Open CourseWare and OERs
The term Open Educational Resource (OER) was first used in a UNESCO workshop on Open CourseWare in 2002. Since then both terms have been evolving in their definitions. We have used the following very basic criteria to define the search results that can be obtained by using the facility on this page:
Open CourseWare (OCW) are publicly available materials that are either a part of or a complete course usually from a higher-education institution such as a university or college.
Open Educational Resources are publicly available resources that may be used for educational purposes and have been deposited (by donation) by a variety of sources to one or more of the many online OER repositories. The range in types of material is much broader that that for Open CourseWare, from suitability for children to college students to professionals. These materials are more often smaller modules rather than complete lesson plans or complete courses.
Using the Google search field, which uses Google Custom search, will initially return all OCW and OER results from the higher-education institutions and OER repositories that we have selected and listed below. Once on the results page, you can refine your search further by selecting only OCWs or only OERs or only OCWs from certain regions.
Using the Yahoo Pipes search field, will help you find specific OCWs.
Search for OCW using Yahoo Pipes:
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The following table may be helpful:
| Find higher education material |
Yahoo Pipes |
It will take you to a direct link to the course material |
Not all OCW material can be included, most notably the Berkley webcasts are excluded AND OERs are excluded
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Find higher education material you know to be from one of the major sources of OCW (e.g., MIT)
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Yahoo Pipes |
It will take you to a direct link to the course material |
None |
| Find either OERs or OCWs |
Google Search |
It includes OERs AND OCW |
Depending on the subject being searched, returns may be overwhelming
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INSITUTIONS/SITES INCLUDED IN INITIAL SEARCH OF OCWs AND OERs
(Uses Google Custom Search; Institutions that, to COL’s knowledge, do not offer Open CourseWare are not listed)
- Australian Flexible Learning Framework (TVET)
- Brigham Young University
- Capilano University
- Carnegie-Mellon University
- China Open Resources for Education
- College of Eastern Utah
- Commonwealth of Learning (COL)
- Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation (CTO)
- Connexions
- Curriki
- Dixie State College of Utah
- Exploring Humanitarian Law Virtual Campus
- Folksemantic
- Food Security Information for Action
- Georgetown University (Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship), USA
- Glasgow University (Podcats)
- HippoCampus
- Imark
- John Hopkins School of Public Health
- Kaplan Higher Education
- Kutztown University of Pennsylvania (Small Business Development Center)
- Learning Resource Exchange for Schools
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
- Michigan State University
- Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning & Training (MERLOT)
- National Repository of Online Courses
- OER Africa
- OERCommons
- OpenLearn (The Open University UK)
- Open Training (UNESCO)
- Open University of Catalonia, Spain
- Stanford University (iTunes)
- Stanford University (School of Engineering)
- Teacher Education in Sub-Saharan Africa (TESSA)
- TU Delft University
- Tufts University
- United Nations University
- University of California, Berkeley
- University of California, Irvine
- University of Massachusetts, Boston
- University of Michigan
- University of Notre Dame
- University of Nottingham
- University of Southern Queensland
- University of the Western Cape
- Utah State University
- Utah Valley State College
- Weber State University
- Western Governors University
- WikiEducator
- Yale University
INSTITUTIONS INCLUDED IN SEARCHING FOR OPEN COURSEWARE:
(Uses Yahoo Pipes; Institutions that, to COL’s knowledge, do not offer Open CourseWare are not listed)
- University of Southern Queensland, Australia.
- Capilano University, Canada.
- China Open Resources for Education, China
- The Open University of Hong Kong, China.
- Kyoto Uinversity, Japan. Nagoya University, Japan.
- Osaka University, Japan.
- The University of Tokyo, Japan.
- United Nations University, Japan.
- Kyung Hee University, Korea.
- Delft Univeristy of Technology, The Netherlands.
- University of the Western Cape, South Africa.
- Open University of Catalonia, Spain
- Middle East Technical University, Turkey.
- The Open University, UK.
- The University of Nottingham, UK.
- College of Eastern Utah, USA.
- Dixie State College of Utah, USA.
- Georgetown University (Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship), USA
- John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, USA.
- Kaplan Higher Education, USA.
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA.
- Michigan State University, USA.
- National Repository of Online Courses, USA.
- Tufts University, USA.
- University of California, Irvine, USA.
- University of Massachusetts, Boston, USA.
- University of Notre Dame, USA.
- Utah State University, USA.
- Weber State University, USA.
- Western Governors University, USA.
- Yale University, USA.
The material from one of the sources, the Connexions OER Repository, falls under the strictest definition of OERs in that it uses the Creative Commons “Attribution” license for all of its content but, otherwise, the material is still free to obtain and reuse. The definition of the “Attribution” license is that it lets others copy, distribute, display, and perform copyrighted work — and derivative works based upon it — but only if credit is given the way it is requested.
The licensing requirements of all material and sources should be checked in order to ensure that copyright is followed. Please see www.col.org/copyright for more on copyright of educational material. |
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