Overview
This guide provides open educational resources (OER) that can be used in learning experiences for specific disciplines.
Explore the guide to discover OER from Deakin, Australia and around the world, that could be applied to your teaching.
What are Open Educational Resources (OER)?
Open Education Resources (OER) are educational materials available for free use and adaption under an open sharing licence (eg. Creative Commons) or are free from copyright restrictions (i.e. the public domain) that can enrich the Deakin teaching and learning experience.
OER can be textbooks, teaching and learning materials, images, videos, games, lesson plans, worksheets and assessments.
Transforming learning and teaching
With the ability to combine multiple media formats, such as text, video, activities, quizzes, questions and summaries, OER transform learning experiences. Format flexibility and fusibility ensure OER are interactive and engaging, allowing learners to explore theoretical content, test their understanding and reflect on their learning.
What can I do with OER?
Open content is licensed in a way that grants users the permission to:
Retain
The right to make, own and control copies of the content
Reuse
The right to use the content in a wide range of ways (e.g. in a class, in a study group, on a website, in a video)
Revise
The right to adapt, adjust, modify or alter the content itself (e.g. translate the content into another language)
Remix
The right to combine the original or revised content with other open content to create something new (e.g. incorporate the content into a mashup)
Redistribute
The right to share copies of the original content, your revisions or your remixes with others (e.g. give a copy of the content to a friend)
This material is based on original writing by David Wiley, which was published freely under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence at: Defining the "Open" in Open Content and Open Educational Resources.
Why use OER?
There are many benefits to using OER, such as:
No restrictions
Learners have 24 hour access to OER with no restrictions. This means learners can use OER as scholarly resources even after graduating from Deakin.
Save costs
The price of resources (such as academic articles and textbooks) has skyrocketed over time. OER solve this problem because the material is freely available online and can be used forever.
Better outcomes
Studies show that 93% of students who use OER learn as well or better than those using traditional materials, since they have easy access to the content relevant to their studies.
Adapted from Open Educational Resource benefits by SPARC Europe CC BY 4.0