This document discusses e-learning and open educational resources (OER). It begins by providing context on the origins of OER through the MIT OpenCourseWare project in 2001. It then discusses how OER are part of the open access movement and have been adopted by many institutions. The document examines definitions of OER and questions concepts like what makes resources open and educational. It also outlines some of the major OER repositories and barriers to producing and using OER. Finally, it provides examples of how OER are used in online courses and MOOCs.

1. E-Learning and OER
(Open Education Resources)
Mokhtar BEN HENDA
Bordeaux Montaigne University
30 October 2019

2. Overview
OER first issued by MIT
OpenCourseWare project
(2001)
 Making the materials used in
the teaching of MIT's
available on the Web
 Free and open digital
publication of high quality
college and university‐level
educational materials.
 Free and openly licensed,
accessible to anyone,
via the internet

3. OER, a filiation with Open access movement
 2001: OERs are part of a philosophy of
open and sustainable community of
practice, transdisciplinary, organized in a
network with reference frames, rules and
objectives;
 OERs have been adopted by many
institutions and international
UNESCO, OECD, WB, William Foundation
and Flora Hewlett Sun Microsystems, etc.
 2007: OER became an independent
Movement:
 Tens of official documents,
conventions, agreements… are
published to strcture the field of OER

4. Strong ties with the Open access movement
 OERs are part of a worldwide Open
Initiatives movement:
 Open Source Movement (softwares),
 Open Access (scientific production)
 Open Content (content creation),
 Open data (free data)
 Open science (sharing any kind of output)
 Open Publishing (online editing)
 Open innovation (anti-patent)
 …
Open
source
initiative
1998
Open
content
Initiative
1998
Open
Initiative
2001
Creative
Commons
2001
(ccLearn
2007)
Open
educational
resources
2002

5. OER: abundant officila litterature

6. Definitions: looking for coherence
"Digital materials freely and
openly offered to educators,
students and self-learners for use
and reuse for teaching, learning
and research" (OECD, 2007, p.10)
This definition does not distinguish between
resources that have an associated license
governing their use (usually Creative Commons)
and resources that do not. It is therefore
susceptible of ambiguity.
 OECD Definition, 2007
OECD (2007). Giving Knowledge for Free: The Emergence of Open Educational Resources. Paris: Centre for
Educational Research and Innovation, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

7. Definitions: looking for coherence
Domains
Media
Licence
Atkins, Brown & Hammond (2007). A Review of the Open Educational Resources (OER) Movement: Achievements, Challenges, and New Opportunities. Report
to The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation
Typology
"OERs are teaching, learning
and research materials using
any media, in the public
domain and distributed under
an open license allowing access
to such resources and their use,
adaptation, re-use and re-
broadcasting by others without
restrictions or with a minimum
of restrictions "(Atkins, Brown
& Hammond, 2007)Usages
 Unesco definition: 2012

8. OER: Questionning the concept
O.E.R.: a strong condensed of
ambiguous values (pb of
borders, porosity)
 Open: what makes them
« Open »?
 Education: how are they
educational?
 Ressource : what is a ressource?
Concept in search of coherence
beyond the 5Rs by David Wiley
(to Retain, to Reuse, to Revise,
to Remix and to Redistribute):

9. How OER are Resources?
First, they are independant training
material (ressources)
 Text, graphics, Audio, Video
Then « Learning Objects »
Now, « Educational Ressources »
 OERs include whole course
materials, modules, manuals,
streaming videos, tests, software
and other tools, materials or
techniques used to support
to knowledge,

10. How OER are Resources?
Typology OECD, 2007
OECD (2007). Giving Knowledge for Free: The Emergence of Open Educational Resources. Paris: Centre for Educational Research and Innovation, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

11. How OER are Educational?
 However, OER can be anything used as a
teaching material (obtained from the web or
from the real world):
 A political Speech, a statue, a chair, a Youtube movie
 A laboratory experience, a book of medicine,
 The shoe of an emperor,
 Anything …
Clio CJS, 2009
CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
Pixabay, 2010, C0
Process Arts 2001
Youtube Satndard

12. How OER are Educational?
 The shoe of Mary
Antoinette, Queen of
France the day when she
was slaughtered
 Could be an OER in a
historical course or in a
leather mnufacturing
industry

13. How OER are Open?
 OER are under Creative Commons licences: no
strict legal reason not to divide the block content
according to its parts;
 Creative Commons are licenses that enable authors to
authors to give away their work for free while protecting
their rights
 Copyright is generally considered an integrated set
of several exclusive rights:
 Reproduction,
 Adaptation,
 Distribution,
 Translation,
 Projection,
 Reformatting, etc.

