Library: Tunxis Going Open: Open Educational Resources And Open Pedagogy: Getting Started

What is OER?

OER & Equity

Open Pedagogy

Kevin Corcoran: Intro to OER
Steve Ersinghaus: Open Source Text Supplements for the Writing Course
Deb Hickox: In the Beginning...One Professor's Journey to On-line Support
Rachel Hyland: OK! Where Do I Start? Hints from Your OER Librarian

OER Slides

In a Nutshell

Open Educational Resources (OER) are "teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license that permits their free use and re-purposing by others."

From The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation

OER allow users to:

    Retain -- users have the right to make, archive, and own copies of the content
    Reuse -- content can be reused in its unaltered form
    Revise -- content can be adapted, adjusted, modified, and altered
    Remix -- original or revised content can be combined with other content to create something new
    Redistribute -- copies of the content can be shared with others in its original, revised or remixed form

Step by Step

Step one: Set aside time.
Searching for these materials takes time and persistence, just like research!

Step two: take a look to see if someone else has created a similar, complete OER course or textbook.
See the "Complete Courses" and "Complete Textbooks" sections of the "Find" tab.
Example: Go to the Open Textbook Library and browse their open business texts.

Step three: Get cozy with your learning objectives.
Instead of focusing on the textbook that you would like to replace, focus on what you would like students to know or be able to do. You will likely need to search for several materials to address different topics or components of your complete class.
Example: instead of searching for “biology” materials, search for “cell structure” or “DNA” or “evolution” materials.

Step four: Use Google “Advanced Search” to search for open resources.

Step five: Search within some of the specific OER repositories/OER search engines:
See the "Find" tab for a list.

*OER Librarian pro-tip* Use the browsing tools that the repository or search engine presents to you! Don’t rely solely on keyword searching.

Step six: Look for library materials like ebooks, articles and streaming videos to fill in gaps.
Visit the library's homepage to search our collection. See our Reference Guides for Web Resources by Subject

Step seven: Not finding what you’re looking for? Ask your OER librarian.
I’m happy to help or refer you! email: Rachel Hyland

Step seven: Consider creating and sharing your own OER.
See the "Create" tab.
Open Learn has a helpful open, modular online course "Creating Open Educational Resources"

"OER Step-by-step" by Jen Klaudinyi is licensed under CC BY 3.0