Open Educational Resources (OER)
Acknowledgment
Material in this guide is reused and adapted with permission from the OER guide by the Office of Information Literacy at University Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
OER Adoption Tools & Resources
OER adoption resources
- Modifying an Open TextbookDetails six basic steps to modifying and hosting an existing open textbook or other OER
- OpenStax CNX: Localization and OERAn overview of localization, which refers to the process of taking educational resources developed for one context and adapting them for other contexts (i.e., how to make OER content usable and adaptable to meet your local needs)
Note: this was reused and adapted from Kirkwood Community College Library's guide on open textbooks.
Authoring tools in OER repositories
If you have found OER to adapt or remix, you should first check to see if there are any built-in authoring tools available from the repository where you found the OER. Here are tutorials of authoring tools in various OER repositories.
- OER Commons: Open AuthorIf the OER were 1) originally composed by Open Author in OER Common, and 2) have been given use licenses that allow for their editing and remixing, you may use the "remix this resource" option to copy and edit an Open Author resource.
Other possible OER edit/publish tools
Free tools to create/adapt OER:
Documents
Images
Audio
Video
eBook publishing
Also, see a list of free and/or open source OER Tools that you can use to create, adapt or remix OER of different types, curated by the Empire State College's library.
Note: OER Authoring Tools guide, created by Sarah Morehouse is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.
Sharing Existing Learning Objects
You probably have already created potential OER and just haven't thought about them as resources you might be able to share! OER take the shape of different resources, including (but not limited to):
- Syllabi and courses created (for example, if you created a class on WWI Literature, it might be useful for others to see your assigned readings and activities)
- Videos/ tutorials on a specific topic
- Worksheets
- Group activities
- Writing prompts
- Tests, quizzes, and other assessments
- Lesson plans
- Research assignments and activities
If you'd like to share one of your learning objects as an OER, think about the following:
- Decide where they might go (general or disciplinary repository)
- Find out what the requirements are for them to go there. Do they need to be in a specific format? What metadata entry is required?
- Rank/ evaluate your OER. What level is it intended for? What’s the language use (very technical or introductory)? Can you add instructions/ tips on how you used it?
- Craft metadata for the object. What terms can you use to make your OER more discoverable?
- Licensing! Look at the CC website to decide what’s right for you. What are your intentions for the object?
- If you are remixing several OER which were published under different licenses, use the Creative Commons License Compatibility Wizards to help you determine whether there will be compatibility issues.
- Refer to CC attribution guide and write appropriate citations for resources you used. The suggested citation format is: [Title] by [Author], used under [CC BY License]