features of e-Research are (1) the use of
grid-computing technologies, (2) data-intensive activity and (3) collaboration. A
very common example of e-Research is that of online studies c onducted on large
linguistic corpora, to find, for instance, the various meanings of a word given its
co-text, i.e., what comes before and after its occurrence, or even how, over time,
a given word gains ground over others, replacing them in language.3 Regarding
the research processes, e-Research is based on (1) a problem formulation with a
context of theoretical relevancy; and (2) the definition of a research design that
allows for data collection, analysis, and preservation (Jankowski, 2009).
2
Cf. http://aero.edu.au/, or http://www.eresearch.auckland.ac.nz/en/centre-for-eresearch.html.
3
See “Has ‘Run’ Run Amok? It Has 645 Meanings … So Far”, by Neal Conan, in http://www.np
r.org/2011/05/30/136796448/has-run-run-amok-it-has-645-meanings-so-far, interviewing Simon
Winchester, May 30, 2011, about his “A Verb for Our Frantic Times” (http://www.nytimes.
com/2011/05/29/opinion/29winchester.html?_r=0, May 28th, 2011). Retrieved May 28th, 2016.
Study Objectives and Methodology 5
nalysis of the Prevalence of European Science Education OAR

A
and Teachers’ Perceptions About Their Usage
Based on the Literature Review we analysed the prevalence of European Science

Education OAR and teachers’ perceptions; which are the most common OAR fea-
tures and its implications; and the impact of OAR usage in teachers’ TPACK devel-
opment. Thus, were considered articles, field studies, reports and statutes related to
Open Access Repositories, Digital Educational Resources, Learning Objects,
Information and Communication Technologies, Teacher Education and TPACK.
The search was performed across ERIC, Scopus and ScienceDirect databases. We
also searched reference scientific journals focussed on subjects such as Education,
Technology, Educational Technology, Teacher Education, Technology and Teacher
Education, Learning Technology (e.g., Educational Technology Research and
Development; Computers & Education; Contemporary Issues in Technology and
Teacher Education; Research in Learning Technology). As to articles, field studies
and reports selection we considered the following criteria:
–– Articles, field studies and reports published from 2005 to 2015;
–– Articles, field studies and reports containing the following keywords: Open access;
Open Educational Practice; Repositories; Open Access Repositories; Open
Educational Resources; Digital Educational Resources Repositories; Science
Education Repositories; Digital Educational Resources; Learning Objects; Quality
assurance; Institutional Repositories Digital Educational Resources quality crite-
ria; Information and Communication Technologies (ICT); Technology; Technology
integration; Teacher technology use; Teacher professional development; Web 2.0;
TPACK (framework); Barriers to ICT / Technology integration;
–– Articles and field studies whose theoretical framework explore the following
concepts: Open Access Repositories; Digital Educational Resources; Learning
Objects; ICT; Teacher Education; and TPACK;
–– Articles and field studies exploring ICT integration barriers in teaching and
learning process.
nalysis of the Most Common OAR Features and Their

A
Implications on Teachers’ Usage and of the Existence of Social
Features and Their Impacts
To ascertain the occurrence of the most common OAR features we analysed five
European Science Education OAR according to the following methodological
techniques:
1. OAR that have been upgraded for at least 1 year (data collected from 12th
January 2015 till 12th January 2016);
2. Online survey of OAR providing the following types of DER: presentations,

animations, videos, games and simulations (interactive multimedia and/or online
laboratories);
3. Analysis of OAR predicting the following features: search for DER; preview
DER; download DER; store and share DER; develop, store and share DER; eval-
uate, rate and comment DER; social media features.
nalysis of the Implications of OAR Usage and Quality Criteria

A
on Teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge
(TPACK) Development
To analyse the impact of OAR usage in teachers’ TPACK development, we selected

a Portuguese Science Education OAR and its social networks, analysing in detail
the features available; the existence of social features and it impacts; and how qual-
ity criteria may promote the development of teachers’ TPACK. For that, we col-
lected data during a year (from 12th January 2015 till 12th January 2016) according
to the following methodological aspects:
1 . Portuguese Science Education OAR that have been upgraded for at least 1 year;
2. Online survey of Portuguese Science Education OAR providing the following
types of DER: presentations, animations, videos, games and simulations (inter-
active multimedia and/or online laboratories);
3. Portuguese Science Education OAR predicting the following features: search for
DER; preview DER; download DER; store and share DER; evaluate, rate and
comment DER; social media features;
4. Adoption of Guía para la Evaluación de Repositorios Institucionales de
Investigación—GERII (Guide for the Evaluation of Institutional Repositories of
Research) to set OAR evaluation criteria (Millaruelo et al., 2014). GERII includes a
series of guidelines for OAR creation and evaluation, gathering a set of 31 evaluation
criteria, distributed over seven dimensions that any quality repository must meet.
Thus, this was considered an excellent benchmark for the intended analysis;
5. Data collection from the selected OAR, based on the adopted GERII evaluation
criteria, crossing data with TPACK forms of knowledge (Table 1);
6. Analysis of data available in Portuguese Science Education OAR and their social networks;
7. Analysis of data provided by OAR stakeholders covering the mentioned period.
revalence of European Science Education OAR

P
and Teachers’ Perceptions
Technological advancements such as simulations, augmented reality and virtual real-

ity interfaces, “[have] allowed the enhancement and enrichment of the current sci-
ence education curricula” (Sampson et al., 2012, p. 200). In addition, interoperability
Prevalence of European Science Education OAR and Teachers’ Perceptions 7
Table 1 OAR evaluation criteria adopted, TPACK forms of knowledge and indicators considered
OAR quality criteria TPACK forms of knowledge Indicators
Visibility dimension Pedagogical content knowledge (PK Indicators that reveal
– at least 75% of DER and CK) the positive impact in
available in repository are Knowledge to teach a particular subject/ OAR teachers’ usage
open access topic and in DER (re) use:
– promotion of public – ability to address the same subject/ – users’ comments
events to share DER and topic in different ways, to rethink and – available
OAR evolution adapt technological resources to information in the
– integration of social different approaches and/or previous OAR and linked pages
media features to promote students’ conceptions – OAR support
OAR and DER usage – ability to use alternative and flexible feedback
Policies dimension teaching strategies – DER information
– public access to the Technological content knowledge (TK contributors
following information: Who and CK)
can submit DER and in what Knowledge to select the most
formats appropriate technological resources to
– public access to DER teach/communicate a particular subject/
and metadata preservation topic
policies – understanding the impact of
– visible contact and technology in teaching and pedagogical
institutional support practices and acquisition of knowledge
Legal aspects dimension in different curriculum areas
– intellectual property – understanding the potential of
preservation technologies in different approaches and
– author authorization for representations of knowledge
DER distribution Technological pedagogical knowledge
(TK and PK)
Metadata dimension
Knowledge to use technological
– DER contain
resources in teaching and learning
information such as author,
process in different approaches and
title, description, age range,
contexts
subject, format, language,
– understanding that the potential of
date, keywords, copyright
technology does not end at its “primary
(e.g., Creative Commons)
function”, that is, their use will always
– search can be performed
depend on teachers’ objectives
by author, title, description,
– ability to realize the following
age range, subject, format,
principle: There are no specific
language, date and
technologies for a particular purpose.
keywords
We determine its purpose of application,
Logs and statistics seeking and adapting technological tools
dimension to pedagogical and didactic needs.
– OAR provides
information related to
DER statistics usage and
repository logged accesses
CK content knowledge, PK pedagogical knowledge, TK technological knowledge
between various European Science Education Open Access Repositories has promoted its
growth and improvement. In the last years, several dedicated Open Access Repositories
(OAR) appeared in the European context, allowing students and teachers to explore dif-
ferent formats of Digital Educational Resources (DER) and Science Education approaches.
In 2008, Learning Resource Exchange, a project involving 17 European Ministries

of Education (Austria, Belgium, Spain, Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France,
Hungary, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, and
Sweden), became a reference in the access to a network of European OAR with fea-
tures that allowed teachers to easily find and (re) use high quality DER (European
Schoolnet, 2016; Learning Resource Exchange, 2016; van Assche et al., 2009).
Additionally, contributions from other Learning Resource Exchange associate partners
as the ASPECT project were also included in the OAR. This project, in particular,
focuses on implementing standards and specifications for DER interoperability
between the Learning Resource Exchange contributors, providing a cross-border reuse
of content and interoperability among European OAR, as search and retrieval function-
alities customized to meet the needs of teachers. To better understand its impact, the
ASPECT project implemented three workshops involving 136 teachers from four
attendee countries (Belgium, Lithuania, Romania and Portugal). The evaluation instru-
ments in the workshops included direct observation, interviews and questionnaires.
The implementation of ASPECT standards and specifications on Learning Resource
Exchange had a positive impact, revealed in teacher’s satisfaction using the OAR and
in the easiness of DER finding. Teachers reported satisfaction related to finding appro-
priate images to fit their lesson plan requirements (65%), and in discovering appropri-
ate simulations, (interactive) animations for activities and tests (more than a third of the
inquired teachers) (Yalaho, Clements, Pawlowski, & Wilson, 2011, p. 61). Five months
after being introduced to the OAR, up to 40% of the participating teachers were using
it at least once a month to search for DER (Yalaho et al., 2011, p. 63).
In 2009, Scientix, a project addressed to teachers, education researchers, policymak-
ers and other educational experts, started to promote and support a Europe-wide col-
laboration among Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) community,
publishing more than 1.000 items for teaching and learning (Scientix, 2016; Stone,
2014). The project, among others, focussed on local and online teachers’ continuous
professional development, carrying out large scale evaluations of the professional
development programmes available for STEM teachers in 27 European countries
(Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia,
Finland, France, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Netherlands,
Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and United
Kingdom). The last report refers that 30% of the attendee countries (Croatia, Cyprus,
Poland, Portugal, Malta, Romania, Slovenia and United Kingdom) had in-service
STEM teacher education initiatives, which had been implemented at central level,
either directly through the Ministry of Education, or the national institution responsible
for teacher training, often affiliated to the Ministry (Kearney, 2016, p. 51). These initia-
tives involved primary, lower and upper secondary education teachers, and reveals a
positive impact in STEM teachers’ skill development. During project evaluation, teach-
ers refer the OAR as useful to approach STEM teaching through inquiry-based learn-
ing, to enhance DER usage in their practices, and to look for new ideas and different
methods to improve their teaching approaches (Stone, 2014).
In the same year, GLOBAL excursion, a project involving seven partners from
European countries (Austria, Belgium, Spain, Hungary and United Kingdom), started
Prevalence of European Science Education OAR and Teachers’ Perceptions 9
enabling “e-Infrastructures” in Nano- and Bio-technologies curricula, using the Virtual

Science Hub platform as the access point to several free and openly licensed DER and
an online community, mainly for teachers (GLOBAL Excursion, 2016). So as to evalu-
ate the OAR, in 2013 GLOBAL excursion implemented an online questionnaire
addressed to 176 registered teachers, collecting 55 responses from teachers from 14
European countries (Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, United Kingdom,
France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, Spain), and
also Israel, Turkey and USA. Teachers referred that for their teaching practice they use
the following resources from the OAR: texts/books (93.88%); videos (89.80%); images
(89.80%); presentations (83.67%); w ebpages (77.55%); audio files (30.61%); and
other material, such as didactic applications, interactive instruments, laboratories
(experiments), games and simulations (26.53%) (Fabian, Kieslinger, Holocher-Ertl, &
Hochgerner, 2013, p. 15). Teachers also referred as the most frequently conducted
activities in OAR the use of shared educational proposals (39.29%); and the upload of
resources (35.71%) (Fabian et al., 2013, p. 18). When asked about OAR improvements
and/or negative aspects, teachers referred it would be important to provide better
resources classification in order to manage the material and find the activities available
(Fabian et al., 2013). When asked about OAR relevance for their practice, most teach-
ers said that the OAR fits rather well into their teaching practices (51.61%); and that it
is rather effective in supporting them to create exciting, stimulating and motivating
teaching materials for their students (43.90%) (Fabian et al., 2013, p. 64).
Also in 2009, OpenScienceResources, a project involving 11 European countries
(Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Luxembourg,
Portugal and Sweden), geared towards the development of a common digital repository
for (in)formal Science Education, proposed an “innovative solution for metadata han-
dling of digital science education objects that are available at the web repositories of
science centres, museums and other organisations” (OpenScienceResources, 2016).
The project also stressed social tagging, allowing users to express their opinions about
the resources, providing cross-languages and sharing opportunities. To validate the
OAR, an online questionnaire addressed to different users’ profiles (teachers, students,
museums visitors and OAR visitors) and a Web analysis were implemented. Among
others, the questionnaire aimed to gather data and compare results about the added
value of the OAR to different users, collecting teachers’ perceptions from four European
countries (Finland—40.7%, Greece—20.7%, Portugal—12.6%, and Italy—10.4%)
(Goldschmidt, Pöhnl, & Bogner, 2012, p. 81). Teachers recognized the added value of
the OAR features for their teaching activities (83.6%), as well as help them to plan their
lessons (85.5%), feeling very motivated to use the portal in the future (58%)
(Goldschmidt et al., 2012, p. 84). When asked, “What have you experienced in the
portal?”, 20.1% of the teachers answered, “just explore it”, 11.9% “search for resources”
and 11.2% uploaded materials (Goldschmidt et al., 2012, p. 94). The report also anal-
ysed how teachers use social features, concluding that 83.7% of the teachers tag in
order to characterise DER and learning activities (66.7% positive feedback)
(Goldschmidt et al., 2012, p. 104).
Since 2012, Go-Lab, a project involving ten European countries (Austria, Belgium,
Cyprus, Estonia, Greece, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland and United
Kingdom), allows students (10–18 year-olds) and teachers to access Astronomy,