14. Creative Commons

15. How OER are Open?
Other open licences
 Free Art License (meeting Copyleft Attitude, Paris
in 2000);
 GNU Free Documentation License, 2002;
 Common Documentation License (Apple, 2001);
 Open Music Licenses (GPL en musique) : Green,
Yellow, Red;
 Design Science License (2001-2002) Copyleft
pour les medias works;
 The Open Content License, 1998;
 Open Publication License, 1998 (lecture seule);
 EFF Open Audio License, GNU GLP pour la
musique.

16. OER genealogy

17. OER repositories to know
 BCampus Open Textbooks : This site lists open textbooks organized by subject area, many of which have been peer reviewed for their
suitability at community colleges.
 Lumen Learning : This OER-focused company provides open courses with "zero textbook cost." Their curriculum comes with all the
OER students will require.
 MERLOT II: The California State University System's collection of slightly more than 45,000 resources is rated, peer-reviewed and
tallied by how many "personal collections" each resides in. It lists more than 3,000 open textbooks, some of which have accessibility
information for students with disabilities.
 MIT Open Courseware Online Textbooks: MIT's library of online textbooks is one of the few sources for OER on aeronautics, civil
engineering and material science, among many other disciplines.
 OER Commons: This digital hub created by the Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education offers 73,000 kinds of
OER, along with tools for creating OER, training on how to use OER and the ability to create OER "Commons" — groups that share
resources for a given purpose.
 Open Course Library: Managed by the Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges, this content is organized by
course.
 Open Education Consortium: The Open Education Consortium is a community of 240-plus schools as well as organizations and
people who want to advance the idea of "open education." It features an OER resource toolkit, webinars, in-person events and links
open textbooks.
 Open Learning Initiative: Carnegie Mellon's (PA) open courses (and associated content) denote a marked emphasis on STEM,
including computing.
 OpenStax CNX: This is Rice University's (TX) "open space," where educators have stashed thousands of learning objects that can be
or are already organized into books. It is also the parent of OpenStax College.
 Open Textbook Library: textbooks that have been funded, published, and licensed to be freely used, adapted, and distributed.
 Orange Grove: Open Courseware, Open Textbooks, 3d object models, learning modules, and videos.
 SUNY Open Textbooks: openly licensed textbooks and courses written and curated by SUNY Faculty.

18. Open Educational Resources (French)
 BNEUF: offers access to all documentary,
pedagogical, scientific and cultural resources
offered by Francophonie actors around the
world.
 L’Université numérique: association (law
1901) composed of 8 French thematic digital
universities (UNT)
 FISCALITÉuqtr.ca: Open Educational
Resources of the Université du Québec à Trois-
Rivières

19. OER in Vietnam
 Ha Noi, 28 September 2016: second International
Conference on Policy Advocacy on OER
development in higher education in Viet Nam:
 Organized by the University of Social Sciences and
Humanities under the Vietnam National University Ha
with support from UNESCO
 Participants:
– Viet Nam’s Open Educational Resources (OER)
Community
– Vietnamese universities, Union of Libraries, research
research centers and Information Technology (IT)
corporations
– University of Social Sciences and Humanities,
– Vietnam Open Educational Resources and the National
National Center for Research and Development of Open
Open Technologies (RDOT)
 Recommendations
– Need for political will from the highest level of the
Government and active response from the grassroots
grassroots levels.
– Representatives of 26 organizations included educational
educational institutions, research centers, library
associations and IT corporations signed the
Memorandum of Understanding to promote OER in Viet
in Viet Nam.
http://www.un.org.vn/en/unesco-agencypresscenter1-100/4199-viet-nam%E2%80%99s-open-educational-resources-oer-community-call-on-action-to-promote-oer-in-higher-education-in-viet-nam.html
http://www.unescobkk.org/news/article/access-to-knowledge-
and-open-educational-resources-at-the-heart-of-national-
debates-on-international

20. Barriers to Produce and Use
 Survey findings from 9 Asian countries :
 Lack of awareness
 Lack of skills
 Lack of time
 Lack of hardware and software
 Lack of access to computers
 Lack of ability to locate specific, relevant , and quality OER for their specific
teachings
 No reward system for staff members devoting time and energy
 Lack of interest in pedagogical innovation amongst staff members
 No support from management level
(Dhanarajan & Porters, 2013)

22. OER scenarios of use

23. OER In Online Courses
 Teachers no longer have to provide their
students with outdated information found in
textbooks.
 OER provide open licenses for the use,
repurposing and dissemination of a myriad of
education resources
 OER is not synonymous with online learning
or e-learning
 e-learning courses may use OER, but this
does not mean that OER are necessarily e-
learning
 OER are extensively used in MOOCs

24. OER in MOOCs
 MOOCs are within the context of
the open education movement
 MOOCs serve hundreds &
thousands of students
worldwide:
 MOOCs allow using OER content in
open teaching and learning
contexts
 MOOCs & OER make knowledge
publicly accessible at large scale
 MOOCs helps opening content to
students not on campus or not
formally enrolled
 MOOCs helps sharing and
collaborating at distance on OER
with other practitioners