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E. H. Butler Library, Buffalo State, The State University of New York

ALMI: Open Educational Resources (OER)

What is an OER?


Open educational resources (OER) are content, assessments, or complete curriculum that reside in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license that permits repurposing by others. Courses using OER provide students with a cost-effective, more readily accessible alternatives to traditional textbooks. The majority of materials linked to below reside in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license that permits repurposing by others.

Searching for OER's

  • OASIS
    OER search tool developed by SUNY Geneseo.
  • Creative Commons Search Tool
    This search tool allows you to search for Creative Commons content based on the way that you want to use the content. You can search using Flickr, Fotopedia, Google, Google Images, YouTube, and SoundCloud.

Open Courses

  • Lumen Learning
    Lumen Learning publishes open courses to make it easier for faculty members to adopt and teach with open educational resources (OER). This site offers CC BY-licensed open courses in 30+ high-enrollment subjects across many disciplines. Open courses are effectively a complete textbook replacement. Each course includes a complete set of OER-based readings and sample assessments. Subject areas include: Mathematics, Science and Technology, General Education, Developmental Education, Business, Education.
  • Saylor Academy
    Peer-reviewed open courses including videos, readings, quizzes. Saylor partners with many different institutions to create open courses. Subject areas include: English, Business, Economics, Art, Sciences, Communication, Computer Science, Engineering, Web Development, Geography, History, Math, Political Science, Microsoft Office, Research Methods, Psychology, Sociology and Literature
  • Open Learning Initiative
    Carnegie Mellon open courses. Subject areas include: Anatomy and Physiology, French, Biochemistry, Engineering Statistics, Health Information, Biology, Chemistry, Psychology, Logics and Proofs, Media Programming, Computing, Probability and Statistics, STEM Foundations.
  • Open Course Library
    The Open Course Library (OCL) is a collection of shareable course materials, including syllabi, course activities, readings, and assessments designed by teams of college faculty, instructional designers, librarians, and other experts. Some materials are paired with low cost textbooks ($30 or less). Many of the courses can be taught at no cost to students. Unless otherwise noted, all materials are shared under a Creative Commons (CC BY) license. Subject areas include: Accounting, Anthropology, Art, Astronomy, Sign Language, Biology, Business, Chemistry, Communication, Drama, Economics, English, Literature, French, History, Geology, Humanities, Research, Mathematics, Music, Nutrition, Oceanography, Philosophy, Physics, Political Science, Psychology, Sociology, and Spanish.

Open Access Repositories (OAR)

  • Open SUNY Affordable Learning Solutions 
    Connected to MERLOT to search for and find OER. Provides information and resources for incorporating OER into courses.
  • Merlot 
    Merlot is a curated collection of free and open online teaching, learning, and faculty development services contributed and used by an international education community. Many subjects. You can search by keywords and content type. Many items are peer reviewed.
  • The Orange Grove 
    A repository of open content: textbooks, entire courses, and other items. Content areas include Business and Consumer Science, Communication and Information, Education, Engineering and Technology, Health Science, Humanities, Mathematics, Professional, Career and Technical, Science, Social Science, and Visual and Performing Arts.
  • OER Commons 
    This is a repository with 73,000 kinds of OER, along with tools for creating OER, training on how to use OER and the ability to create OER.
  • Open Education Consortium 
    The Open Education Consortium is a worldwide community of hundreds of higher education institutions and associated organizations committed to advancing open education and its impact on global education. A variety of resources including courses and webinars. Subjects include: Arts, Applied Sciences, Computer Science, Geography, Health and Medicine, History, Humanities, Language, Mathematics, Natural Sciences, Religion, Social Sciences.

Evaluating an OER

Open Textbooks

  • Open SUNY Textbooks
    Open SUNY Textbooks is an open access textbook publishing initiative established by State University of New York libraries. Subject areas include: College Writing, Academic Foundations, Nursing, Information Literacy, Assessments, Web Development, Humanities, Biometrics, Mathematics.
  • Open Textbook Library
    Open Textbook Library's books have been reviewed by faculty from a variety of colleges and universities to assess their quality. These books can be downloaded for no cost, or printed at low cost. All textbooks are either used at multiple higher education institutions; or affiliated with an institution, scholarly society, or professional organization.
  • OpenStax College
    OpenStax College offers students free textbooks that meet scope and sequence requirements for most college courses. the texts are peer-reviewed. You can adopt a text or modify it to suit your teaching approach. Free online and low-cost in print. Subject areas include: Physics, Sociology, Biology, Physiology, Statistics, Pre-Calculus, Economics, and coming in early 2015 Chemistry, U.S. History, Psychology.
  • The Global Text Project
    The Global Text Project publishes electronic texts for students in the developing world. It also maintains a database of links to books for such students. Global Text Project books have been internationalized and converted to a standard format using OpenOffice. You can access individual chapters and modify them. Subject areas include: Business, Computing, Education, Health, Science, Social Science.
  • 2012 Book Archive
    Archive of a small project by Andy Schmitz to archive Creative Commons-licensed copies of all the books which were available online from a specific publisher at the end of 2012. That publisher is a textbook publisher, focusing on (mostly entry-level) college textbooks. Subject areas include: include Business, Writing, Economics, Sociology, History, Math, Political Science, Literature, and Science.
  • Flat World Knowledge
    College textbooks for many subjects. Students can purchase books in multiple formats for less than traditional texts. Subject areas include: Business and Economics, Humanities and Social Sciences, Mathematics, Sciences, and Professionals and Applied Sciences.
  • College Open Textbooks
    You can search Open Textbook Content by subject. You can also create custom books using this content. Students can purchase an ebook, bound books, color bound books for less than traditional textbooks. Subject areas include: Anthropology and Archeology, Languages and Communications, Art, Law, Biology & Genetics, Literature, Business, Math, Chemistry, Music, Computer Science, Philosophy, Economics, Physics, Education, Political Science, Engineering & Electronics, Psychology, English & Composition, Science, Health & Nursing, Sociology, History, Statistics & Probability.
  • Online Textbooks MIT
    Some of these online textbooks are open-licensed electronic versions of print books. Others are self-published online books, or course notes which are so thorough that they serve as an alternative to a conventional textbook. Subject areas include: Aeronautics and Astronautics, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Engineering Systems Division, Foreign Languages and Literatures, Materials Science and Engineering, Mathematics, Mechanical Engineering, Media Arts and Sciences, Physics.
  • Open Textbook Store
    Open textbooks for a variety of math courses.

Quizzes and Other Resources

  • My Open Math
    Hosts interactive math problems and activities that can be used as self-study for students, or interactive homework for faculty to include in their course. Courses include Pre, Beginning and Intermediate Algebra, Pre Calculus 1, Calculus 2, and Trigonometry.
  • Learning Pod
    The Learning Pod hosts a library of online practice questions relating to OpenStax textbooks.
  • Khan Academy
    Khan Academy contains instructional video lectures. All of the site's materials and resources are available to you completely free of charge. The content covers math, science topics such as biology, chemistry, and physics, and even reaches into the humanities with playlists on finance and history.
  • PhET Interactive Simulations
    The PhET Interactive Simulations project at the University of Colorado Boulder creates free interactive math and science simulations. PhET sims are based on extensive education research and engage students through an intuitive, game-like environment where students learn through exploration and discovery. All simulations available at http://phet.colorado.edu are open educational resources available under the Creative Commons Attribution license (CC-BY).
  • iTunesU
    Audio and video downloads from various educational institutions including Duke, Stanford University, Harvard, MIT, and UC Berkeley.
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