Biology, Chemistry, Earth Science, Electronics, Engineering, Environmental Sciences,
Materials Science, Maths, Physics, and Technology remote and virtual laboratories,
apps and resources, organised by inquiry learning stages (Go-Lab Project, 2016). The
OAR is also available for lab owners and scientists. One of the goals of the Go-Lab is to
examine the impact that the OAR has on teachers’ knowledge, skills, and affective
domain constructs (i.e., beliefs, attitudes and intentions), based on the Technological
Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) framework (Koehler & Mishra, 2009). We
will explain this framework in more detail in the section “The Impact of OAR Usage in
Teachers’ TPACK Development”. “The idea behind measuring teachers’ knowledge is to
investigate whether teachers have the technical, pedagogical, and content knowledge
required to teach with computer technology environments, such as Go-Lab” (Tasiopoulou
et al., 2014, p. 27), complementing the TPACK framework with the Technological
Pedagogical Science Knowledge (Jimoyiannis, 2010) (also detailed in the referred sec-
tion). Thus, OAR offers teachers peer assistance for expertise sharing related to online
labs and educational strategies, so teachers, lab owners and scientists can help each
other and share their skills and knowledge. First cycles of the Go-Lab project were
focussed on designing the pedagogical framework, the OAR infrastructure and large-
scale pilot implementation. In order to validate the OAR, online pre- and post-question-
naires addressed to 293 and 138 teachers, respectively, from 17 European countries,
were implemented (Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Estonia, France,
Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, United
Kingdom) (de Jong et al., 2015). A dashboard tool was also used to collect information
from the questionnaires and teachers progress in the OAR (e.g., activities design). In the
pre-questionnaire, when teachers were questioned about how they intended to use the
OAR, most answered discover and use online laboratories (48%); also referring adapt
and use Inquiry Learning Spaces (ILS) available in the OAR with their classes (28%);
and implementing their own ILS (24%) (de Jong et al., 2015, p. 145). Regarding the
frequency intention on the use of the OAR, more than 70% expressed their intention to
use ILS on a weekly/monthly basis, planning to use ILS (64%) and authoring tools
(58%) (de Jong et al., 2015, p. 149). In the post-questionnaire, when teachers were ques-
tioned about how they used the OAR, most answered created a new ILS (51%), while a
small percentage used an existing ILS and search for an online laboratory (25% each)
(de Jong et al., 2015, p. 151). Regarding the frequency usage of OAR features, teachers
referred to use monthly online labs repository (30%); existing ILS (29%); and authoring
tools (20%) (de Jong et al., 2015, p. 155). A small percentage of teachers referred to use
all features of the OAR weekly (15%) (de Jong et al., 2015).
Summary of Findings
Development and availability of European Science Education OAR along the years
have promoted teachers’ easy access and (re) use of high quality DER and Science
Education approaches. Alongside, peer assistance, workshops, teachers training in
the use of OAR and available DER, and the implementing of OAR evaluation studies,
contributed to its improvement, as well as to teachers’ OAR and DER usage increase.
Most Common European Science Education OAR Features and Their Implications 11
In the presented studies, most teachers reported satisfaction related to finding

appropriate DER and in the exploration of OAR features, being its usage recorded
even after projects implementation. Teachers also referred that its usage improved
their educational practices, helping them to develop technological and STEM skills,
as well as adopt new methodological approaches such as inquiry-based learning sup-
ported by technology.
Additionally, teachers reported the importance of OAR usage in the enhancement
of DER in their practices, and to look for new ideas and different methods to improve
teaching and learning process. Because of the adoption of OAR in teachers’ prac-
tices, an increase of DER development, share and (re) use was verified. Teachers also
mentioned that OAR are relevant to create exciting, stimulating and motivating
teaching materials for their students.
Regarding OAR most relevant features, teachers highlighted the possibility to
search, upload and download DER; to plan teaching activities; to tag DER in order to
characterise and evaluate DER and learning purposes; and to develop their own DER
and “Inquiry Learning Spaces” (de Jong et al., 2015, p. 145). This last result means
that teachers recognized the importance of authoring tools integration in the OAR
and personal area (e.g., create lessons, associate other users).
ost Common European Science Education OAR Features

M
and Their Implications
From the analysis of the Open Access Repositories (OAR) presented in the previous
section, we could conclude that, according to their focus, Science Education OAR can
present different goals and, consequently, promote different usages and teacher’s
involvement levels. Depending on their goals, OAR may also support different features,
such as search for Digital Educational Resources (DER); preview DER; download DER;
store and share DER; evaluate, rate and comment DER; and social media features.
All the analysed OAR allow users to search for DER. This means that users can
search DER under different criteria such as author, title, type, subject, unit, and key-
words. Some OAR also provide model-based search such as subject; school year; age
range; format/type (e.g., Scientix); language; tags (e.g., Virtual Science Hub); keywords;
provider (e.g., Learning Resource Exchange); level of difficulty and interaction (e.g.,
Go-Lab); and most recent and popular (e.g., Go-Lab). Although many teachers still
search DER using search engines (Gras-Velázquez et al., 2011), “it is a more complex
task to ensure that the materials and documentation discovered in such searches are
appropriate to a specific educational field and context” (Atenas & Havemann, 2014,
p. 2). Thus, when teachers search for DER in an OAR they are not only assuring DER
quality, but also “buying time” to other educational tasks (Atenas & Havemann, 2014;
Sampson et al., 2012).
The analysed OAR also allows DER preview, enabling users to view DER metadata
descriptions and decide whether to use or not before DER download. This preview is
normally displayed using browser plugins, allowing users to completely explore DER;
however, some OAR require users’ registration/login prior to DER preview. Most of
the analysed OAR allow DER download without users’ registration/login, although, to
ensure DER safety and promote copyright assurance and responsible DER usage,
users’ registration/login should be current practice, as well as to promote formal peer
review processes improving DER quality and usefulness. Only one of the analysed
OAR requires users’ registration/login prior to DER download: OpenScienceResources.
All OAR enables the possibility of teachers to store and share DER. Some require
users’ registration/login (e.g., Scientix, Virtual Science Hub, OpenScienceResources,
Go-Lab) and others also collect DER from other national OAR (e.g., Learning Resource
Exchange). Users can store and share their DER along with their metadata descriptions.
Enabling users to assign keywords gives a contextual description in the form of key-
words or descriptive concepts that enhances opportunities for users to retrieve and
evaluate the usefulness of a resource. These possibilities increase dissemination of
knowledge, assure DER quality, improve their (re) use, and provide an indication of the
impact of a specific DER. Metadata also promotes interoperability between OAR
maintaining DER pedagogical quality and objectives.
From the analysis of OAR, only one allows users to develop, store and share DER:
Virtual Science Hub. The other four only allow DER upload and assign detail metadata.
Not less important, Go-Lab enables a translation tool so teachers can translate DER to
their mother tongue. OAR that offer authoring tools (develop, store and share DER)
also allow users to design DER according to pre-defined templates, store them in OAR,
and author DER. Browne, Holding, Howell, and Rodway-Dyer (2010) refer that ensur-
ing authorship is key in motivating DER development and (re) use. Authoring tools
have been advocated as an instrument to reduce the high costs, in time and money, of
DER development. Furthermore, using OAR tools for DER development not only pro-
motes cohesion models, it also allows the creation of structured content, its description
and the manipulation of content in various ways (Hoermann, Hildebrandt, Rensing, &
Steinmetz, 2005; Windle, Wharrad, McCormick, Laverty, & Taylor, 2010).
Regarding features to evaluate, rate and comment DER, only one OAR offers these
three features: Virtual Science Hub. All OAR offer rate and comment DER. OAR that
offer evaluate, rate and comment DER features allow users to evaluate and provide
their ratings and comments to a DER stored in the OAR. The possibility to evaluate
DER promotes the successful development of OAR and might facilitate content
retrieval. Trusting users to evaluate DER can help improve critical mass of OAR
engaged users, supporting the quality control of DER (Atenas & Havemann, 2014;
Clements & Pawlowski, 2012). Peer review can also improve the quality and useful-
ness of DER, equally assuring OAR quality and users’ confidence (Windle et al., 2010).
Finally, the availability of social media features was registered in all OAR:
–– Learning Resource Exchange: Facebook, Twitter, Blogger, Google+, and Delicious;
–– Scientix: Facebook, Twitter, and e-mail;
–– Virtual Science Hub: Facebook, Twitter, Blogger, Google+, and e-mail;
–– OpenScienceResources: Facebook, and Twitter;
–– Go-Lab: among others, Facebook, Twitter, Google+, e-mail, Pinterest, Tumblr,
LinkedIn, Blogger, and Delicious.
Most Common European Science Education OAR Features and Their Implications 13
OAR that offer social media features, allow users to tag DER and share them using
social media plugins. Users also have access to other social platforms linked to the
OAR, accessing additional information and resources. Social media features increase
online access to DER and promote pedagogical innovation, generating opportunities to
collaborate, discuss, evaluate, and (re) use DER (Alevizou, 2012; Atenas & Havemann,
2014; Browne et al., 2010; Pegler, 2012; Sampson et al., 2012; Shafi, Sumeer, & Tariq,
2013; UNESCO, 2012; Windle et al., 2010). Thus, social media features are getting “in
tune” with OAR, allowing a rapidly and massive share of DER by the adoption of
interactive features such as RSS, Wikis, social networking, bookmarking, YouTube and
Flickr (Shafi et al., 2013). For this reason, in the last years, OAR providing social media
features have been highlighted as spaces supporting better sharing of resources and
extraordinary opportunities for users to share and (re) use knowledge (Alevizou, 2012;
Atenas & Havemann, 2014; Baumgartner et al., 2012). Shueb and Sofi (2014), in a
study aimed at ascertaining the occurrence of social media features in English-
interfaced OAR (1196 functional repositories), could verify that 792 OAR, about 66%
of the total, made use of social media features, namely RSS (690), Facebook (291), and
Twitter (266). The study also revealed that “Europe stands at the top” (Shueb & Sofi,
2014, p. 33) with 74.01% operational OAR offering social media features (393 in 531
repositories). Attending to the emphasis given to the integration of social media fea-
tures in OAR in the last years and their impact in DER usage, we will analyse in more
detail these features in the section “Results and Discussion”.
According to the availability of social media features, OAR can promote different
approaches and scenarios in teachers’ practices integrating technologies, increasing
access to valuable and diversified DER. In this regard, Baumgartner et al. (2012) argue
that OAR can improve the quality of teaching and learning processes, democratization
of information access and collaborative dynamics between peers, attending to aspects
such as (a) re-usability, accessibility, interoperability and durability characteristics of
DER; (b) available plug-ins for widely use of software packages and DER information
standardisation; and (c) connection with the deep web, using web search engines to
increase the number of OAR users, allowing them “to get through the back door”
(Baumgartner et al., 2012, p. 78).
Summary of Findings
The availability of the analysed features can enhance teachers’ practices integrating
technologies, as well as improve access and (re) use of valuable and diversified
DER. OAR represent a valuable tool for teachers to easily search and select DER,
assuring their quality and “buying time” to other educational tasks. Likewise, features
that allow teachers to preview DER before download are an excellent way to evaluate
DER accuracy and adjustment to their educational objectives.
One of the most highlighted features of OAR is the possibility to download DER,
allowing teachers to (re) use DER. Although most OAR do not require users’ registra-
tion/login to download DER, all OAR should require it to assure DER safety, promote
copyright assurance and responsible DER usage, and improve higher confidence of
teachers in OAR and DER use. OAR that predict store and share features allow users
to assign keywords to DER and incorporate descriptions that enhance opportunities
for other users to retrieve and evaluate DER usefulness, increasing DER (re) use. As
previously referred, users’ registration/ login requirement should be considered.
Although the literature underlines the importance of features that allow users to
develop, store and share DER, in the European scenario the number of Science
Education OAR offering authoring tools is still low. These features are referred as a
key to motivate DER development and their (re) use, as well as to promote users’ DER
development under cohesion models.
Regarding DER evaluation, rate and comment, these features are already quite com-
mon and represent an opportunity for users to support the quality control of DER. It also
improves DER development and (re) use, helping users to easily search and analyse DER.
Attending to the current and massive use of social networks, social media features are
highlighted as an opportunity to increase DER share, access and (re) use. Social media
features also include links to OAR social networks and other relevant pages, enabling
additional information and resources to support teachers’ educational practices.
The Impact of OAR Usage in Teachers’ TPACK Development
Considering what has already been addressed in the two previous sections, it is man-
datory to understand how teachers are integrating technology in educational practices,
particularly regarding the use of Open Access Repositories (OAR) and the enhance-
ment of their features and Digital Educational Resources (DER) availability. Meeting
several studies and measured data about technology integration in educational prac-
tices, research now considers that same integration is related to teachers’ knowledge
in different dimensions (Edwards & Nuttall, 2015). This relationship has been dis-
cussed throughout the years and its outcomes relate technological knowledge to con-
tent and pedagogical knowledge.
Aiming to contribute to a greater understanding of the knowledge dimensions that
teachers must possess, so as to implement effective and meaningful educational prac-
tices in different contexts and for different students, Shulman (1986, 1987) states that
teachers’ knowledge cannot be explained only on the basis of their content knowledge
or their pedagogical knowledge, since it alone is insufficient to meet learning needs
(Shulman, 1986, 1987). He advocates, then, that it is from the intersection of both
dimensions that teachers formulate solid strategies that promote a tailored teaching
and learning process to each student and context, and facilitate (or render difficult)
content/themes learning. Evolving from this idea, Shulman theorized a new knowl-
edge dimension that he called Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) that results
from the intersection of Pedagogical Knowledge (PK), reflected in the ability to know
how to teach a particular content, and Content Knowledge (CK), reflected in the abil-
ity to know how to select the most appropriate resources to teach/communicate a
particular content.
The Impact of OAR Usage in Teachers’ TPACK Development 15
In this line of thought and given the new technological requirements, Mishra and
Koehler (2006) added a new knowledge dimension to PK and CK: Technological
Knowledge (TK), reflected in the ability to know how to use selected technological
resources in the teaching and learning process (Koehler & Mishra, 2009; Mishra &
Koehler, 2006; TPACK & Matthew, 2015). This new dimension brought, on one hand,
greater complexity, due to the skills that teachers should possess and, on the other, a
greater understanding about the required relationship and interdependence for an effec-
tive integration of technology in the teaching and learning process, resulting in the con-
ceptualisation of the TPACK framework—Technological Pedagogical Content
Knowledge. This framework represents the relationship between Content Knowledge
(CK), Pedagogical Knowledge (PK) and Technological Knowledge (TK), whose inter-
action results in four more complex forms of knowledge (explained subsequently and
represented in Fig. 1), helping teachers to understand that, before they try to introduce
innovative forms of pedagogical practice with technology, they first need to assure that
they are able to transform, adapt and adjust their knowledge to different students, needs,
contexts and educational situations.
From the intersection of CK with PK Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK)
emerges. PCK is the ability to teach a specific subject/topic; to address the same subject/
topic in different ways; to rethink and adapt the resources to alternatives and/or previous
students’ conceptions; and to use alternative and flexible teaching strategies. This “trans-
Fig. 1 TPACK©—reproduced with permission of the publisher, 2012 by tpack.org

