There are many reasons why people deliberately look for open resources when searching for materials. Resources with open licences can provide valuable and interesting additional or primary teaching materials, or the basis for a workshop or study group, at low- or no-cost. Within a variety of situations OER can provide content where there was none previously available or replace expensive proprietary material (for example textbooks, where cost savings can be an important motivating factor in OER adoption).
OER can be utilised at short notice and do not require payment or permission for their use. Open materials can often be modified to suit your specific context, so you can create unique resources based on others’ expertise. Some OER are produced by well-known institutions or shared by educators who are experts in their subject. In addition, resources are often peer-reviewed by others online or during their production process, when OER are produced at scale (as in the instance of open textbooks, see OpenStax College for one example).
Whilst the outcomes of using OER are important motivators for their use, there are also potential impacts on educator practice. Some of the possible changes in practice are implicit in in this summary on reasons for using OER produced by Glasgow Caledonian University:
Research conducted by the OER Research Hub on the impact of OER found that educators are better able to accommodate diverse student needs and can be more experimental in their teaching approaches. They are not restricted to using specific resources and can develop their own materials from existing resources or find resources that they are not able to create themselves or which have interesting ways of conveying points. Open resources might provide inspiration and ideas when developing one’s own resources or expose one to different practices or approaches.
Using OER and engaging in more open practices can yield a range of institutional benefits. A JISC-funded study supplemental Good Intentions by McGill, Currier, Duncan and Douglas (2008) maps a range of stakeholder aims against different ‘sharing’ strategies, including an ‘open’ option. The open approach was described as having the potential to have ‘significant impact’ on nine out of a possible 15 ‘benefits for educational institutions’ (with ‘possible’ or ‘some’ impact possible in the remaining six areas):
‘Openness’ therefore has the potential to raise standards, increase engagement and widen participation. For example, OER Hub collaborative research revealed that 32 per cent of learners using The Open University’s OpenLearn platform felt that their use of OER on the site influenced their decision to register for their current course of study (N=934). Research by Wiley, Hilton III, Ellington & Hall (2012) revealed that implementing the use of open resources according to the ‘successful model’ they developed as part of their two-year research study, can offer institutions significant savings when compared with the use of proprietary materials.
Open and Public Domain resources enable you to reuse materials without asking permission as long as you attribute their source and the type of licence the resource carries. OER can also change your practice by enabling you to access and rework materials, experiment with them and tailor them to your needs.
However, there are also possible questions and concerns regarding OER use. OER Mythbusting by the OER Policy for Europe project addresses the main concerns, including the quality of resources, compatibility with the curriculum, sustainability and time.
Read two of David Wiley’s blog posts, ‘Evolving “open pedagogy”’ and ‘The real threat of OER’, which look at unravelling open practice within the context of teaching and the reasons educators use OER, respectively. As David notes at the start of ‘Evolving…’ the key question to consider is:
‘What can I do in the context of open that I couldn’t do before?’
Now that you have read David’s posts, look back at your reflective log notes from earlier in the course, review your notes on how and why you share and what kinds of practices you consider to be ‘open’. Now consider the following questions:
Write down your responses in your reflective log.
OpenLearn - 2 Why use open practices and resources? Except for third party materials and otherwise, this content is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 Licence, full copyright detail can be found in the acknowledgements section. Please see full copyright statement for details.