ABSTRACT
The development work is usually done by a fairly close-knit central team, somewhat on Open University pattern. The demands of adaptability impose two main constraints on the types of materials which can be produced in higher education on the basis of this model. More localised counterparts of type of approach can be found in some of the recently-established staff development programmes which involve groups of specialist teachers from various institutions, and in the work of relatively few existing teachers’ centres in higher education sector. The Open University has in a remarkably short time established itself as an institution with much to offer to those concerned with curriculum development in higher education. The special problems which it had to tackle, of teaching-at-a-distance, gave rise to a series of innovative techniques. Experience in developing unit structures is relevant to those colleges who have adopted a consecutive pattern, and particularly those who are amalgamating with a polytechnic which already has a modular system.