formation of content” is extremely important attending to students’ differences and cen-

tres of interest. The use of technology is a facilitator so as to involve and motivate
students in their learning process, especially if teachers adopt different sources and
stimuli (e.g., schemata and representations, video, sound, games and simulations)
(Harris & Hofer, 2009; Jimoyiannis, Tsiotakis, Roussinos, & Siorenta, 2013; Koehler &
Mishra, 2009; Koh & Chai, 2014; Koh, Chai, & Tay, 2014; Mishra & Koehler, 2006;
Tavares, 2016; Tavares & Vieira, 2016; Tavares, Vieira, & Pedro, 2016; TPACK &
Matthew, 2015).
From the intersection of CK with TK Technological Content Knowledge (TCK)
emerges. TCK reflects the ability to know how to select the most appropriate technologi-
cal resources to teach and/or communicate a specific subject/topic; to understand the
impact of technology in teaching and pedagogical practices and knowledge acquisition
in different curriculum areas; and to understand the potential of technologies in different
approaches and knowledge representations. Technological resources can provide more
flexibility in the teaching and learning process, attending to the available diversity of
tools. The use of technology allows the representation of content in several ways, and
facilitates its communication and appropriation by students (e.g., concept maps, info-
graphics, images and educational wikis) (TPACK & Matthew, 2015).
From the intersection of PK with TK Technological Pedagogical Knowledge
(TPK) emerges. TPK purports the ability to know how to use the selected resources in
the teaching and learning process; to understand that the potential of technology does
not end at its “primary function”, in other words, its use will always depend on the
objectives set by the teacher; and to develop appropriate pedagogical designs and
strategies. TPK is grounded on the following principle: There are no specific technolo-
gies for a particular purpose. We determine its purpose of application, seeking and
adapting technological tools to pedagogical and didactic needs. In other words, tech-
nology is a promising tool that should be used according to teachers’ and students’
needs, regardless of its pedagogical function (e.g., Google Drive© was developed to be
used for business but it has an incredible educational potential; Facebook© was
designed to be a social network but teachers rapidly started using it for educational
purposes) (TPACK & Matthew, 2015).
Finally, from the intersection of PCK, TCK and TPK, TPACK emerges. TPACK
reflects the ability to know how to represent concepts using technologies; what peda-
gogical techniques should be used to embrace technologies in constructive ways to
teach content; what makes concepts difficult or easy to learn and how technology can
help resolve problems; and how technologies can be used to improve and enhance
existing knowledge (Koehler & Mishra, 2009). Technology integration complexity
levels will always depend on the intersection between these three components.
However, we should not confuse complexity with difficulty: “Teaching successfully
with technology requires continually creating, maintaining, and re-establishing a
dynamic equilibrium among all components” (Koehler & Mishra, 2009, p. 67), that is,
greater content and pedagogical knowledge, greater technological knowledge and bet-
ter educational practices in integrating technologies.
Contrary to the expected, after several years studying and highlighting technology
as a powerful tool for teaching and learning process, its integration in educational prac-
tices is still not being completely successful (Bocconi, Kampylis, & Punie, 2012;
Edwards & Nuttall, 2015; Ertmer, Ottenbreit-Leftwich, Sadik, Sendurur, & Sendurur,
2012; Jimoyiannis et al., 2013; Koehler & Mishra, 2009; Kopcha, 2012; Tsai & Chai,
2012). In order to understand why technology integration is not as simple as expected,
studies took place identifying external barriers (first-order) and internal barriers (sec-
ond-order) to its integration (Ertmer et al., 2012; Kopcha, 2012; Tsai & Chai, 2012).
First-order barriers include factors that teachers cannot control, such as adequate access
to technology (hardware and software as educational resources); time to use and exper-
iment technologies; and training and support on the use and enhancement of technol-
ogy. On the other hand, second-order barriers are related to intrinsic factors, such as
teachers’ pedagogical beliefs and attitudes towards technology; the ability to change
their beliefs and attitudes and try new approaches; the ability to go beyond their stan-
dard practices; and the (under) perceived value of technology for the teaching and
learning process. Hew and Brush (2007), based on the analysis of 48 empirical studies,
outlined the three most frequently cited barriers for technology integration: availability
of resources; teachers’ knowledge and skills; and teachers’ attitudes and beliefs.
In 2010, Jimoyiannis implemented a long-term project in Greece, aiming to prepare
teachers of different grades and specialities, namely preschool, primary and secondary
teachers of Education Literacy, Mathematics and Science, to integrate technology in
their practices. Based on the TPACK framework, the author designed and implemented
the Technological Pedagogical Science Knowledge (TPASK) framework, a model for
Science teachers’ professional development, replacing the “C” of Content with the “S”
of Science Content (Jimoyiannis, 2010; Jimoyiannis et al., 2013). Jimoyiannis high-
lights the importance of this adaptation given that Science Education is an area of
privileged knowledge for the integration of technology, revealing itself as a tool with
great potential both in terms of how teachers address scientific subjects, and how to get
students involved in the teaching and learning process. At the same time, the author
highlights the wide variety of digital media for Science Education (e.g., simulations,
virtual laboratories, platforms and/or DER repositories, augmented reality contents,
and virtual worlds dedicated to Science), representing opportunities for students’
engagement and for teachers to innovate and find new ways to address scientific con-
cepts. As a result of the project implemented, teachers “reported their ability to see
ICT, Pedagogy, and Science knowledge as an integrated and interrelated construct
rather than as separate elements (…) an increased willingness and confidence in their
ability to apply ICT in their own instruction” (Jimoyiannis, 2010, p. 1266).
Ertmer et al. (2012) applied a multiple case-study research design to examine the
similarities and differences among the pedagogical beliefs and technology practices of
twelve K-12 teachers—purposeful sample based on an online search crossing the names
of Technology award winners; teachers recognized, among others, by the International
Society for Technology in Education; and teachers whose websites presented the most
apparent student-centred practices (Ertmer et al., 2012). Teachers mostly referred barri-
ers to use technology in their practices was support and state standards for its implemen-
tation (external barriers); and their knowledge, skills attitudes and beliefs about
Technology (internal barriers) (Ertmer et al., 2012). When asked about the role of tech-
nology in their practices, they referred it as a way to reinforce skills; a tool to transform
their teaching (complement or enrich the curriculum); and a tool to transform teaching
and learning process (support a new kind of pedagogy, e.g., inquiry-based science learn-
ing) (Ertmer et al., 2012). In this study, the authors concluded that, in general, teachers’
practices were closely aligned with their beliefs (e.g., teachers who believed that tech-
nology’s best use was for collaboration purposes, implemented projects in which stu-
dents collaborated with local and distant peers) (Ertmer et al., 2012).
In order to analyse the main barriers for OAR usage, Clements and Pawlowski
(2012), in an empirical quantitative study applied in two phases (first survey (n = 80)
including teachers from Lithuania, Portugal, Finland, Belgium, and Romania; and the
second (n = 66) also including teachers from these countries, but additionally from
Austria, Sweden, Greece, United Kingdom, Bulgaria, Turkey, and one teacher from
Ethiopia), analysed how teachers, as users of OAR, acted in DER (re) use and how they
perceived DER and OAR quality. The study allowed to verify that the main aspects for
teacher’s confidence in DER available in OAR were: recommendations from col-
leagues (82%) (Clements & Pawlowski, 2012, p. 9); recommendations from personal
friends (71%) (Clements & Pawlowski, 2012); and resources ranking (56%), indicating
that quality instruments such as rankings and recommendations can facilitate teacher’s
confidence in DER (and OAR) (Clements & Pawlowski, 2012). Regarding the major
barriers of (re) use and share of DER, teachers referred curriculum compatibility prob-
lems (74%); copyright problems (52%); and subject/topic variation between countries
(48%) (Clements & Pawlowski, 2012). When teachers were asked about the OAR fea-
tures that could help them increase re-use of DER, most teachers answered reviews and
DER evaluations (55%) (Clements & Pawlowski, 2012). Following this, when teachers
were asked about DER quality evidence they referred “good use of multimedia (anima-
tions and simulations)” (83%); scientific correction (80%); adjustment to the national
curriculum (79%); and the source of DER, such as organizations with a good reputation
(e.g., NASA, CERN) (55%) (Clements & Pawlowski, 2012, pp. 10–12). This last is
also reflected in teachers trust in OAR (85%) (Clements & Pawlowski, 2012).
As referred in the section related to the study of the European Science Education
OAR prevalence and teachers’ perceptions, in 2014, the Go-Lab project, among oth-
ers, focussed its first trial report on the analyses of teachers technical, p edagogical, and
content knowledge to teach with computer technology environments, as well as the
evaluation of OAR usage impact on teachers’ knowledge, skills, and affective domain
constructs (i.e., beliefs, attitudes and intentions). Thus, the TPACK survey was used
(Schmidt et al., 2010), analysing, among others outcomes, how teachers rated their
technological skills in the use of OAR; and which was the most useful features of OAR
for Science teachers. Most teachers felt confident using OAR (85%) and the authoring
tools without support (58%), referring that they could take advantage of OAR and their
features in their educational practice (de Jong et al., 2015, p. 152). Consequently, the
features of the OAR most referred to as useful were the Inquiry Learning Spaces (ILS)
and authoring tools (de Jong et al., 2015). Additionally, analysing pre- and post-ques-
tionnaire results, the report authors also observed “a change in teachers’ technical
skills with a significant rise in the numbers of teachers that are stepping up and dare to
use the authoring tool” (de Jong et al., 2015, p. 157). They also conclude that support
materials available to teachers and training sessions that took place all around Europe
were highly significant “to this change” (de Jong et al., 2015, pp. 157–158).
Another interesting study was taken by Blas et al. (2014), which developed an empir-
ical study according to the TPACK framework about the implementation of L4ALL
(Learning for All), an Italian national research project set up to investigate the impact of
technology on teaching and learning process. This OAR is not just a simple repository,
it has a complex structure and crosses several information in each educational experi-
ence: audio files of interviews of the teacher (before and after the experience); interview
transcripts (filtered, that is, irrelevant parts are removed and more colloquial sentences
are summarised in order to make the transcript more readable); resources, such as mate-
rials produced in the course of the experience (e.g., multimedia presentations); and
forms with relevant information about the experience (e.g., characteristics of the whole
class and the rationale behind the experience)—L4ALL has three different forms avail-
able for teachers related to expectations, results and comparison between these two
(Blas et al., 2014). Based on the analysis of a large number of educational experiences
integrating technologies (e.g., teachers’ analysis, documents and lesson plans), among
others, the authors could verify the positive impact of OAR usage in the development of
teachers TPK: “teachers said that the complex taxonomy helped them to start realising
the relationships between technology and pedagogical issues” (Blas et al., 2014, p. 20).
Summary of Findings
The European Science Education OAR growing number in the last years and peer
assistance, workshops, teacher training in the use of OAR and available DER, and
the implementing of OAR evaluation studies have been increasing teachers’ DER
usage, as well as their TPACK development. Although some barriers still persist,
teachers are increasingly integrating technology in their educational practices, using
OAR to search and (re) use DER, and to design and/or readapt learning activities.
The studies analysed highlight the growing confidence of teachers in technology
usage in their practices according to the TPACK framework. Most teachers are
increasingly adopting technology, confident that it is a tool to transform teaching
and learning process, although its usage is particularly related to teachers’ beliefs
and technological skills.
The studies also allowed us to conclude that the main aspects that support teach-
er’s confidence in OAR and available DER are recommendations from colleagues
and/or personal friends; reviews and DER evaluations and ranking; availability of
good multimedia DER, such as animations and simulations; and scientific accuracy.
On the other hand, one of the main constraints to OAR usage is copyright issues,
which means that an OAR to be successful must comply with policies and legal
aspects. Another relevant conclusion from the studies analysed is that teachers start
to feel highly confident with the use OAR authoring tools. This means that teachers
increasingly desire to develop their own DER and learning activities in OAR.
Recent studies (2014–2015) focussed on OAR usage, report important changes
in teachers’ beliefs and attitudes towards technology integration, namely the under-
standing of the relationship and interdependence between content, pedagogical and
technological knowledge, and the willingness to explore new tools.
Results and Discussion
The present section aims to analyse the selected Open Access Repository (OAR),
according to the defined methodological aspects. As referred in the section related
to the study objectives and methodology, to consider the impact of OAR usage on
teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) development,
we analysed in detail the following aspects: (a) the OAR and its available social
networks features; (b) the existence of social features and their impacts; and (c) how
quality criteria may promote the development of teachers’ TPACK. For that, we
collected data throughout the span of a year (from 12th January 2015 till 12th
January 2016).
For a better contextualization of the selected OAR and it analysis, firstly it is
presented and characterized. Therefore, an historical overview of House of Sciences
(originally Casa das Ciências) is presented, as well as the adopted maintenance
strategies, the promoted initiatives, and the existing partnerships. Furthermore, the
OAR features are presented and its possibilities analysed and discussed.
Secondly, attending to the emphasis given to the integration of social media fea-
tures in OAR and their impact on Digital Educational Resources (DER) usage, we
analysed the relationship between downloads, ratings, votes and users’ comments
from the most downloaded DER, crossing data collected with DER views in House
of Sciences social networks, namely YouTube and Issuu.
Finally, and so as to understand how OAR quality criteria can influence teachers’
TPACK development, we analysed House of Sciences according to the adopted
evaluation criteria, crossing it with TPACK forms of knowledge. For a deeper
understanding, we also collected indicators that revealed the positive impact on
OAR teachers’ usage and on DER (re) use.
OAR Selection and Characterization
According to methodological aspects of OAR selection and analysis, only one OAR
corresponds to the set criteria: House of Sciences. Launched in 2008, this OAR pro-
motes teachers access to Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) DER.
House of Sciences is a project financed by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation (origi-
nally Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian), a Portuguese private organization with public
utility whose statutory aims are Art, Charity, Science and Education (House of Sciences,
2016b). The Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation has a strong tradition in supporting
Portuguese Education quality, and involving DER preparation and distribution in
Science areas. House of Sciences is an OAR for Science Education teachers, integrating
and amplifying current efforts in the use of information technologies in the teaching
and learning process, and providing visibility and usefulness to many teachers’ efforts
on DER development, recognizing their merit and becoming a reference OAR for all
Science Education teachers in Portugal [14.464 registered users—data collected 29th
September 2015 (House of Sciences, 2015b)].
Results and Discussion 21
Portuguese teachers, sharing their DER and exchanging ideas, experiences and
needs, have mainly supported its evolution. The OAR is dedicated to the Introduction
to the subjects of Science, Biology, Physics, Geology, Mathematics and Chemistry, and
teachers can access animations, simulations, videos, interactive presentations, games,
interactive whiteboard resources, documents and activities exploration guides. All sub-
mitted or recommended DER are previously evaluated by House of Sciences coordina-
tion, attending to various criteria based on scientific and pedagogical accuracy. To
submit a DER, contributors must follow a set of established rules in House of Sciences
materials regulations related to DER typology, licences and authoring, and submit the
DER to the Editorial Board for acceptance (House of Sciences, 2015c). DER frequency
peer usage and comments posted measure the DER impact and acceptance, as well as
the House of Sciences Award, an initiative promoted since 2010, representing an impor-
tant event to recognise teachers’ DER and to make the best Science Education practices
visible.
Besides OAR and annual awards, House of Sciences also has a Wiki, which pro-
motes debates on emergent subjects and provides a bank of images. OAR also offers an
online journal available for both Windows and iOS operating systems. House of
Sciences is also present in social networks, such as Facebook (5.498 likes), Google+
(94 followers and 305.787 views), Twitter (117 followers and 4.348 tweets), YouTube
(2.980 subscribers and 584.751 views), Instagram (249 posts and 35 followers), Issuu
(440 publications and 104 followers), and Slideshare (609 followers), providing a wide
range of support content for Science Education teachers and the educational commu-
nity (data collected 28th September 2015).
In 2012, House of Sciences signed a protocol with the Portuguese School Libraries
Network (originally Rede de Bibliotecas Escolares) to promote House of Sciences by
maintaining its link on the School Libraries Network website and recommending
Portuguese schools to adopt House of Sciences DER. On the other hand, House of
Sciences reserves a space for the School Libraries Network dissemination in the links
area, and also promotes all partners daily information agendas (School Libraries
Network, 2015).
In March 2013 House of Sciences held its first House of Sciences International
Meeting (originally Encontro Internacional da Casa das Ciências), with approximately
200 participants and 80 oral presentations collected in a Book of Abstracts (House of
Sciences, 2015a), counting with over 100 participants, 38 oral presentations and ten
posters in the second House of Sciences International Meeting, also collected in a Book
of Abstracts (House of Sciences, 2015d). House of Sciences also provides content inte-
gration in Discover Programme, which aims to promote Science and Culture, provid-
ing the school community and the general public with a series of awareness-raising
proposals for Arts, complementing the artistic supply with museums’ permanent col-
lections and temporary exhibitions, programming season concerts and promoting the
natural heritage of the Gulbenkian Garden (Discover Programme, 2015).
In January 2015, House of Sciences started a crowdfunding campaign to raise
funds to improve and maintain the following assets: Technology and Support—serv-
ers, development and support; and People—payment to the five members of staff
that constitute the House of Sciences office. In September 2015, the crowdfunding
campaign counted with 215 supporters and a total of €3.637 in donations. Since the
start of the crowdfunding campaign, the OAR suffered several changes and improve-
ments, namely in DER organization and dissemination, and relevant information
such as “Support texts” in subjects like Didactics, new partners (projects TEA and
Chemistry Is All Around Network), and “OAR Friend” (a list of relevant national
and international Science Education OAR) (House of Sciences, 2015c, 2015e).
As a result of the dynamics generated and growing teachers’ memberships from
different Science areas, this OAR has emerged and contributes to Science Education
quality in Portugal. In Table 2 we present OAR features availability (see “Most
Common European Science Education OAR Features and Their Implications”) and
the detailed possibilities of such features.
Summary of Findings
From data gathered, as the most analysed OAR, House of Sciences does not allow users
to develop, store and share DER either. This means that the OAR does not offer author-
ing tools. This can mean that this feature corresponds to high levels of development
such as design, program and maintenance of pre-defined templates; and design, support
and maintenance of a high structured database to store DER. However, and supporting
Browne et al. (2010), we believe that this feature is an excellent way to motivate users
to develop DER and promote a coherent OAR design and DER models, facilitating
DER reuse and adaptation.
Analysing available features, House of Sciences enables very structured search fea-
tures, allowing users to decide how they want to search for DER and simplifying the
process. It also improves the selection of appropriate DER to a specific educational
objective, assuring DER adequacy and “buying time” (Atenas & Havemann, 2014;
Sampson et al., 2012). Regarding the preview DER feature, it also facilitates and
improves DER selection, allowing users to decide whether to use it or not, specially
attending to the possibility to test/use DER in an online version before it is
downloaded.
The fact that the OAR requires users’ registration/login prior to download DER is
also a valued aspect, once it assures DER quality and safety for users, also improving
responsible DER usage. Regarding the store and share DER feature, the fact that House
of Sciences requires users’ registration/login prior to DER submission also improves
the assurance of its quality and safety. DER submission requirements allow users to
assign keywords and descriptions that enhance opportunities for users to retrieve and
evaluate the usefulness of a resource. Simultaneously, DER usage and submission are
under Creative Commons and by-sa licence under the Attribution and Share Alike
terms, promoting copyright culture and responsible DER usage. These possibilities
increase dissemination of knowledge and assure DER quality and (re) use.
Analysing the “evaluate, rate and comment DER features”, House of Sciences does
not enable the evaluation feature, although users can rate DER (1–5 stars) and write and
view comments. The evaluate feature can promote successful development of DER and
OAR and might facilitate content retrieval. Trusting users to evaluate DER can help
Table 2 Open Access Repository features and possibilities

