Introducing OER

"Open Educational Resources (OER) are learning, teaching and research materials in any format and medium that reside in the public domain or are under copyright that have been released under an open licence, that permit no-cost access, re-use, re-purpose, adaptation and redistribution by others." UNESCO

OER can be: full courses, learning objects, tests or any other tools, materials, or techniques for use in teaching, learning, and research:

Course material, textbooks, videos, lessons plans, software, games and podcasts.

Acknowledgements:

BCcampus. BCOER Poster

UNESCO. Open educational resources 

William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. Open education

Advantages of OER include:

Costs: The reduction in costs is a major benefit of OER but they're also much more flexible than commercial textbooks.

Immediate and continued access: Students can access OER anywhere in the world, at any time, provided they have a stable internet connection. This includes both before courses start and after courses end.

Enhancement of regular course content: You can use different types of materials, including multimedia, to help engage students. OER can be useful supplementary material when students need background information or are interested in extending their knowledge.  

Adaptability: You can add, remove and edit content to suit your needs. If you're using an OER textbook you don't need to worry about using the whole book to justify the cost to students.   

Increased diversity: You can use a selection of resources to include a wide range of perspectives, such as Indigenous voices, and/or edit resources to ensure language is inclusive and relevant to your students.    

Dynamic: OER can be quickly edited at any time without needing to wait for a new edition or going through a lengthy review process, increasing the timeliness and relevancy of resources  

The “5 Rs” is a framework that encourages educators to capitalise on the unique rights associated with open content. These rights include the ability to:

• Retain: Make and own copies of the work (e.g., download, duplicate, store, and manage)

• Reuse: Use the work in a wide range of ways (e.g., in a class, in a study group, on a website, in a video)

• Revise: Adapt, modify and translate the work (e.g., translate the content into another language)

• Remix: Combine it with another resource to make a new work (e.g., incorporate the content into a mashup)

• Redistribute: Share the work with others (e.g., give a copy of the content to a friend)

These rights, or permissions, are made possible through open licensing. For example, Creative Commons open licences help creators of OER retain copyright while allowing others to reproduce, distribute, and make some uses of their work.

Acknowledgements:

David Wiley. Defining the 'open' in open content and open educational resources

There are many misconceptions about OER. Below we address some of the most common misunderstandings surrounding these open resources. 

Myth 1: OER simply means free

We access free content on the internet every day that is free to read, watch or listen to. But what is the difference between free content and open content? Open does mean free, but is more than that. Most free online materials still have some restrictions on use and copying, so modifying and redistributing them may infringe copyright. Open means that users can download, edit and share educational materials with others without restrictions.

Myth 2: All OER are digital

OER can be a printed book, a video, software or any form. Although most OER usually begin as digital files, they do not need to remain digital to be accessed and shared. For example, an open textbook can be read on screen or printed. Similarly, digital files can be converted to PDFs and printed out. The format of the OER is not important but the ability to access, adapt and reuse material is.

Myth 3: Free = low quality

OER can be both free and of high quality. For example, there are many steps in place to ensure that open textbooks are of the same, or better quality than commercially produced textbooks. Many are produced with rigorous editorial guidelines and peer-review processes, and many OER repositories allow faculty to review the material. Some studies have found that students achieve the same or better learning outcomes when using OER rather than commercial textbooks. (Hilton, J. (2020) Open educational resources, student efficacy, and user perceptions: a synthesis of research published between 2015 and 2018. Educational Research  and Development. 68, 853-876. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11423-019-09700-4.  See also the Open Education Group web site for further updates. )

Myth 4: Copyright for OER is complicated

OER are open because they have been given an open licence by their author to allow anyone to freely download, edit and share the content. An open licence is a simple legal way for authors to retain their copyright whilst allowing others to retain, reuse, revise, remix and redistribute their work. These open licences are called Creative Commons (CC) licences and you do not need to be a legal expert to use them. Authors simply choose a CC licence, which come in varying degrees of openness, and include a copyright statement in their work to inform others what CC licence it has. For more information take a look at the Licensing section of this toolkit.

Acknowledgements:

SPARC. OER mythbusting