1.3: OERs in Teaching

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Sources of OER

There are many ‘repositories’ of open educational resources; however, when searching for possible open educational resources on the web, check to see whether or not the resource has a Creative Commons license or a statement giving permission for re-use. Some may believe it to be common practice to use free (no cost) resources without worrying unduly about copyright, but there are risks without a clear license or permission for re-use. For instance, many sites, such as OpenLearn, allow only individual, personal use for non-commercial purposes, which requires providing a link to the site for students rather than integrating the materials directly into your own teaching. If in any doubt about the right to re-use, check with your library or intellectual property department.

Types of OER

Open textbooks

Firefly Blank pages flying into and hovering over an open book open on a desk with light coming from (2).jpg Textbooks are an increasing cost to students. Some textbooks cost $200 or more, and in North America a university undergraduate may be required to spend between $800-$1,000 a year on textbooks. An open textbook on the other hand is an openly-licensed, online publication free for downloading for educational or non-commercial use. You are currently reading an open textbook. There is an increasing number of sources for open textbooks, such as OpenStax College from Rice University, and the Open Textbook Library at the University of Minnesota, and the B.C. Open Collection in British Columbia.

Open research

Governments in some countries such as the USA, Canada and the United Kingdom are requiring all research published as a result of government funding to be openly accessible in a digital format.

Commercial publishers, who have dominated the market for academic journals, are understandably fighting back. Where an academic journal has a high reputation and hence carries substantial weight in the assessment of research publications, publishers are charging researchers for making the research openly available. This acts as a incentive for researchers to publish in less prestigious open journals without having to pay to get published.

However, it can only be a question of time before academics fight back against this system, by establishing their own peer reviewed journals that will be perceived to be of the highest standard by the quality of the papers and the status of the researchers publishing in such journals. Once again, though, open research publishing will flourish only by meeting the highest standards of peer review and quality research, by finding a sustainable business model, and by researchers themselves taking control over the publishing process.

Open data

In 2004, the Science Ministers of all nations of the OECD, which includes most developed countries of the world, signed a declaration which essentially states that all publicly funded archive data should be made publicly available. Following an intense discussion with data-producing institutions in member states, the OECD published in 2007 the OECD Principles and Guidelines for Access to Research Data from Public Funding.

The two main sources of open data are from science and government. In science, the Human Genome Project is perhaps the best example, and several national or provincial governments have created web sites to distribute a portion of the data they collect.

Again, increasing amounts of important data are becoming openly available, providing more resources with high potential for learning.

How to use OER

Despite the challenges, teachers and instructors are increasingly creating open educational resources, or making resources freely available for others to use under a Creative Commons license. Repositories or portals where faculty can access open educational resources have matured over the years, increasing the likelihood that professors will be able to find the resources that best suit their particular teaching context.

There are therefore several choices:

take OER selectively from elsewhere, and incorporate or adapt them into your own courses;
create your own digital resources for your own teaching, and make them available to others (see for instance Creating OER and Combining Licenses from Florida State University);
build a course around OER, where students have to find content to solve problems, write reports or do research on a topic;
take a whole course from OERu, then build student activities and assessment and provide learner support for the course.

Learners can use OER to support any type of learning. For instance, MIT’s OpenCourseWare (OCW) could be used just for interest, or students who struggle with the topics in a classroom lecture for a credit course may well go to OCW to get an alternative approach to the same topic.

The Finding OERs section of this open textbook will provide further details and resources for finding and using OERs.

Consider: Deciding on OER

Have you used OER in your own course(s)? Was this a positive or negative experience?
If you have not used OER, what is/are the main reason(s)? Have you explored to see what is available? What is the quality like? How could they be improved?
Under what circumstances would you be prepared to create or convert your own material as OER?

Interactivity and OER

As we've discussed, OERs are not just an open license replacement for a textbook, but a way for educators to rewrite what a textbook can deliver. Platforms such as H5P, as seen within LibreStudio, provide educators a way to use, cite, and even create interactive media as OERs.

H5P serves as a potent tool for educators, offering the capability to craft interactive and engaging content. This content, spanning presentations, quizzes, and interactive videos, among other types, can be seamlessly embedded into OER textbooks or even used as a standalone OER. It allows for embed, similar to how services like YouTube, providing educators the ability to even use H5P directly in an LMS such as Canvas. The adaptability and customization features of H5P enable educators to tailor content to align precisely with specific learning objectives, fostering a more interactive approach to teaching and learning within an OER.

A noteworthy aspect of this integration is the emphasis on accessibility, as H5P enables the creation of content adhering to accessibility standards. The resulting OERs are inclusive and accommodate a diverse range of learners. In asynchronous online learning environments, educators can use features within H5P to create real-time feedback mechanisms within H5P content, such as quizzes that check for understanding to help bridge topics and break away from more passive media consumption within a course.

The open licensing options provided by H5P resonate with the ethos of OER, facilitating the sharing, remixing, and reuse of content within the broader educational community. This collaborative dimension is reinforced by H5P's community or as we use it within Western Washington University through LibreStudio's collection, where educators and developers share their creations, fostering a culture of collective innovation.

An example of H5P below, sourced from LibreStudio, is a word search on terms involved in OERs. Drag your mouse to highlight words that you find.

For more on interactivity and H5P in OERs, see our OER Tools & Development open textbook.

References

Falconer, I. et al. (2013) Overview and Analysis of Practices with Open Educational Resources in Adult Education in Europe Seville, Spain: European Commission Institute for Prospective Technological Studies

Green, C. (2013) Open Education, MOOCs, Student Debt, Textbooks and Other Trends Vancouver BC: COHERE 2013 conference

Hampson, K. (2013) The next chapter for digital instructional media: content as a competitive difference Vancouver BC: COHERE 2013 conference

Hilton, J., Wiley, D., Stein, J., & Johnson, A. (2010). The four R’s of openness and ALMS Analysis: Frameworks for open educational resources. Open Learning: The Journal of Open and Distance Learning, 25 (1), 37–44

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Consider: Deciding on OER