Features
available Possibilities
Search for – free search, allowing users to use search box to introduce terms,
DER keywords, DER name…
– model-based search (subject; school year; format; awarded DER; and
contributor), allowing users to sort DER by most recent and most
downloaded, apply Boolean operators, and search for all terms or exact terms
– link search, allowing users to search DER in other linked pages (list of
national and international websites organized under the following subjects:
Introduction to science, Biology, Physics, Geology, mathematics and chemistry)
Preview DER – OAR allows users to preview and use DER (online version) without
registration/login
Download – OAR allows users to download DER but requires users’ prior registration/login
DER
Store and – OAR allows users to store and share DER but requires users’ registration/
share DER login prior to DER submission
– after DER evaluating by the House of Sciences coordination, assuring it
quality and safety, DER are available for all the OAR community
– DER submission requires a careful classification through a series of
standardized criteria promoting an organized OAR, and helping users to
easily search DER under different criteria: Author; title; description; type;
subject; unit; category; interactivity; keywords; FAQ’s; file name; file size;
downloads; comments and users’ classification. Some DER also contain
website, technical form and notes
– DER usage and submission are under Creative Commons and by-sa
licence (Share—Copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format;
and Adapt—Remix, transform, and build upon the material), under the
Attribution and Share Alike terms (Attribution—Give appropriate credit,
provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made; and
ShareAlike—Remix, transform, or build upon the material, distributing the
resource contributions under the same license as the original)
Evaluate, rate – users can rate DER (1–5 stars), write their comments and view other
and comment users’ comments
DER – OAR provides vast information related to DER statistics usage as chart
and table statistics related to: Most downloaded DER; most uploaded subject
DER; most uploaded cycle/year DER; most uploaded DER type; most viewed
DER (introduction to science, mathematics, Biology, Geology, Physics,
chemistry); most viewed 1st, 2nd and 3rd cycle DER; most viewed 10th, 11th
and 12th year DER; most viewed DER format (text, multimedia, hypertext,
application, presentation); approved, rejected and under review DER; and
daily visitors. It also offers DER and “top+” subject
Social media – OAR enables links to social networks such as Facebooka, Google+b,
features Twitterc, Instagramd, Issuue, Slidesharef, Wikig and YouTubeh
– OAR offers other sources of information such as a Bank of imagesi and an online Journalj
– the OAR also enables a chat to talk in real time with House of Sciences support
a
https://www.facebook.com/casa.das.ciencias.org
b
https://plus.google.com/+casadasciencias/posts
c
https://twitter.com/casa_cienciasPT
d
https://www.instagram.com/webmaster.casadasciencias/
e
https://issuu.com/casadasciencias
(continued)
Table 2 (continued)
f
http://www.slideshare.net/CasaCincias
g
http://wikiciencias.casadasciencias.org/wiki/index.php/P%C3%A1gina_principal
h
https://www.youtube.com/user/casadasciencias
i
http://imagem.casadasciencias.org/?uid=0#/
j
http://rce.casadasciencias.org/
improve critical mass of OAR engaged users, supporting the quality control and useful-
ness of DER (Atenas & Havemann, 2014; Clements & Pawlowski, 2012; Windle et al.,
2010). The fact that House of Sciences provides vast information related to DER usage
and download can improve users’ confidence, as well as facilitate DER selection and
adaptation to teachers learning objectives.
Finally, regarding social media features, during the analysis period, the OAR didn’t
allow users to tag DER and share those tags using social media plugins. Social media
features are very important to increase online access to DER and promote pedagogical
innovation, generating opportunities to collaborate, discuss, evaluate, and (re) use
DER. They are also an opportunity for users to massively share their DER and for OAR
to get to other teachers by being more connected with the deep web (Baumgartner et al.,
2012). Not less important, House of Sciences enables the possibility of users to rate,
vote and comment available DER. It also enables access to other social platforms linked
to the OAR, allowing users access to additional information and resources (Issuu,
Slideshare, Wiki, YouTube, a bank of images and an online journal). Furthermore, the
OAR enables “in time” support by integrating a chat to talk in real time with House of
Sciences support, helping teachers to feel supported and to easily dissipate doubts.
From the availability of features and their analysis we conclude that House of
Sciences represents a great opportunity for Science teachers to find valuable, diversified
and validated DER for their practices, and consequently promote different approaches
and learning scenarios, integrating technologies in teaching and learning process.
Impact of OAR Social Media Features on DER (re) use
Attending to the emphasis given to the integration of social media features in OAR
and their impact on DER usage, we analysed the relationship between downloads,
ratings, votes and users’ comments from the most downloaded DER: most down-
loaded ever and most downloaded in the month.
Arising from this and to better understand the impact of social media in DER (re)
use, we also crossed data collected in the OAR with DER views in House of Sciences
social networks, namely YouTube (animations and videos) and Issuu (documents
and presentations). For DER, such as games and simulations, the only data available
is on the OAR itself (downloads, ratings, votes and users’ comments). For YouTube,
we were able to gather monthly data; however, for Issuu, data is annual (total of
views), which results in a more limited analysis. Once the OAR is dedicated to
Introduction to Science, Biology, Physics, Geology, Mathematics, and Chemistry
subjects, we will present and analyse data according to those clusters.
Introduction to Science
The most downloaded ever DER of Introduction to Science was Solar System
(a game)—Fig. 2. Throughout a year, this DER recorded 2.358 downloads,
registering in the last 6 months (from August 2015 to January 2016) a signifi-
cant increase (plus 2.064 downloads). In November 2015, DER registered three
new users’ comments, one related to software issues and the other two related
to DER added value. No variation of rating (three) or users’ number of votes
(11) were registered during the period analysed; however, DER registered an
average of 196.5 downloads (note that the average is increased in the values of
the last 5 months).
From the five most downloaded in the month, We the fantastic living things—a
brief history of Evolution DER (a video) stands out—Fig. 3. From all five, it was the
best evaluated DER (rating four). During the analysed period, this DER recorded
432 views in YouTube from a total of 1.834 (published on 11th February 2013).
Crossing the number of downloads with YouTube views, in most of the cases we can
find a direct relationship between these numbers. In March 2015, DER registered 17
more views in YouTube and 10 more downloads in the OAR. The same trend was
verified in January 2016, where DER registered 95 more views in YouTube and 256
more downloads in the OAR. In the same month two new users’ comments related
to DER added value were also registered. For the span of 1 year, no variation related
to ratings (four stars) or number of votes (nine) was verified; however, DER regis-
tered an average of 66,25 downloads (note that the average is increased by values of
January 2016).
700
600
500
400
300
200
100
0
Oct-15
Apr-15
Nov-15
Dec-15
Jan-15
Feb-15
Jun-15
Jul-15
Jan-16
Mar-15
Aug-15
Sep-15
May-15
Jan-15 Feb-15 Mar-15 Apr-15 May-15 Jun-15 Jul-15 Aug-15 Sep-15 Oct-15 Nov-15 Dec-15 Jan-16
Downloads (n) 45 46 56 35 42 52 18 26 386 394 377 197 684
Rating (1-5 stars) 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
Votes (n) 11 11 11 11 11 11 11 11 11 11 11 11 11
Comments (n) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 0
Fig. 2 Most downloaded ever introduction to Science DER: Relationship between downloads,
ratings, votes and users’ comments
400
350
300
250
200
150
100
50
0 Feb-15
Apr-15
Oct-15
Nov-15
Dec-15
Mar-15
May-15
Jan-15
Jun-15
Aug-15
Sep-15
Jan-16
Jul-15
Downloads (n) 36 28 38 54 32 27 12 13 24 36 61 89 345
Rating (1-5 stars) 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4
Votes (n) 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9
Comments (n) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2
YouTube (n) 21 42 59 62 27 17 8 4 19 31 23 12 107
Fig. 3 We the fantastic living things—a brief history of Evolution: Relationship between down-
loads, ratings, votes, users’ comments and YouTube views
250
200
150
100
50
0
Oct-15
Apr-15
Nov-15
Dec-15
Jul-15
Mar-15
Jan-15
Feb-15
Jun-15
Jan-16
May-15
Aug-15
Sep-15
Downloads (n) 56 87 66 154 45 45 39 77 214 178 196 222 227
Rating (1-5 stars) 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
Votes (n) 16 16 16 16 16 16 16 16 16 16 16 16 16
Comments (n) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0
Fig. 4 Most downloaded ever Biology DER: Relationship between downloads, ratings, votes and
users’ comments
Biology
The most downloaded ever DER of Biology was Biotic Factors (an interactive
book)—Fig. 4. For 1 year, this DER recorded 1.606 downloads, registering two sig-
nificant moments of download increase: April and September 2015, with 154 and
214 downloads respectively. In September 2015, DER registered a new user com-
ment related to DER added value. No variation of rating (three) or users number of
votes (16) were registered during the period analysed; however, DER registered an
average of 133.83 downloads (note that the average is increased due to April 2015
and the last 5 months’ values).
From the five most downloaded in the month, the Mitosis, chromosomes and
kinetochores DER (a video) stands out—Fig. 5. From all five, it was the best evalu-
350
300
250
200
150
100
50
0
Oct-15
Apr-15
Nov-15
Dec-15
Jul-15
Mar-15
Jan-15
Feb-15
Jun-15
Jan-16
Aug-15
Sep-15
May-15
Downloads (n) 6 5 3 7 7 7 15 14 265 299 204 45 149
Rating (1-5 stars) 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4
Votes (n) 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
Comments (n) 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0
YouTube (n) 29 39 59 58 64 70 45 49 160 204 167 39 100
Fig. 5 Mitosis, chromosomes and kinetochores: Relationship between downloads, ratings, votes,
users’ comments and YouTube views
ated DER (rating four). Another relevant result is that, during the analysed period,
this DER recorded 1.083 views in YouTube from a total of 1.665 (around 65% of the
total views since it was published on 13th November 2014). From September to
October 2015, DER registered a significant increase of downloads (550 more), the
months when it was also registered a growth in YouTube views. Crossing the number
of downloads with YouTube views, in most of the cases we can find a direct relation-
ship between these results. In September 2015, DER registered 111 more views in
YouTube and 251 more downloads in the OAR. In October 2015, DER registered 44
more views in YouTube and 34 more downloads in the OAR. The same trend was
detected in January 2016, the month when DER registered 61 more views in YouTube
and 104 more downloads in the OAR. The inverse also occurred. In December 2015,
YouTube views decreased 128 views and DER downloads in the OAR declined from
204 to 45. The only registered users’ comment during the year occurred in July 2015
relating to DER scientific accuracy—“I really liked it. Very enlightening and with
good quality. However, I disagree with the statement “… access to genetic code …“
that appears at the beginning of the video” (House of Sciences, 2016a). During the
period analysed, no variation was detected as to ratings (four stars) or number of
votes (seven); however, DER registered an average of 85.5 downloads (note that the
average is increased by September and October 2015 values).
Physics
The most downloaded ever DER of Physics was Pince-nez (a web page)—Fig. 6.
Throughout a year, this DER recorded 2.600 downloads, registering two significant
moments of download increase: November 2015 and January 2016, with 443 and
780 downloads, respectively. The only registered users’ comment during the year
occurred January 2016 related to DER added value. No variation of rating (four) or
users’ number of votes (four) was registered during the period analysed; however,
900
800
700
600
500
400
300
200
100
0
Mar-15
Feb-15
Oct-15
Nov-15
Dec-15
Jan-15
Jun-15
Jan-16
Apr-15
May-15
Aug-15
Sep-15
Jul-15
Downloads (n) 55 84 85 77 58 123 77 132 168 209 443 309 780
Rating (1-5 stars) 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4
Votes (n) 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4
Comments (n) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1
Fig. 6 Most downloaded ever Physics DER: Relationship between downloads, ratings, votes and
users’ comments
160
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
May-15
Feb-15
Oct-15
Jan-15
Mar-15
Nov-15
Dec-15
Jan-16
Apr-15
Jun-15
Aug-15
Sep-15
Jul-15
Downloads (n) 37 27 51 27 42 40 33 25 42 53 86 149 99
Rating (1-5 stars) 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5
Votes (n) 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2
Comments (n) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Fig. 7 3D static magnetic field: relationship between downloads, ratings, votes and users’
comments
DER registered an average of 216.67 downloads (note that the average is increased
by the last 3 months’ values). Analysing this DER and the five most downloaded in
the month, Pince-nez is the only one that registered users’ comments during 1 year.
From the five most downloaded in the month, the 3D Static Magnetic Field DER (a
simulation) stands out—Fig. 7. From all five, it was the best evaluated DER (rating
five) and it was the most download from all (711 downloads), registering an increase
of 63 DER downloads in December 2015. Along 1 year, no variation related to ratings
(five stars) or number of votes (two) was detected; however, DER registered an average
of 59.25 downloads (note that the average is increased by December 2015 values).
160
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
Oct-15
Apr-15
Nov-15
Dec-15
Jan-15
Feb-15
Mar-15
Jun-15
Jul-15
Jan-16
May-15
Aug-15
Sep-15
Downloads (n) 20 7 2 3 6 10 5 4 53 93 81 25 135
Rating (1-5 stars) 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
Votes (n) 17 17 17 17 17 17 17 17 17 17 17 17 17
Comments (n) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0
Fig. 8 Most downloaded ever Geology DER: relationship between downloads, ratings, votes and
users’ comments
2000
1800
1600
1400
1200
1000
800
600
400
200
0
Oct-15
Nov-15
Dec-15
Jan-15
Feb-15
Mar-15
Jun-15
Jul-15
Jan-16
Apr-15
Aug-15
Sep-15
May-15
Downloads (n) 42 6 19 9 5 7 10 6 69 25 22 10 1760
Rating (1-5 stars) 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
Votes (n) 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6
Comments (n) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 8
Fig. 9 Volcanoes—the positive side: relationship between downloads, ratings, votes and users’
comments
Geology
The most downloaded ever DER of Geology was Pangea (an animation)—Fig. 8.
Throughout a year, this DER recorded 444 downloads, registering an increase of
downloads in October 2015 to January 2016, with 93 and 135 downloads, respec-
tively. In September 2015, DER registered one new user comment related to DER
added value. No variation of rating (three) or users’ number of votes (17) were regis-
tered during the period analysed; however, DER registered an average of 37 down-
loads (note that the average is increased by October 2015 and January 2016 values).
From the five most downloaded in the month, the Volcanoes—The positive side
DER (a non-interactive book) stands out—Fig. 9. From all five, it was the one that
collected more users’ comments (eight). Another relevant finding is that, during the
period analysed, this DER recorded 456 views in Issuu. In the last month (January
2016) it registered a significant increase of downloads (1750 downloads more) and
eight new users’ comments related to DER added value. For 1 year, no variation related
to ratings (three stars) or number of votes (six) was verified; however, DER registered
an average of 165.83 downloads (note that the average is increased by January 2016
values).
Mathematics
The most downloaded ever DER of Mathematics was Pantograph (a web page)—
Fig. 10. Throughout a year, this DER recorded 2.021 downloads, registering the
highest number of downloads in April, May and September 2015, with 214, 222 and
210 downloads, respectively. During the period analysed, users’ comments weren’t
registered; however, DER registered 81 views in Issuu. No variation of rating (four)
or users’ number of votes (three) were registered during the period analysed;
however, DER registered an average of 168.42 downloads.
From the five most downloaded in the month, the Sections in the Cube DER (a non-
interactive book) stands out—Fig. 11. From all five, it was the DER that collected
more votes (seven). Another relevant finding is that, during the period analysed, this
DER recorded 81 views in Issuu. In September 2015 and January 2016, it registered a
significant increase of downloads, with 122 and 114 downloads, respectively, and one
user comment. Along 1 year, no variation related to ratings (four stars) or number of
votes (seven) was verified; however, DER registered an average of 39.67 downloads
(note that the average is increased by September 2015 and January 2016 values).
Chemistry
The most downloaded ever DER of Chemistry was Galileo Thermometer (a simula-
tion)—Fig. 12. For the period of 1 year, this DER recorded 1.480 downloads, register-
ing an increase in March 2015 and November 2015, with 184 and 222 downloads,
respectively. In November 2015, DER registered one new user comment related to DER
added value. No variation of rating (four) or users’ number of votes (two) were regis-
tered during the period analysed; however, DER registered an average of 123.33 down-
loads (note that the average is increased by March 2015 and November 2015 values).
From the five most downloaded in the month, the The Table (is really) Periodic!
DER (a video) stands out—Fig. 13. From all five, it was the one that collected more
votes (nine). During the period analysed, this DER recorded 346 views in YouTube
from a total of 1.265 (published on 13th January 2014). Crossing the number of
downloads with YouTube views, in most of the cases we can find a direct relation-
ship between these results. In April 2015, DER registered 31 more views in YouTube
and 94 more downloads in the OAR. In September 2015, DER registered one user
250
200
150
100
50
0
Feb-15
Mar-15
Oct-15
Jan-15
Nov-15
Dec-15
Apr-15
May-15
Jun-15
Jan-16
Aug-15
Sep-15
Jul-15
Downloads (n) 42 75 143 214 222 170 129 173 210 198 173 106 166
Rating (1-5 stars) 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4
Votes (n) 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3
Comments (n) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Fig. 10 Most downloaded ever Mathematics DER: Relationship between downloads, ratings,
votes and users’ comments
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
Oct-15
Apr-15
Nov-15
Dec-15
Jan-15
Feb-15
Jun-15
Jul-15
Jan-16
Mar-15
Aug-15
Sep-15
May-15
Downloads (n) 6 5 6 7 10 3 22 5 122 102 53 21 114
Rating (1-5 stars) 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4
Votes (n) 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
Comments (n) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0
Fig. 11 Sections in the cube: relationship between downloads, ratings, votes and users’
comments
250
200
150
100
50
0
Oct-15
Apr-15
Nov-15
Dec-15
Jan-15
Feb-15
Jun-15
Jul-15
Jan-16
Mar-15
May-15
Aug-15
Sep-15
Downloads (n) 50 134 184 117 88 86 42 72 110 69 222 183 123
Rating (1-5 stars) 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4
Votes (n) 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2
Comments (n) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0
Fig. 12 Most downloaded ever Chemistry DER: relationship between downloads, ratings, votes
and users’ comments
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
Feb-15
Oct-15
Mar-15
Nov-15
Dec-15
Jan-15
Apr-15
Jun-15
Jan-16
May-15
Aug-15
Sep-15
Jul-15
Downloads (n) 11 6 5 99 19 4 4 5 8 10 25 4 53
Rating (1-5 stars) 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2
Votes (n) 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9
Comments (n) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0
YouTube (n) 9 23 26 57 30 27 17 16 34 25 41 7 34
Fig. 13 The table (is really) periodic!: relationship between downloads, ratings, votes, users’
comments and YouTube views
comment related to DER added value, also registering 18 more views in YouTube.
In November 2015, DER registered 16 more views in YouTube and 15 more down-
loads in the OAR. The same trend was detected in January 2016, the month when
DER registered 27 more views in YouTube and 49 more downloads in the OAR. The
inverse also occurred. In December 2015, YouTube views decreased 34 views and
DER downloads in the OAR declined from 25 to 4. Along the year, no variation
related to ratings (two stars) or number of votes (nine) was verified. However,
although this DER was the most viewed in YouTube, DER average was very low
(21.08 downloads, increased by April 2015 and January 2016 values).
Summary of Findings
Data collected didn’t allow for a comprehensive analysis about the impact of social
media features in DER (re) use. However, we will analyse the relationships found
focussing on the variations occurred during the period under scrutiny: downloads,
number of users’ comments and DER views in social networks.
The most downloaded ever DER of Introduction to Science registered three
users’ comments in November 2015; however, and contrary to the expected, this
fact didn’t increase DER downloads in the following month. Instead, in December
2015 downloads decreased almost 50%. The DER selected from the five most
downloaded of Introduction to Science registered an increase of downloads in
January 2016, a month when two new users’ comments related to DER added value
were registered. This fact allied to a high number of YouTube views (95 more) may
have contributed to the download increase in January 2016.
The most downloaded ever DER of Biology registered one user comment in
September 2015; however, this fact didn’t increase DER downloads in the following
month. Instead, in October 2015 downloads decreased almost 20%. Regarding the
DER selected from the five most downloaded of Biology, in September and October
2015 DER registered an increase of downloads, allied to a higher number of
YouTube views (160 and 204, respectively). Although no users’ comments were
registered in this period, DER views in YouTube may have contributed to the down-
load increase.
The most downloaded ever DER of Physics registered one user comment in
January 2016, increasing almost 70% of DER downloads; however, we cannot asso-
ciate this fact to that rise. Regarding the DER selected from the five most down-
loaded of Physics no comments were registered, although DER registered a
significant increase of downloads in December 2015 (around 40%). In the same
month, DER registered an increase of YouTube views (63 more), a fact that may
have contributed to the download increase.
The most downloaded ever DER of Geology registered one user comment in
September 2015, increasing almost 45% of DER downloads; however, as previ-
ously mentioned, it is not possible to associate this fact to that rise. The DER
selected from the five most downloaded of Geology registered an increase of down-
loads in January 2016, a month when eight new users’ comments related to DER
added value were registered. This fact allied to a higher number of Issuu views
(456) may have contributed to the download increase.
Regarding the most downloaded ever DER of Mathematics no comments were
registered; however, except for January and February 2015, DER registered a low
number of downloads (42 and 75, respectively), maintaining a very constant fre-
quency (average of 168.42 downloads). The DER selected from the five most down-
loaded of Mathematics registered an increase of downloads in September 2015, a
month when one new user comment was registered related to DER added value.
This fact allied to a relevant number of Issuu views (81) may have contributed to the
download increase.
The most downloaded ever DER of Chemistry registered one user comment in
November 2015; however, this fact didn’t increase DER downloads in the following
month. Instead, from November 2015 to January 2016 downloads decreased almost
50%. The DER selected from the five most downloaded of Chemistry registered an
increase of downloads in April 2015 and January 2016. However, no users’ com-
ments were registered in those months, DER registered an increase of views in
YouTube (31 and 27 respectively), a fact that may have contributed to the download
increase.
From crosswise data analysis, we concluded that House of Sciences presents
high levels of DER (re) use (OAR users’ downloads) and that networks play an
important role in DER access (YouTube and Issuu users’ views). Attending to that,
embedding social media plugins in each DER pages would probably increase it (re)
use and share. In this regard, literature also underlines that social media features
increase online access to DER and promotes pedagogical innovation, generating
opportunities to collaborate, discuss, evaluate and (re) use DER (Alevizou, 2012;
Atenas & Havemann, 2014; Browne et al., 2010; Pegler, 2012; Sampson et al.,
2012; Shafi et al., 2013; UNESCO, 2012; Windle et al., 2010).
elationship Between OAR Quality Criteria and Teachers’

