Exploring Open Educational Resources: A Comprehensive Guide

Open Educational Resources (OER) are revolutionizing the landscape of education by providing accessible, adaptable, and affordable learning materials. These resources, ranging from open textbooks to interactive simulations, offer a wealth of opportunities for educators and students alike. This article delves into the world of OER, exploring various examples, benefits, and resources available to support their adoption and implementation.

Understanding Open Educational Resources

Open Educational Resources (OER) are teaching, learning, and research resources that are either in the public domain or have been released under an open license. This allows for their free use and re-purposing by others. The core principle behind OER is to provide equitable access to high-quality educational materials, removing financial barriers and fostering innovation in teaching and learning.

The 5R Permissions

David Wiley defines OER Related Pedagogy as the set of teaching and learning practices only possible or practical when you have permission to engage in the 5R activities. These permissions are:

Retain: The right to make, own, and control copies of the content.
Reuse: The right to use the content in a wide range of ways.
Revise: The right to adapt, adjust, modify, or alter the content itself.
Remix: The right to combine the original or revised content with other material to create something new.
Redistribute: The right to share copies of the original content, revisions, or remixes with others.

Types of Open Educational Resources

OER encompass a wide variety of materials that can be used to support teaching and learning. These resources can be stand-alone tools, or they can be combined to create entire courses.

Open Textbooks

Open textbooks are typically authored by faculty and published on the web with the support of universities or new commercial companies. This model enables free online access to textbooks. Open textbooks offer a cost-free alternative to traditional textbooks, decreasing financial burden and ensuring equitable access of resources for all students. Moreover, OERs are free to reuse and remix (edit), allowing improved alignment of the textbook to a specific course.

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Examples of open textbook initiatives include:

British Columbia's Open Textbook Collection: Showcases innovative work with open textbooks.
Five College Calculus Project: Offers a free online calculus textbook.
Linn-Benton Community College (Oregon): Provides open textbooks, course shells, and more from faculty.
WhatCom Community College (Washington State): Offers open textbooks.
Lyryx: Provides high-quality open textbooks in accounting, mathematics, and economics.
Rice Connexions: Provides peer-reviewed, quality open textbooks with interactive components.

OpenCourseWare (OCW)

OpenCourseWare (OCW) is a free and open digital publication of high-quality college and university-level educational materials. These materials are organized as courses and often include course planning materials and evaluation tools, as well as thematic content. MIT OpenCourseWare is a well-known example.

Learning Modules

A learning module is a tool that provides course materials in a logical, sequential order, guiding students through the content and assessments in the order specified by the instructor. Instructors can insert formatted text, files, web links, discussion topics, assignments, tests and quizzes, and soon, assessments. Content can be structured to require students to complete content before proceeding. Instructors can also set up a place for students to add content to the learning module.

Streaming Video

Streaming video is content sent in compressed form over the Internet and displayed by the viewer in real-time. With streaming video, a Web user does not have to wait to download a file to play it. Instead, the media is sent in a continuous stream of data and is played as it arrives. The user needs a player, which is a special program that uncompresses and sends video data to the display and audio data to speakers.

Open Access Journals

Open access journals provide free, immediate, online availability of research articles combined with the rights to use these articles fully in the digital environment. Open access is the needed modern update for the communication of research that fully utilizes the Internet for what it was originally built to do-accelerate research.

Read also: Online Science Learning at Doane

Online Tutorials

An online tutorial is a self-study activity designed to teach a specific learning outcome. They are usually delivered via a course management system but can also be made available via the Internet or on a DVD. Recorded tutorials are video or screencast recordings, typically of a subject expert presenting information and ideas or giving a demonstration. Interactive tutorials are a structured collection of navigable web pages. Individual pages can contain any combination of text, images, audio, video, self-test questions, and other interactive activities. Because of the benefits they offer, online tutorials are becoming commonplace within both programs of learning and on a number of support service web sites.

Digital Learning Objects

Digital learning objects are small, modular, discrete units of learning designed for electronic delivery and use. To facilitate reuse with a minimum of effort, a learning object is "packaged" to include a lesson, an activity, and an assessment. The most reusable learning objects will have a learning outcome that is concrete and fundamental to a broad range of courses.

