How do I even get started using OER?
Learn more about OER with the OER Starter Kit (Elder and Katz, 2020)! This publication has been created to provide instructors with the basics ideas behind the use and creation of open education resources (OER).
Modifying an Open Textbook: What you Need to Know
This is a five-step guide for faculty who want to modify an open textbook. Step-by-step instructions for importing and editing common open textbook file and platform types are included.
Open textbooks are free, online learning materials with Creative Commons licenses. Many of the collections will have links to the same books, but each will have a particular focus, and items you can't find in other collections.
As a partnership of the University Library and Health Information Technology and Services, it is the home for all things open at the University of Michigan—including expertise and services for open educational resources, open data, and open publications.
OpenStax is a nonprofit educational initiative based at Rice University that publishes high-quality, peer-reviewed, openly licensed college textbooks that are absolutely free online and low cost in print.
Collection of openly-licensed textbooks that been reviewed by faculty from a variety of colleges and universities to assess their quality. The Open Textbook Library is supported by the University of Minnesota Center for Open Education and the Open Education Network.
A non-commercial open textbook organization initiated at the University of California, Davis. Their collection is used across the nation as primary course textbooks and as supplemental learning resources.
An open-access textbook publishing initiative established by State University of New York libraries and supported by SUNY Innovative Instruction Technology Grants. They publish high-quality, cost-effective course resources by engaging faculty as authors and peer-reviewers, and libraries as publishing service and infrastructure.
Collection of open textbooks for a variety of subjects and specialties from the B.C. Campus OpenEd. The open textbooks have been reviewed by faculty, meet accessibility requirements, and/or include ancillary materials (quizzes, test banks, slides, videos, etc.).
Openly licensed images are helpful when created OER course materials, including textbooks and presentations. Below are a number of sites that feature images in the public domain or that are openly licensed. Remember to attribute the creator properly if you incorporate them into your OER. You can find more information about how to attribute items that have a Creative Commons license here.
Openverse
Flickr Creative Commons
Use license dropdown menu in search results to limit your search to images with Creative Commons licenses.
Wikimedia Commons
Media file repository of public domain and freely-licensed educational media content.
Unsplash
All of the pages you will find in this repository can be reused, modified, and shared for free; more information about the Unsplash license.
Google Images
Using the Tools function, you can sort by license type.
One of the benefits of using OER is that you have options: you can choose to adopt materials as-is, adapt materials to better meet your needs, or create new materials to share openly with other instructors.
Adopt
If there are high-quality, peer-reviewed Open Educational Resources available on your course topic, and you do not feel the need to edit or otherwise alter them for use in your course, you might consider adopting them for use "as is." Adopting is the simplest way or including OER in your course, and the least time-intensive. This is most similar to a traditional textbook adoption.
Adapt
If there are OER available on the topic your course covers, but they are out-of-date or are too broad, you may want to consider adapting the materials. After checking that the Creative Commons license attached to the materials allows for adaptation, you may choose to edit the materials to tailor them to your course.
If there are existing OER available on the topic your course covers, but no single resource that covers all the needs of your course, you may want to consider building an "OER course pack," a selection of various OER, free online materials, and websites which make up the resources for use in a course. Like traditional course packs, these sets of materials can be extremely versatile and adaptable for different uses.
Create
If there are no high-quality OER available on your topic or if you have course materials that you believe are superior to the OER available to you online, you may want to consider creating or licensing your own OER course materials. This can be as simple as openly licensing and sharing a syllabus you currently use or sharing lesson plans on OER repositories like OER Commons. Other OER creation processes, such as publishing open textbooks, can be more complex.
Right Click to view or download image
OER repositories contain more than just open textbooks. Learning materials in these collections include full courses, syllabi, images, presentations, videos, simulations, and many more.
A digital public library and collaboration platform launched by the Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education (ISKME). OER Commons allows searching by material types, educational or grade levels, and subject disciplines.
The Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching (MERLOT) provides access to curated online learning and support materials and content creation tools, led by an international community of educators, learners and researchers.
Openly Available Sources Integrated Search (OASIS) is a search tool that aims to make the discovery of open content easier. OASIS currently searches open content from 115 different sources and contains 440,380 records.
The OAPEN Library contains freely accessible academic books, mainly in the area of humanities and social sciences. OAPEN works with publishers to build a quality controlled collection of open access books.
A collection of expertly developed educational materials – including textbooks, syllabi, course activities, readings, and assessments – for 81 high-enrollment college courses. This collection was developed by the Washington State Colleges.
Because OER may vary in quality, it is important for instructors to carefully evaluate them before adopting or adapting them. In general, you want to consider the following when evaluating or reviewing an OER.
There are many different approaches to evaluating OER. Below are a variety of checklists and rubrics to help guide your evaluation process:
