Based in South Africa, Siyavula was launched in 2008 with the purpose of offering curriculum-aligned open educational resources (OER) to teachers across all grades, subjects, and learning areas. Siyavula resources include a comprehensive set of workbooks and teacher's guides, in English and Afrikaans, covering grades R-9 for all learning areas. Also included are advanced mathematics and physical science course materials, covering grades 10-12. The project aims to facilitate and sustain teacher engagement around OER by providing targeted professional development workshops and social networking tools.
ISKME, as the researcher for this project, conducted research on Siyavula’s activities and those of its teacher users to increase understanding of factors that contribute to the creation, use and localization of OER within the South African teaching and learning context. In doing so, ISKME sought to inform the implementation of the Siyavula project and to contribute to an emerging model of professional development and social networking supports around open educational resource use, reuse and community building.
