Sibren Fetter, Open Universiteit Nederland, The Netherlands
Adriana J. Berlanga, Open Universiteit Nederland, The Netherlands
Peter B. Sloep, Open Universiteit Nederland, The Netherlands

ABSTRACT

Traditionally, the Open Educational Resources (OER) movement has focused on the production, distribution, and retrieval of open content. There is, however, more to OER than the resources alone. For OER to function properly, underlying communities are needed to support learners and teachers in the use, development, and dissemination of OER. A central question is how learners and teachers can be supported in their use of OER, while at the same time building up and sustaining the needed community. These support and community formation aspects are especially important in a non-formal context. Peer-support is claimed to be ideal for providing encouragement as well as building up of a community. In this chapter, an explanation is given of peer support in a non-formal learning context, called Ad Hoc Transient Groups. These help to foster collaboration in OER networks. Based on this concept, the chapter presents the design of a stakeholder-validated peer support service. Some related work pointing out how peer support for non-formal learning with OER can be best organized is then given.