R
TPACK Development
To understand how OAR quality criteria can influence teachers’ TPACK develop-
ment, we analysed the OAR according to the adopted evaluation criteria from Guía
para la Evaluación de Repositorios Institucionales de Investigación—GERII
(Guide for the Evaluation of Institutional Repositories of Research), crossing it with
TPACK forms of knowledge. For a deeper understanding, we also collected indica-
tors that reveal the positive impact in OAR teachers’ usage and in DER (re) use.
These indicators were retrieved from the analysis of the most download DER [most
downloaded in the month and most downloaded ever—see “Impact of OAR Social
Media Features on DER (re) Use”].
Users’ comments (indicators) displayed in House of Sciences, although origi-
nally in Portuguese, were translated into English (US), using the automatic translat-
ing features offered by Google settings. We decline any responsibility for eventual
translation errors.
OAR Visibility Dimension and Teachers’ TPACK Development
Analysing the OAR according to the adopted criteria, House of Sciences complies
with all the visibility dimension set of criteria. All resources available are open
access, OAR promotes public events to share DER and OAR evolution, and the
OAR integrates social media features to promote OAR and DER (re) use. By com-
plying with these criteria, OAR allows teachers to access and (re) use various DER
in educational practices, ensuring quality in technology integration processes. It
also allows teachers to rethink and adapt DER to different educational approaches,
exploring multiple DER formats and, consequently, addressing the same subject/
topic in different ways.
Once some DER enable teaching and learning strategies, teachers can adopt/
explore alternative and flexible methodologies, as well as select the most appropri-
ate DER to teach/communicate a specific subject/topic. Finally, these quality crite-
ria help teachers understand the potential of technologies in different approaches
and representations of knowledge, allowing them to develop the ability to integrate
technology in teaching and learning process.
Table 3 presents how this quality criteria can influence teachers’ TPACK devel-
opment, presenting some indicators that reveal the positive impact of teachers’
usage of the OAR and DER (re) use: users’ comments related to DER quality and
adjustment to their educational practices.
We also collected available information in the OAR and linked pages, and infor-
mation provided by House of Sciences stakeholders to analyse OAR promotion of
public events to share DER and OAR evolution, and the impact of social media
features to promote OAR and DER usage.
Table 3 Relationship between OAR visibility dimension data collected and teachers’ TPACK
development
OAR data Indicators (users’ comments; available
collected information in the OAR and linked
(quality Teachers’ TPACK development pages; information provided by House
criteria) (implications) of Sciences stakeholders)
Visibility DER diversity and open access policy DER diversity and open access policy
dimension allows teachers to: (users’ comments)
– DER are – use multiple DER in their “despite being a simple film applied it as
100% open educational practices according to their an introduction to the evolution of 11th
access objectives (PCK and TCK) grade and worked very well.
– promotion – address the same subject/topic in Congratulations to the authors, it is very
of annual different ways (PCK) well done and can be shown to various
House of – rethink and adapt DER to different age levels”—We the fantastic living
Sciences educational approaches (PCK) things—a brief history of Evolutiona
International – explore multiple content formats “practical and quick to understand what
Meeting (e.g., image, video, games and was previously a lot of work and required
– promotion simulations) (PCK and TCK) a lot of material and effort”—Areas and
of annual – adopt alternative and flexible perimetersb
House of teaching methodologies (PCK and TPK) “very interesting game for the 5th
Sciences – explore different methodologies of year—Enables, in a playful way, the
Award teaching and learning (PCK and TPK) evaluation (self-evaluation included) of
– integration – select the most appropriate DER to content covered”—Diversity game
of the teach/communicate a specific subject/ animalsc
following topic (TCK) “wow, the connection to google earth is
social media – understand the potential of too much! Very interesting”—Rivers of
features: technologies in different approaches and Portugald
• links to representations of knowledge (TCK) “educational resource of high quality.
social Motivating, interactive and playful.
networks Everything a student needs to study and
such as review the biotic factors. Studying can be
Facebook, fun!”—Biotic Factorse
Google+ “tool useful for most schools that do not
and Twitter, have the laboratory equipment to perform
Instagram, these activities”—Virtual Laboratory of
Issuu, Biotechnologyf
Slideshare, “very simple material and great teaching
Wiki and power. Let’s us focus attention on the
YouTube essential aspects of the phenomenon of
• links to refraction. It gives freedom to diverse
other educational pathways and allows
sources of questioning the student about various
information aspects of reflection phenomena,
such as refraction and total reflection”—
Bank of Reflection and Refractiong
images and
an online
journal
(continued)
Table 3 (continued)
OAR data Indicators (users’ comments; available
collected information in the OAR and linked
(quality Teachers’ TPACK development pages; information provided by House
criteria) (implications) of Sciences stakeholders)

