Open Educational Resources: Home

Open educational resources (OER) are freely accessible, openly licensed, and adaptable for instructional use.

OER include content such as:

• textbooks
• classroom modules
• lesson plans
• video content
• animations and simulations

Open is not just about low cost (though that is an important benefit of using OER) but about the ability to take what others have created, customize it for your specific educational needs, and then share your creation with others.

Open content is licensed in a way that grants users permission to:

Retain
Make, own, and control copies of the content (e.g., download, duplicate, store, and manage)

Reuse
Use the content in a wide range of ways (e.g., in a class, in a study group, on a website, in a video)

Revise
Adapt, adjust, modify, or alter the content (e.g., translate the content into another language)

Remix
Combine the original or revised content with other material to create something new (e.g., incorporate the content into a mashup)

Redistribute
Share copies of the original content, your revisions, or your remixes with others (e.g., post a copy of the content online for others to download)

Adapted from David Wiley's 5R permissions licensed under CC BY 4.0.

Adapted from the BCOER poster by BCcampus licensed under CC BY 4.0.