Open Educational Resources

Interested in making your teaching materials available as OERs?

There are four major ways designate materials as OERs:

• OER generation sites (such as MERLOT)
  (use the site's platform to format your content)

• OER collection sites (such as MERLOT, OER Commons)
  (upload materials in a shareable format, such as Microsoft PowerPoint, or link to materials already posted online)

• institutional repositories (such as DigitalCommons@EMU)

• social networking sites (such as YouTube)

There are some considerations to keep in mind as you create OERs*:

1. Make your materials reusable, and preferably customizable, by using a Creative Commons license.
   
   The Creative Commons site has a license generator that will provide the html or text for materials.
   
   Microsoft has an add-on for marking documents with specific Creative Commons licenses.


2. Upload in formats that are editable (html, rtf, png) rather than in formats that are difficult to modify (pdf).


3. Add the URL to any hyperlinks so the information is not lost if the user prints the material.


4. Make the materials accessible to all users. Use large fonts and add captions to images and videos.


5. Keep slang and regional colloquialisms to a minimum.

*From "Democratizing Access to Knowledge: Find Out What Open Educational Resources (OER) Have to Offer," by Michael B. McNally, CC BY-3.0