Full Description
Best Practices in Designing Courses with Open Educational Resources is a practical guide that assists faculty and institutions looking to adopt and implement open educational resources (OER) and to foster meaningful, effective learning experiences through the course design process. Chapters loaded with tips, case examples, and guidance from practitioners advise readers through each step necessary for sustainable OER initiatives, from preliminary planning and course redesign through teaching, learning, and faculty development.
Written by two authors with direct experience in training higher education professionals to use OER, this is a comprehensive resource for faculty, instructional designers, course developers, librarians, information technologists, and administrators hoping to rethink and refresh their curricula by moving beyond traditional textbooks. An authors' website expands the book with resources, templates, and examples of implementation models, including faculty development workshop OER materials that can be adopted by readers.
Contents
Part I: Overview
Chapter 1: Introduction to OER: What's It All About?
This chapter introduces the broad landscape of OER in higher education, providing some definitions and an overview of current trends and issues. It also identifies the key role faculty play in the OER movement and lays out the reasons why design is an essential element for an effective teaching and learning experience with OER.
Chapter 2: Before You Begin: the OER Essentials
This chapter provides a comprehensive step-by-step guide for how to distinguish between the different OER permissions for adoption, attribution, and reuse; how to find OER, including the use of resource collections and discipline-specific sites; and how to evaluate OER using appropriate standards and criteria.
Part II: Course Design
Chapter 3: Adopting, Adapting, and Authoring
This chapter uncovers the process for adopting OER and compares it with the process of creating your own OER content. We examine options for curating and distributing OER, ranging from free and open to paid and closed platforms. The chapter also examines how to make the most of OER when using a digital format or a learning management system (LMS).
Chapter 4: Plan Out Your Course with OER
This chapter offers an OER course planning document for faculty to plan out their course redesign, utilizing the backward design approach. We will explore the organization of course content and examine the elements that define a learning unit's structure, as well as special considerations for OER in the course design process. This chapter also discusses how to evaluate OER for accessibility and presents some tips for making content accessible.
Chapter 5: Designing with Student Engagement in Mind
This chapter focuses on course design techniques for OER that increase student engagement, contribute to better retention and recall, and provide a foundation for higher-order thinking. We suggest some practical strategies for creating opportunities for students to interact with and respond to learning content. Faculty can structure learning paths by means of intentional design strategies, whether they teach online or face-to-face.
Part III: Teaching and Learning
Chapter 6: Teaching with OER
This chapter offers insights into the experience of faculty teaching with OER, providing practical tips and recommendations for getting the most out of OER. We also explore the potential benefits to both faculty and students and how OER can enhance the teaching and learning experience.
Chapter 7: Learning With OER: Student Voices in OER
This chapter explores student perspectives and experiences with OER. It discusses approaches to introducing students to OER and creating learning opportunities to support their success, including engaging students in the curation and creation of OER when appropriate.
Part IV: Scaling Up
Chapter 8: Support and Planning
The chapter provides an overview of support systems needed to ensure effective OER implementation. Successful and sustainable OER initiatives require a unified effort and continuous support from various units involved in teaching and learning and course design, along with effective collaboration with faculty.
Chapter 9: Faculty Development
This chapter offers several models to prepare faculty to adopt, adapt, or create OER, ranging from single events and consultations, to year-long fellowships and grants, to an intensive online faculty development program. We make the case for faculty development for OER that includes the fundamentals of online course design.
Chapter 10: Challenges and Possible Solutions
This chapter provides an overview of common barriers and possible solutions for institutional and individual faculty adoption of OER, ranging from issues related to accessibility and technical implementation of OER to incentives and recognition of OER use and development.