• chat to – develop the ability to use “it will not replace the practice and
talk in real technological resources in teaching and laboratory component where my students
time with learning process (TPK) will explore the materials and try all
House of Annual House of Sciences angles and materials available, but this
Sciences International Meeting allows teachers application will certainly be useful to
support to: support a theoretical or practical class
– contact with science teachers from where no one can have access to
different educational contexts and share experimental materials. I will certainly
experiences, constraints and solutions use it”—Reflection and Refraction
integrating technology (TPK) (Windle et al., 2010)
– contact with various science education “the material is interesting. I downloaded
practices integrating technology through it to prepare materials for the coming
oral presentations and posters (TPK) school year. It is time...”—Tectonic platesh
– gather shared knowledge by “very educational feature, which
collecting oral presentations and posters promotes playful and so many semi-real
presented in annual book of Abstracts learning scientific concepts and impels
(free access shared knowledge the student/player to solve the challenge
construction) (PCK, TCK and TPK) (problem) through the mobilization of
Annual House of Sciences Award knowledge and rebuilding relations/
allows teachers to: hypotheses, establishing logical
– recognise the value of teachers’ deductive reasoning between members
DER and improve its usage (PCK and and relevant aspects of the BG national
TCK) program for the 11th grade—Geology”—
– share the best science education Sands—Geology in separate partsi
practices and make them visible to all “very helpful and complements DER
science and scholar community (TPK) titled “journey through plate
– improve future DER development tectonics””—Pangeaj
(TCK) “very interesting material, the bond that
– encourage teachers to develop, share and makes music with mathematics (…) I
(re) use DER (TCK) will suggest it to colleagues who teach
(see Fig. 14) mathematics at this level”—Mathematics
Social media features allow teachers models in Musick
to: Annual House of Sciences
– increase online access to DER and International Meeting (available
promote pedagogical innovation (PCK information in the OAR and linked
and TPK) pages)
– generate opportunities to – first House of Sciences International
collaborate, discuss, evaluate, and (re) Meeting
use DERs (PCK) • 180 participants
– rapidly and massively access and • 84 communications collected in a
share DER (PCK) book of Abstracts (House of Sciences,
– access other social platforms linked to 2015a)
the OAR, accessing additional information • 9 posters available online (House
and resources (PCK and TPK) of Sciences, 2015a)
– access “in time” support and easily – second House of Sciences
dissipate doubts (chat) (TK) International Meeting
(see Fig. 15) • 334 participants
• 38 communications and 10 posters
collected in a book of Abstracts
(House of Sciences, 2015d)
(continued)
Table 3 (continued)
a
http://www.casadasciencias.org/cc/redindex.php?idart=303&gid=38127446
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
i
j
k
300
251
250
201
200 177 172
150
109
92
100 53
43 35
50 23 24 17
0
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
DER submissions Teachers participations
Fig. 14 Annual House of Sciences Award: DER submissions and teachers’ participations
Since 2010, the OAR promotes DER teachers’ development and sharing by
awarding their DER. Figure 14 shows a clear growth of DER submissions and
teachers’ participations in the Annual House of Sciences Award from 2010 to 2012
(information provided by OAR stakeholders). This public event allows to recognise
the value of teachers’ DER and improve its usage, share the best Science Education
practices and make them visible to all Science and scholar community, improve
future DER development, and encourage teachers to develop, share and (re) use
DER. Although from 2012 to 2014 DER submission and teachers’ participations
decreased significantly, in 2015 that trend changed. This may be a result of OAR
improvements. As referred in section “OAR Selection and Characterization”, in
January 2015, House of Sciences started a crowdfunding campaign to raise funds to
improve and maintain the following assets: Technology and Support—servers,
development and support; and People—payment to the five members of staff that
constitute the House of Sciences office. Since then, and as mentioned, the OAR suf-
fered several changes and improvements, namely in DER organization and dissemi-
nation, and relevant information (“Support texts” in various subjects, association of
new partners as TEA, and a list of relevant national and international Science
Education OAR) (House of Sciences, 2015c, 2015e).
700000 677362
600000
500000
400000
342718
300000
200000
100000
50042
11617 18967
6072 124 152 3472 16 102 609
0
Facebook Google+ Twitter Youtube Instagram Issuu Slideshare
Views Followers
Fig. 15 Followers and views of social networks linked to the OAR
Regarding the integration of social media features to promote OAR and DER
usage, House of Sciences includes the following linked pages to the OAR: Facebook,
Google+, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, Issuu, and Slideshare—Fig. 15. Although
some networks register a low number of followers, such as Issuu and Google+,
when analysing the number of views, these pages present a very high number. For
example, in Issuu, views represent available material readings (registering 786.445
prints). Crossing this data, we infer that, although users “don’t get involved in the
network”, House of Sciences and its material reaches and is used by several users.
From all social networks, YouTube is the one that registers a higher number of
views (677.362), enabling more than 400 videos and reaching mainly Brazilian
(80%), Portuguese (15%) and American users (5%—Mexico, USA and Colombia).
The second most accessed network is Google+, registering 317.119 images views
and 22.343 post views. Not less important, Issuu and Slideshare represent important
ways to access and share additional information and resources. For example, Issuu
enables 601 publications registering 562 shares. Besides these networks, the OAR
also offers a Wiki with 1.634 pages about Biology, Physics, Geology, Mathematics,
Chemistry, Information Sciences and Science History; a bank of more than 2.000
images that users can download and share in social networks; and an online journal,
with nine issues registering more than 1.000 Facebook and Google+ shares.
OAR Policies Dimension and Teachers’ TPACK Development
Regarding the policies dimension, the OAR complies with all the set criteria,
enabling public access to information about who can submit DER and in what
formats, and enabling public access to DER and metadata preservation policies.
OAR also enables visible contacts and institutional support. By complying with
these criteria, OAR allows teachers to feel secure in DER share and (re) use,
lowering internal barriers (e.g., beliefs and attitudes towards technology integra-
tion in educational practices). It also facilitates OAR teachers’ contribution,
promoting the adoption of new teaching and learning methodologies using
technologies.
Once DER are under platform administrators and peer review, these criteria pro-
mote a careful organization, review and presentation of contents and concepts,
assuring DER quality. FAQs, informative videos and virtual tutoring represent
important ways to support teachers, promoting the development of technological
skills through contact with new software with educational potential and new possi-
bilities to develop and (re) use DER.
In Table 4 we present how these quality criteria can influence teachers’ TPACK
development, presenting some indicators that reveal the positive impact of teachers’
usage of the OAR and DER (re) use: users’ comments related to OAR structure and
available information; DER peer review; and institutional support.
OAR Legal Aspects Dimension and Teachers’ TPACK Development
According to the adopted legal aspects dimension criteria, the OAR enables correct
and detailed information related to intellectual property preservation and author
authorization for DER distribution. The OAR also enables copyrights, identifying
software providers in case users need to download additional software to use
DER. By complying with these criteria, OAR promotes teachers’ confidence on
available DER, as well as responsibility on DER (re) use.
The fact that OAR requires DER development and share under copyright and
Creative Commons and by-sa licence under the Attribution and Share Alike terms,
it promotes teachers’ technological literacy development, helping them to under-
stand the added value of DER share and adaptation. The availability of support-
ing software helps teachers to feel more confident in DER (re) use, as well as
promoting the development of teachers’ technological skills through contact with
new software with educational potential and with new possibilities of DER
development.
In Table 5, we present how these quality criteria can influence teachers’ TPACK
usage of the OAR and DER (re) use: institutional support feedback related to users’
constraints in DER download and/or usage. For intellectual property preservation,
usage terms and DER (re) use rights evaluation, we were not able to collect any
indicators; however, we present their impact on teachers’ TPACK development
based on the Literature Review (see “Most Common European Science Education
OAR Features and Their Implications”).
Table 4 Relationship between OAR policies dimension data collected and teachers’ TPACK development
OAR data Teachers’ TPACK
collected development Indicators (users’ comments; DER peer review;
(quality criteria) (implications) institutional support)
Policies The fact that OAR OAR structure and available information
dimension registration/login and (users’ comments)
– OAR DER submission and “(…) I think the site is very useful.”—We the
provides detailed download is restricted to fantastic living things—a brief history of Evolutiona
information teachers: DER peer review
about who can – promotes security and a “I enjoyed the game, very attractive and
submit and “personal identity” for OAR motivating. However, I identified various types of
download DER and its contributors (TCK) errors (sentence construction, lack of words ...
(teachers) and in – promotes teachers’ And also scientific ones)”—Diversity game
what formats maintenance and security animalsb
– OAR using shared DER (TCK) “I really liked it. Very enlightening and with good
provides detailed – lowers internal barriers quality. However, I disagree with the statement “...
information as beliefs and attitudes and Access to the genetic code ...” that appears at the
about accepted promotes the adoption of beginning of the video”—Mitosis, chromosomes
and available new teaching and learning and kinetochoresc
DER formats, methodologies using “I liked the document graphic aspect and the
underlining and technologies (TPK) lesson plan is well structured. It seems to me,
specifying all Detailed information however, that it is a material used in a pure lecture.
materials about DER accepted and I conclude, from the reading of the lesson plan, it
regulations available formats, as well would be necessary to go asking questions in the
– OAR requires as detailed materials presentation that took the student to interact more
user registration/ regulations: in class, as well as the inclusion of a practical /
login prior to – facilitates teachers’ laboratory activity”—Tectonic platesd
DER download contribution (TCK) “I found it interesting at first: The pictures are
and submission, – improves teachers’ great; the content is correct. However, to
after evaluating contribution (TCK) manipulate it, I realized that some of the proposed
and validating DER contribution under situations seem absurd: It is no longer possible to
users’ association platform administrators directly measure the height of the tower or the
– DER and peer review promotes: width of the river, how to measure the distance
submission is – the development of between the observer and the top of the tower, or
under platform teachers’ “content between him and the point across the river. It
administrators competences”—Careful follows that, for the situation to be likely, the
and peer review organization, review and situation in which the tangent applies is the only
– institutional presentation of contents and possibility”—Trigonometric relationse
support available concepts (PCK) “‘4. Check the minimum pH and complete.’
is appropriate – assurance of DER instead of ‘4. Check the maximum value of pH
(FAQs that allow quality and safety (TCK) and finished.’”—AL2.2|11th year—Rain (normal)
users to explore Institutional support and and acid rainf
text information tutorials help teachers to: Institutional support and tutorials
and several – develop technological “the validation of calculations does not seem right!
informative skills through contact with On the perimeter, it gives the validation error in
videos, DER new software with the presented sum and in help the same amount
comments, and a educational potential (TCK) appears but with the instalments for another order!
virtual tutor— – contact and experiment In the area with the calculation it gives a validation
Real time chat) with new possibilities of error and help does not work!” (user comment)>
DER development and (re) “the material has been updated. Thank you!”
use in teaching and learning (OAR support)—Areas and perimetersg
process (TCK)
(continued)
Table 4 (continued)
OAR data Teachers’ TPACK
collected development Indicators (users’ comments; DER peer review;
(quality criteria) (implications) institutional support)
“very good. To convert not to be dependent on the
fact of whether to have internet in the classroom or
not?” (user comment)> “if you download the
material previously and carry a pen, for example,
you can use it without internet access. Note that
the material is made in flash so you must ensure
that the computer where the material appears has
an updated version of flash. The download of the
Adobe flash player can be done through our
utilities page” (OAR support)—Solar systemh
“I could not access the file. According to my
computer: Safari is unable to do so” (user
comment)> “just downloaded with safari (under
Windows) and did not have any problems. The file
is a zip with a rar file within it. To open the rar you
need the program. MAC can download at: http://
en.Softonic.Com/s/winrar-mac:Mac for Windows
at: http://www.Baixaki.Com.Br/download/winrar.
Htm to run the files in rar, you need the flash
plugin you can find on our plugins page” (OAR
support)—Biotic Factorsi
“I could not open the file” (user comment)> “the
material is a zip something heavy (490.1 MB),
almost half a giga. Make sure the download was
completed successfully. If you cannot open the zip
the problem is precisely that, you have dropped
the connection e.g. if only for a moment, it made it
impossible to complete the download. If you can
open the zip, inside it there are several types of
files and you need the programs associated with
them (video files, PDF’s, Flash’s (find the flash
plugin on our plugins page), and an executable
that you simply click to run the program)” (OAR
support)—Sands—Geology in separate partsj
“I wanted to give three stars but could only turn
one!” (user comment)> “updated (…) thank you!”
(OAR support)—Tabuadak
“the file recording system did not work on my
computer” (user comment)> “the file available for
download is a zip. Opening after the zip has an
.Air file that automatically installs the Adobe air
program, which runs the application. You may
need to install Adobe flash player, which can be
downloaded on our plugins page” (OAR
support)—Simulation aqueous solutions.
Concentration and activityl
“I could only see the slide cover and the text of the
presentation” (user comment)> “you must click on
the image. Thank you!” (OAR support)—Petrol
Chemical additivesm
(continued)
Table 4 (continued)
a
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
i
j
k
l
m
Table 5 Relationship between OAR legal aspects dimension data collected and teachers’ TPACK
development
OAR data collected Teachers’ TPACK development Indicators (institutional
(quality criteria) (implications) support)
Legal aspects Intellectual property preservation OAR software providing
dimension usage terms promote teachers’: “the download of the Adobe
– DER – confidence on available DER (TCK) flash player can be done
descriptions, brands – responsibility on DER (re) use and through our utilities page”—
and common copyright preservation (TCK) Solar systema
contents are under – technological literacy—Copyright “to run the files in rar, you
intellectual and Creative Commons license (TK) need the flash plugin you can
property DER re-use rights covered by find on our plugins page”
preservation usage Creative Commons and by-sa licence (OAR support)—Biotic
terms, and general under the Attribution and Share Alike Factorsb
national and terms allows: “find the flash plugin on our
international law – teachers to adapt DER to their plugins page”—Sands—
– DER educational practices according to their Geology in separate partsc
submission and (re) objectives and to their pedagogical and “you may need to install
use are under didactic needs (PCK and TPK) Adobe flash player, which can
Creative Commons The availability of supporting be downloaded on our plugins
and by-sa licence software helps teachers to: page”—Simulation aqueous
under the – use some of the submitted DER in solutions. Concentration and
Attribution and case they don’t have the required activityd
Share Alike terms software (TK)
and represented by – easily select and use technological
the specific logo resources in teaching and learning
– OAR allows process (TPK)
software to be – develop technological skills through
downloaded, contact with new software with
providing copyright educational potential (TK)
identifying who the – contact with new possibilities of
provider is DER development (TK)
a
b
c
d
OAR Metadata Dimension and Teachers’ TPACK Development
Analysing the OAR according to the adopted criteria, House of Sciences complies
with all the metadata dimension set criteria. All DER contain information such as
author, title, description, age range, subject, format, language, date, keywords, and
copyright. The OAR enables users to search DER, among others, by author, title,
description, age range, subject, format, language, date, and keywords. By comply-
ing with these criteria, OAR promotes teachers’ understanding of the potential of
technologies in different approaches and representations of knowledge, motivating
them to experiment with new methods of teaching and learning.
Once DER contain detailed information, it can improve teachers’ experimenta-
tion of different DER and motivate them to develop and share their own DER and
experiences. The fact that OAR enables easy search of DER increases its search
and, consequently, its usage. Search methods also promote teachers’ technological
literacy by establishing search mechanisms and techniques (e.g., select keywords,
use quotation marks to confine terms, use truncation (*), use synonyms).
In Table 6 we present how these quality criteria can influence teachers’ TPACK
usage of OAR and DER (re) use: contributors’ DER information related to peda-
gogical strategies, suggestions and additional materials that facilitate teachers’ DER
analysis, selection and usage. Regarding the search method, we were not able to
collect indicators; however, we present its impact in teachers’ TPACK development
OAR Logs and Statistics Dimension and Teachers’ TPACK Development
Regarding logs and statistics dimension, the OAR complies with all the set criteria,
offering information related to DER statistics usage and repository logged accesses.
By complying with these criteria, OAR promotes easy DER search and access,
allowing teachers to contact with several methodological approaches for the same
subject/topic, and encouraging them to implement them in their classrooms. Logs
and statistics also help teachers attenuate internal barriers (e.g., beliefs and attitudes
related to technology integration in educational practices).
In Table 7 we present how this quality criteria can influence teachers’ TPACK
development. For logs and statistics dimension evaluation we were not able to col-
lect indicators; however, we present their impact on teachers’ TPACK development
Summary of Findings
Analysing OAR quality criteria and crossing them with TPACK knowledge forms,
criteria represent critical assets in teachers’ OAR confidence and DER (re) use,
allowing them to feel secure in the adoption of DER and in the implementation of
Table 6 Relationship between OAR metadata dimension data collected and teachers’ TPACK
development
OAR data
collected Teachers’ TPACK
(quality development
criteria) (implications) Indicators (DER information contributors)
Metadata Detailed metadata Detailed metadata
dimension promotes: – “groups of 4–5 students to play against each other, which
– DER – teachers’ ultimately bring dynamism to the class. Instead of the player
contain understanding of name the students can give the group a name and put that
information the potential of name.”—Diversity game animalsa
such as technologies in – “allows the autonomous work of the students in small
author, title, different groups”—Virtual Laboratory of Biotechnologyb
description, approaches and – “besides being able to test their knowledge by completing the
age range, representations of interactive exercise, you can also watch the full cycle, including
subject, knowledge (TCK) photographs of various structures, both macroscopic and
format, – teachers’ microscopic character.”—Life cycle of Horsetailc
language, motivation to – “we present herein the planning on the theme of the theory
date, experiment new of plate tectonics.”—Tectonic platesd
keywords, methods of – “the script of the student and the teacher, an interactive
and teaching and application (SANDS—Geology in separadas.Exe parts) and one
copyright learning (TPK) PowerPoint presentation (presentation grain to grain) are
– search – teachers’ available”—Sands—Geology in spare partse
can be experimentation of – “this site offers various support materials for students and
performed different resources teachers for each of the themes (…) in each thematic cited
by author, in teaching and several study visits, field practical activities, laboratory work and
title, learning process experimental work are suggested.”—Geology, classroom to the
description, (TPK) natural environment in the western region of Portugalf
age range, – teachers’ – “it is intended for the 1 cycle of basic education, but can be
subject, motivation to share used by those wishing to train mental arithmetic.”—
format, their own resources Multiplication table of Animalsg
language, and experiences – “can be used by the student in the classroom or at home and
date, and (TPK) is intended primarily for students of the 1st cycle of basic
keywords Search method: education, although it can be useful to those wishing to train
– enables easy mental arithmetic. In the classroom, the fact of being in flash
search of resources allows use control via the keyboard and the interactive
to implement new whiteboard.”—Multiplication tablesh
educational – “in the slide presentation that says, ‘how to draw sections of a
approaches (TPK) cube’ (…) it is for students to draw upon presentation with a
– promotes marker in the case of an available board (that is, the design) such
teachers’ as a whiteboard.”—Sections in the Cubei
technological – “group work in the classroom to: Investigate existing
literacy mathematical relationships between the frequencies of the
– establishment musical notes of the tempered scale; and create mathematical
of search models (exponential and logarithmic function) with the
mechanisms and frequencies of the musical scales.”—Mathematics models in
techniques (e.g., Musicj
select keywords, – “can be used by teachers and students in primary, secondary
use quotation and higher education (…), and facilitates the understanding of
marks to confine the concepts: Solution concentration and activity (…); the user
terms, use can simulate the preparation of solutions starting from a solid
truncation (*), use solution, or by diluting a more concentrated solution (…); in the
synonyms) (TK) simulation, a help menu is available with a hypertext glossary
with information on the solution chemistry.”—Simulation
aqueous solutions. Concentration and activityk
(continued)
Table 6 (continued)
a
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
i
j
k
Table 7 Relationship between OAR logs and statistics dimension data collected and teachers’
TPACK development
OAR data collected (quality criteria) Teachers’ TPACK development (implications)
Logs and statistics dimension DER usage statistics allow teachers:
– OAR provides information related to – to easily find relevant DER (TCK)
DER statistics usage and repository logged – to contact with different methodological
accesses approaches for the same subject/topic (TPK)
– feel secure in DER (re) use (TCK)
– feel encouraged to experiment with new
pedagogical and didactic approaches (TPK)
the proposed methodological approaches. Regarding the visibility dimension and its
impact on teachers’ TPACK development, criteria can increase teachers’ access and
(re) use of various DER in educational practices, ensuring quality in the technology
integration process. It also helps teachers to understand the potential of technologies
in different approaches and representations of knowledge, allowing them to develop
the ability to integrate technology in teaching and learning process. Furthermore,
the promotion of public events to share DER and OAR evolution, as well as the
integration of social media features to promote OAR and DER (re) use, have a posi-
tive impact in DER development and sharing, improving DER usage and making it
available to the whole (Science Education) community.
Analysing the policies dimension and its impact on teachers’ TPACK develop-
ment, criteria can raise teachers’ confidence in OAR and DER (re) use, facilitating
teachers’ quality contribution once DER are under platform administrators and peer
review. These criteria also promote a careful organization, review and presentation of
contents and concepts, assuring DER quality. Regarding the legal aspects dimension
and its impact on teachers’ TPACK development, criteria can also raise teachers’ con-
fidence on available DER, as well as responsibility on DER (re) use, as well as the
availability of institutional support promotes teachers’ confidence in OAR, as well as
the development of teachers’ technological skills through contact with new software
with educational potential and with new possibilities of DER development.
Analysing the metadata dimension and its impact on teachers’ TPACK develop-
ment, criteria can promote teachers’ understanding of the potential of technologies
in different approaches and representations of knowledge, motivating them to
experiment new methods of teaching and learning. It also improves teachers’ exper-
imentation of different DER and motivates them to develop and share their own
DER and experiences. Regarding the logs and statistics dimension and its impact on
teachers’ TPACK development, criteria can increase DER search, access, and con-
sequently, (re) use, allowing teachers to contact with several methodological
approaches to the same subject/topic, and encouraging them to implement them.
From crosswise data analysis, we conclude that House of Sciences represents a sig-
nificant opportunity for Portuguese Science Education teachers to share, access and
(re) use secure and quality DER.
Considerations
In the last few years, Open Access Repositories (OAR) have gained importance in
the educational trends, stressed by the easier access and dissemination of a wide
range of relevant Digital Educational Resources (DER), simplifying DER search
and teachers’ design of pedagogical and didactic approaches. This study revealed
several aspects that must be reflected upon and explored in future studies, allowing
to stress that Science Education OAR development and availability, especially when
involving teachers in evaluation and validation processes, represent an important
tool to increase DER (re) use and the adoption of new pedagogical and didactic
approaches.
Regarding House of Sciences, we conclude that this project (the OAR and the
linked pages, as well as the public events) is an excellent tool not only to increase
DER access and (re) use, but also to help teachers’ TPACK development, support-
ing and encouraging technology integration in Science Education classrooms. It is
also an important way for Science Education teachers to interact and collaborate as
knowledge producers, specially attending to public events that recognise the value
of teachers’ DER and practices; disseminate the best Science Education practices;
and encourage teachers to develop, share and (re) use DER.
Based on the comprehensive analysis of House of Sciences and attempting to
underline availability, maintenance and updating, and enhancement requirements
for the importance of DER usage, we present a set of proposals to consider in
(future) Science Education OAR:
1. In addition to the mother tongue, always display an English-interface in other
to allow Science teachers from all around the world to access OAR and to (re)
use available DER. For that, OAR stakeholders can invite users to help translate
OAR interfaces and available DER. This is a common practice in several projects
Considerations 47
(e.g., Edmodo Translator4—platform that allow members of the Edmodo©