Examples of repositories with digital learning objects include:

Applied Math and Science Educational Repository: Contains learning materials, software, data, and models for teaching quantitative skills in undergraduate biology courses.
Learning objects and lessons from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Other OER Examples

Videos
Images
Course modules
Lectures
Homework assignments
Quizzes
Lab and classroom activities
Games
Simulations
Research Assignments

Benefits of Using OER

The adoption of OER offers numerous advantages for students, educators, and institutions.

For Students

Reduced Costs: OER materials are freely accessible, meaning no cost to students. This results in a more equitable course, as all students, regardless of their financial situation, have access to the same materials from day one. Students are skipping purchasing textbooks due to the cost and are choosing between buying food and textbooks. A surprisingly large percentage of students report having skipped meals in order to afford their textbooks. Students facing food insecurity skip buying textbooks more than the average student.
Increased Retention and Student Success: Students can access materials on the first day of class or prior to, eliminating the need to borrow from classmates, illegally download, or drop courses due to an inability to afford materials.

For Instructors

Improved Alignment: OERs are free to reuse and remix (edit). This allows improved alignment of the textbook to a specific course.
Customization: OER provide an opportunity for instructors to customize content for their courses.
Streamlined Access: OERs can be integrated into Canvas and accessed easily. Students do not need to get access through a paywall, so there are fewer technical difficulties.
Support: Support is available to build or adopt OER for your course. You can author an OER, whether that be an entire textbook, or a single chapter, worksheets, illustrations, videos, etc.

Finding and Evaluating OER

Several resources can help educators discover and evaluate OER for their courses.

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OER Search Engines and Repositories

OER Commons: A helpful place to begin searching for existing OER that you may want to use or adapt for your course.
Creative Commons Search Engine: Lets you search for resources that are CC licensed.
Open Education Consortium: An organization dedicated to advancing open education globally.
MERLOT (Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching): A curated collection of free and open online learning materials.
Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ): A directory of open access journals across various disciplines.
Smithsonian Open Access: You can download, share, and reuse millions of the Smithsonian’s images.
Saylor Academy: Offers complete courses composed of mostly open materials that can be copied and adapted for free.
Lumen Learning: Offers partnering with institutions to manage and adapt resources for courses at a cost to students.
HippoCampus: A project of the Monterey Institute of Technology and Education (MITE), is full of high-quality resources in a variety of subjects.
WeBWorK: An open-source online homework system for math and science courses.
WA Open Course Library project: Offers 81 of Washington's most enrolled courses.
OpenStax CNX: Rice Connexions is providing peer reviewed, quality open textbooks with interactive components.
Internet Archive: Find the full text of classics and public domain works from the first massive ebook creating organization in existence.

Evaluation Criteria

When selecting OER, consider the following criteria:

Accuracy: Ensure the content is accurate, up-to-date, and aligns with current research.
Relevance: Verify the material is relevant to the course objectives and learning outcomes.
Clarity: Assess whether the content is presented in a clear, concise, and understandable manner.
Accessibility: Confirm the resources are accessible to all students, including those with disabilities.
Licensing: Understand the licensing terms and ensure they align with your intended use.

Implementing OER in Your Course

Integrating OER into your course can be a seamless process with the right planning and support.

Steps to Implement OER

Explore and Evaluate: Identify potential OER that align with your course objectives.
Adapt and Customize: Modify the resources to fit your specific needs and teaching style.
Integrate into Course Design: Incorporate the OER into your syllabus, assignments, and assessments.
Provide Access: Ensure students have easy access to the OER through your learning management system or course website.
Solicit Feedback: Encourage students to provide feedback on the effectiveness of the OER.

Support and Resources

University Libraries: Libraries can support you in finding OERs and have information on OER specifics.
Teaching Centers: Teaching Centers offer consultations on the pedagogical considerations of OERs.
Provost’s Standing Committee on OER: Can offer resources and support throughout the process.
Nancy Tannery Grant for OER: Provides funding for faculty to adopt, adapt, or author OER for use in a Pitt course.

Syllabus Statement

You can offer this information in your syllabus (and be sure to define what an OER is!).

Course Designation

You can designate your course as OER or no textbook required on PeopleSoft, so that students can see this designation when looking up courses.

Pitt OER Repository on OER Commons

Consider also listing OERs you have authored or adapted on the Pitt OER Repository on OER Commons.

OMET Student Feedback Surveys

Consider also offering a question on your OMET student feedback surveys to prompt your students to reflect on your use of OER.

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