Open Educational Resources

Open Educational Resources are freely licensed materials that can be used for learning and teaching. They must be:

• Licensed in a way that allows use – usually under specified conditions – without infringing copyright
• Accessible to a wide range of users
• Independent of specialist software
• Capable of being adapted for use in other contexts.

Open Educational Resources are copyrighted but they are licensed to the academic community to use and re-purpose under conditions specified by an open licence such as Creative Commons. 

Advantages of using OERs

There are many advantages of using OERs. Below are some of them:

• Save time in preparing new resources
• Offer a wide range of resources on a specific topic
• Meet the needs of different learners
• Provide access to materials produced by subject experts and leading educators
• Meet high standards of accessibility and usability, and are free from copyright constraints
• Can be modified for different purposes, or incorporated into new resources
• Are supported by useful contextual information
• Can be used as sources of new ideas and approaches in education.

OER resources

The OER industry is expanding rapidly with some universities placing large amount of material online. View the resources below.

• Open education consortium
• Jorum repository – UK
• Merlot – USA
• Xpert OER search site – University of Nottingham

External resources

Have a look at more resources that explain what OERs are.

• Introducing OERs – University College London
• Open Educational Resources – The Open University
• OER resource guidelines – OSIER project