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Heritage University OER (Open Access Resources): Finding OER

New LibGuide for OER (Open Access Resources)

Finding OER

OER Logo

Textbook Collections

Top Picks:

OpenStax College
"We
 publish high-quality, peer-reviewed, openly licensed college textbooks that are absolutely free online and low cost in print.”

Open Textbook Library
Textbooks in the Open Textbook Library are considered open because they are free to use and distribute, and are licensed to be freely adapted or changed with proper attribution.

MERLOT Open Textbook
Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching (MERLOT)
is a curated collection of free and open online teaching, learning, and faculty development services contributed and used by an international education community.

More Options:

BC (British Columbia) Campus OpenEd
“At BCcampus, we’re using open technologies to facilitate, evaluate, and create open educational resources to share across the province and around the world; saving millions of student-dollars.” through hundreds of open textbooks adopted in thousands of classrooms

Directory of Open Access Books, All Academic, peer reviewed publishers,  browse by subject

Galileo Open Learning Materials
“GALILEO Open Learning Materials brings together open educational resources throughout the University System of Georgia, including open textbooks and ancillary materials.”

Intech Open Books
“We pride ourselves on our belief that scientific progress is generated by collaboration, that the playing field for scientific research should be leveled globally, and that research conducted in a democratic environment, with the use of innovative technologies, should be made available to anyone.”

Open Textbook Library
"The Open Textbook Library provides a growing catalog of free, peer-reviewed, and openly-licensed textbooks."

Taylor & Francis Open Access Books
      “At Taylor and Francis we’ve been publishing open access journals since 2006, and in 2013 we complimented it               with our Open Access Book program”.

Textbook Equity
"Barriers to education, whether intentional or not, by policy or price, decays humanity."


Old and Really Old Textbooks

Internet Archive Open Library, Textbook Search, supported by California State University

OER Search Engines

 

Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB) 

"The primary aim of DOAB is to increase discoverability of open access books. Academic publishers are invited to provide metadata of their open access books to DOAB." 

 

    

"Real-time federated search for OER content"

A real-time federated search for OER content across 20+ collections. Rather than searching static databases, it  launches a real-time, simultaneous search across more than 20 OER collections including OER Commons, OASIS, MERLOT, and OpenStax..

The downside of real time federated searching is that MOM is often slower than other search engines..

 

Openly Available Sources Integrated Search (OASIS)

A solid search tool seeking to make open content more discoverable.  It currently searches content form over 115 different sources and contains nearly 400,000 records.

Recipient of the OER Curation Award for Excellence, 2019.

 

             OER Commons
              A search engine developed by the Creative Commons tied to internet-based OER.  Provides venues for creation and collaboration with                  colleagues around the world

 

Open Research Library (ORL)

Plans to include all Open Access book content worldwide on one platform for user-friendly discovery, offering a seamless experience navigating more than 14,000 Open Access books.

 

 

Linked OpenCourseWare Data Faceted Search

This integrated and incremental search engine was established by universities in Spain and Ecuador.  As such it has more Spanish language resources than other collections.

 

              “Open Educational Resources from Leading Colleges and Universities”

This resource is designed primarily for those teaching undergraduates.  High -quality content is provided by faculty and curated by                          librarians.  The collection includes textbooks, course materials, lectures, lesson plans, multimedia, lectures, as well as K-12 materials.                    The site is hosted on the robust Digital Commons platform.

 

 

Major Repositories

Khan Academy
“Students practice at their own pace, first filling in gaps in their understanding and then accelerating their learning. Created by experts, Khan Academy’s library of trusted, standards-aligned practice and lessons covers math K-12 through early college, grammar, science, history, AP®, SAT®, and more. It’s all free for learners and teachers.  With Khan Academy, teachers can identify gaps in their students’ understanding, tailor instruction, and meet the needs of every student. .”—from the website

Merlot System 
“Provides access to curated online learning and support materials and content creation tools, led by an international community of educators, learners and researchers.”—from the website

OER Commons
“The worldwide OER movement is rooted in the human right to access high-quality education. This shift in educational practice is not just about cost savings and easy access to openly licensed content; it’s about participation and co-creation.”—from the website

Major Courses and Courseware

Coursera--
“Every course on Coursera is taught by top instructors from the world’s best universities and educational institutions. Courses include recorded video lectures, auto-graded and peer-reviewed assignments, and community discussion forums.”—from the website

edX
“There are three commitments we've made to the world. We've been grounded by these since day one:  Increase access to high-quality education for everyone, everywhere.  Enhance teaching and learning on campus and online.  Advance teaching and learning through research.”—from the website

Khan Academy
“Students practice at their own pace, first filling in gaps in their understanding and then accelerating their learning. Created by experts, Khan Academy’s library of trusted, standards-aligned practice and lessons covers math K-12 through early college, grammar, science, history, AP®, SAT®, and more. It’s all free for learners and teachers.  With Khan Academy, teachers can identify gaps in their students’ understanding, tailor instruction, and meet the needs of every student. .”—from the website

MIT Open CourseWare 
“The idea is simple: to publish all of our course materials online and make them widely available to everyone.” Dick K.P. Yue, Professor, MIT School of Engineering.”—from the website

OER Commons

"Full University Courses.  This collection highlights some of the complete courses indexed on OER Commons--231 affiliated resources

Saylor Academy
“A nonprofit initiative working since 2008 to offer free and open online courses to all who want to learn.”—from the website