Open Educational Resources

Open educational resources (OER) are teaching, learning, and research materials in any medium that are freely available and openly licensed, allowing you and your students to access and use them in your courses for free. OER include textbooks, curricula, syllabi, lecture notes, video, audio, simulations, assessments, and any other content used in education (ELI 2018).

Have you considered incorporating OER into your courses? Use of OER reduces cost for students and ensures all students have access to course materials from day one, thus breaking down barriers to access and affordability. As an instructor, using OER allows you to choose the most current, meaningful content and customize materials to your specific course learning outcomes.

Check out this video for a brief overview of OER and research on their effectiveness:

To get started using OER, we encourage you to visit Educause’s Open Educational Resources page, which provides some key resources for understanding and integrating these resources into your courses as well as links to OER repositories. Prefer to talk to someone in person? Contact an Instructional Technology staff member to set up a consultation.

We also invite you to two events we are hosting on the topic of OER in the coming weeks:

Reference

“7 Things You Should Know About Open Education: Content.” 7 Things You Should Know About Open Education: Content, ELI, June 2018, https://library.educause.edu/resources/2018/6/7-things-you-should-know-about-open-education-content.

Event Cancelled: Disruptive Innovation via Open Education Resources

CANCELLED: Baraniuk talk and events
We regret to announce that the Wednesday, March 26 talk by Richard Baraniuk, “Disruptive Innovation via Open Education Resources,” and all related events are cancelled.  The speaker, Richard Baraniuk, has fallen ill and is unable to travel to Austin tomorrow.
Please feel free to query the Center for Teaching Excellence if you have any questions.

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Build your Classroom Technology Toolbox

On September 24, Instructional Technology held a tech snack focused on free tools for classroom use.

What types of technology do you use in your classroom?

Do you need your students to complete their assignments with certain types of software? You can create your own technology toolbox  from cloud-based tools that are free to use and can benefit students both during the course and after. If you need training for yourself or your students on any of the software that is listed, please contact training@stedwards.edu with your request.

Classroom Management, Collaboration, and Productivity:

Social Bookmarking and Personal Research:

Web Based Presentation Tools

Free E-Books and Other Open Educational Resources

Website Development