community to translate the platform interface; TED Translators5 / Open
Translation Project—a global volunteer effort to subtitle TED Talks and other
videos from organizations such as DO-IT). At the same time, this practice
increases users’ involvement with the OAR community;
2. Include menus in the OAR main page such as age range, subject, category and
format, to facilitate DER search, organization and access, and to promote direct
access, as spending too much time searching-finding information on DER in an
OAR can discourage its usage;
3. Normalize DER metadata according to European standards to generate interop-
erability with European (Science Education) OAR;
4. Include “Link to software” in DER features, as nowadays people use different
operating systems in their devices that could present DER compatibility
constraints;
5. Include flexible pre-models based on open source technology to produce DER,
so teachers can generate, share and download more DER, for one of the reasons
that leads some teachers to produce fewer DER is related to their complex
structure and the time spent producing them;
6. Allow social media plugins to rapidly share DER in social networks, improving
DER access and (re) use, as well as OAR dissemination;
7. Allow other social features, as group creation, forums and private chat (between
users online/registered) on OAR. Nowadays, most collaborative platforms pro-
vide features for interaction among peers, leading to a larger involvement and
participation in OAR;
8. Provide a collaborative network between students and teachers, maximizing
OAR educational potential, because when students and teachers share the same
interests and the same platforms in the teaching and learning process, sharing
ideas and information, learning process become disruptive and therefore
significant;
9. Involve Ministries of Education and/or government agencies in OAR support
and funding, so OAR can improve their visibility, structure and supply, avoid-
ing the integration of advertising as a means of financing. Cooperation between
OAR stakeholders and Ministries of Education and/or government agencies
also promotes OAR growing “side by side” with emerging technologies and
user requirements;
10. Involve Science Education experts and researchers in OAR design, develop-
ment and monitoring, so OAR can become more reliable, have a larger visibil-
ity in the international community, and become a subject for future (case)
studies, promoting their improvement and updating according to international
scenarios.
4
https://blog.edmodo.com/2011/07/27/edmodo-internationalization-become-and-edmodo-trans
lator/
5
https://www.ted.com/participate/translate
Finally, based on the results, analysis and discussion, we present two future
research proposals: (a) a comparative study between House of Sciences and an
European OAR with similar characteristics, evaluating Science Education OAR
impact on teaching practices’ improvement in different countries; and (b) a com-
parative study between a Science Education OAR for teachers and a Science
Education OAR for teachers and students, evaluating participation, interaction and
collaboration among peers, between student and teacher, and how this “co-
inhabitation” promotes and enhances the teaching and learning process, if at all.
Final Remarks
Throughout the present study, many ideas have been exchanged between the authors
and the House of Science stakeholders, to identify improvements that could be intro-
duce in the Open Access Repository (OAR). Because of these iterations, some of
the authors’ suggestions, supported mainly by the literature and their professional
and academic experience, were welcomed, namely the integration of social media
plugins (Facebook, Google+, and Twitter) in the OAR, specially in Digital
Educational Resources (DER) pages, to facilitate and promote DER share and, con-
sequently, its dissemination. Although this new integration took place in March
2016, a period not tallied in the present study (data collection took place from 12th
January 2015 till 12th January 2016), we could not forget to underline the impact of
these new features on DER share and download.
Analysing the impact of the integration of social media plugins in DER down-
loads (DER analysed in “Results and Discussion” section), since 30th March 2016
till 30th September 2016 (6 months), and crossing data with the total values of the
period of data collection (12 months), there was a significant increase of downloads,
highlighting what the literature and the authors’ recommendations emphasize. For
example, during the period of post-data collection, the most downloaded ever DER
of Introduction to Science—Solar System (a game)—registered 30 shares using the
Facebook plugin and 6 shares using the Google+ plugin, counting a total of 569
downloads in 6 months. Comparing to the period of data collection, DER counted
226 more downloads than during the 12 months of data collection. The same trend
was registered in the selected DER from the five most downloaded in the month of
Introduction to Science—We the fantastic living things—a brief history of Evolution
(a video). During the period of post-data collection DER registered ten shares using
the Facebook plugin and three shares using the Google+ plugin, counting a total of
1.165 downloads in 6 months. Comparing to the period of data collection, DER
counted 1.193 more downloads than during the 12 months of data collection.
Regarding Twitter, during the period of post-data collection none of the selected
DER registered shares using the Twitter plugin. This result, although divergent, is
supported by national studies on the use of social networks by the Portuguese popu-
lation. Although the company responsible for Twitter does not disclose official data
about Portuguese users, some studies indicate that this network still presents a low
Final Remarks 49
level of use in Portugal. One of the latest studies carried out in 2014 by the
Observatory of Communication (originally Observatório da Comunicação—
OberCom), reports that only 9% of the Portuguese population use Twitter. In con-
trast, about 98% use Facebook, and 13.7% Google+ (Cardoso, Mendonça, Lima,
Paisana, & Neves, 2014). The increased use of Facebook and Google+ reflects data
collected. During the period of post-data collection, using the available plugins, a
total of 125 Facebook shares, 97 Google+ shares, and zero Twitter shares were
registered.
Analysing this preliminary data, it is expected that the growing number of down-
loads will be a trend, as well as the number of direct shares. It is also expected that
the possibility of teachers to share DER using these plugins will promote a growing
DER usage, facilitating its dissemination and encouraging teachers to increasingly
develop, share and (re) use DER. It will certainly be an opportunity not only to
access open knowledge, but also to allow teachers to innovate and improve on their
approaches, and to promote the effective usage of digital technologies in Science
Education, motivating students for learning.
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SPRINGER BRIEFS IN EDUC ATION

