Monday, April 13, 2015

The Internet minus Copyright = Open Education Resources (OERs)



Why Open Education Matters a 2 min 27 sec video by David Blake

Case:

Dr. Smith needs high quality (accurate, authoritative, current) educational content for her undergraduate courses. Right now Smith uses textbooks in each of her classes. She has carefully reviewed texts from good publishers. She is confident in the material in those she has selected and happy-enough with the organization of content. She is not happy that her students have to pay between $90 and $200 for these books.

[Wouldn't it be great if we could provide high quality content to students without the exorbitant cost? Maybe we can.]

Dr. Smith heard that some of her colleagues had replaced their textbooks with open educational resources (OERs).  She learned that OERs are teaching and research resources that are published with an "open license" to be used and shared, for free. She asked her librarian and instructional designer for help. Together they found a rich collection of materials that substituted nicely for her text books. Her students are happy. And Dr. Smith is pleased that she is using excellent content in a variety of formats (e-books, articles, videos, interactive web activities).
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Scholars and educators around the world have begun to recognize that they will have a larger impact if they share their content rather than if they hold onto it. You may be able to find OERs that suit your instructional needs, at one of the many repositories of OER content. And what about all the great content you create?

Resources:
An OER Handbook from WikiEducator
TideWater CC offers a zero textbook cost ("Z") degree in Business Admin
9 Videos, each under 5 mins, from Edutopia's Why Open Education Matters video contest




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