Implications of Open Access

ISSN 2211-1921 ISSN 2211-193X (electronic)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017940636

© The Author(s) 2017

Printed on acid-free paper

This Springer imprint is published by Springer Nature

Being asked to write a foreword to a publication is almost always considered a

almost impossible to mention it without mentioning technology. But these (profes-

Aveiro, Portugal Luís Pedro

r­ epository and attempting to underline availability, maintenance and updating, and

Aveiro, Portugal Rita Tavares

Implications of Open Access Repositories Quality Criteria

Fig. 1 TPACK©—reproduced with permission of the publisher,

Table 1 OAR evaluation criteria adopted, TPACK forms of knowledge

Keywords Digital educational resources • Open access repositories • Science edu-

Open Access Repositories and Digital Educational Resources

© The Author(s) 2017 1

educational methodologies, therefore improving the quality of teaching and learning

Study Objectives and Methodology

 nalysis of the Prevalence of European Science Education OAR

Based on the Literature Review we analysed the prevalence of European Science

 nalysis of the Most Common OAR Features and Their

2. Online survey of OAR providing the following types of DER: presentations,

 nalysis of the Implications of OAR Usage and Quality Criteria

To analyse the impact of OAR usage in teachers’ TPACK development, we selected

 revalence of European Science Education OAR

Technological advancements such as simulations, augmented reality and virtual real-

In 2008, Learning Resource Exchange, a project involving 17 European Ministries

enabling “e-Infrastructures” in Nano- and Bio-technologies curricula, using the Virtual

Kingdom), allows students (10–18 year-olds) and teachers to access Astronomy,

In the presented studies, most teachers reported satisfaction related to finding

 ost Common European Science Education OAR Features

The Impact of OAR Usage in Teachers’ TPACK Development

Fig. 1 TPACK©—reproduced with permission of the publisher, 2012 by tpack.org

formation of content” is extremely important attending to students’ differences and cen-

OAR Selection and Characterization

Table 2 Open Access Repository features and possibilities

Impact of OAR Social Media Features on DER (re) use

 elationship Between OAR Quality Criteria and Teachers’

OAR Visibility Dimension and Teachers’ TPACK Development

DER submissions Teachers participations

OAR Policies Dimension and Teachers’ TPACK Development

OAR Legal Aspects Dimension and Teachers’ TPACK Development

OAR Metadata Dimension and Teachers’ TPACK Development

OAR Logs and Statistics Dimension and Teachers’ TPACK Development

(e.g., Edmodo Translator4—platform that allow members of the Edmodo©

Alevizou, P. (2012). Open to interpretation?: productive frameworks for understanding audience

© The Author(s) 2017 51

Chaves: AISTI Associação Ibérica de Sistemas e Tecnologias de Informação. Retrieved from

ESRC/EPSRC technology enhanced learning (pp. 33–34). London: University of London—

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