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Open Educational Resources for Educators and More

  • Aug 18, 2022
  • 12 min read

“Education is inherently an enterprise of openness and sharing and generosity.”

– David Wiley

Sarah Weston – Director of Instruction & Technology – Mountain Heights Academy

License: Mountain Heights Academy: Sarah Weston Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International  Adapted by Susan Spellman Cann @sspellman cann

Counselling

OER Resources

  • Curriki includes thousands of OER materials vetted by educators and searchable by subject, grade level, and learning standard.

  • EDSITEment features OER materials for the humanities.

  • Edmodo.com use the spotlight feature

  • Gooru.org lesson plans and more. You can find full courses that can be downloaded.

  • OER Commons includes a vast collection of OER materials searchable by subject, grade level, and learning standard.

  • ShareMyLesson includes a host of “open” lesson plans.

  • Smithsonian Learning Lab features more than a million images, recordings, and texts that can be reused, shared, or adapted.

Teaching

Open Educational Resources publishing an open textbook

OER Passport

OER How To Courses

OER Content Resources

OER Building Resources

Other OER Resources

Math

  • Algebrahelp.com is a collection of lessons, calculators, and worksheets created to assist students and teachers of algebra.Algebra Help – Calculators, Lessons, and Worksheets

  • BrainNook is a new online game that helps kids develop Math and English skills while exploring the Earth and playing safely with others.brain nook

  • Calculus: A Comedy, is an awesome post from a great teacher and blogger, Shawn Cornally.Shawn Cornally

  • Construction of a Golden Rectangle using SketchUp digital photography

  • Digital Photography Resource Digital photography 

  • Estimation 180 daily estimation challenges

  • GeoGebra is a resource for teachers GeoGebra has loads of lessons and sample videos using GeoGebra.

  • Glean search for quality math and science videos on this site.

  • Graphing Calculator Desmos graphing calculator

  • Illuminations is designed to provide standards-based resources that improve the teaching and learning of mathematics NCTM illuminations

  • Math games, lessons, practice, puzzles, books (Geometry, algebra, pre-calculus) Cool Math

  • Math nrich Lots and lots of math resources from this publisher’s site (many middle and elementary resources as well)

  • Math Munchan amazing blog with new math connections, ideas, and activities daily. Inspiring love of math.

  • MPCC: Math   Open Minnesota Math Course Collection

  • Mathematics Vision Project (MVP) Mathematics Vision Project

  • NLVMThe National Library of Virtual Manipulatives (NLVM) is an NSF supported project with web-based virtual manipulatives or concept tutorials, mostly in the form of Java applets, for mathematics instruction (K-12 emphasis).

  • SketchUpSketchup

  • The Federal Government produces an immeasurable amount of data each day. DataMasher helps citizens have a little fun with that data by creating mashups to visualize them in different ways and see how states compare on important issues.Agen SBOBET

  • Visual Patterns What is the next step? Here’s step 43…what is the equation?

  • Would You Rather? “Would you Rather?” daily math challenges…usually money related.

Language Arts

  • A teacher’s guide to geniusThis educator version of an otherwise possibly inappropriate site may be more higher-ed appropriate…but the ability to annotate texts digitally, including already hyper annotated texts like Shakespeare’s plays and The Great Gatsby are worth checking out, if only as a teacher resource!  

  • Become a writer with Storybird Storybird Example: the power of friendship

  • Breaking News English is a free current events based lesson builder. New lesson every three days. All lessons are based on stories currently in the news – as the world’s news breaks, teach it.Breaking News English

  • Book track classroom listen to or create the soundtrack for your favorite books!

  • Create tag clouds Word Art Tagul

  • Dictionary, word of the day, etc .Merriam Webster

  • eeiiooVery highly rated grammar app with a modern diagramming feel. 

  • Fluency Tutor many leveled passages, students record and download. Teachers can then complete running records from recordings. Free for basic functions. Premium includes online analytics and online running record support.

  • Get a single word and 59 seconds to free write...quick and creative? http://oneword.com/

  • Google trips Literature resource using Google Maps:  google trips

  • Great site for emphasizing detail and complex sentences. Create expanding sentences: http://www.telescopictext.org/write/ and see a sample of a finished product here:Telescopic Text

  • Hemingway EditorAmazing writing review program…have students review their work here first?

  • Level It Books scans a book’s ISBN number and gets the reading/lexile level.

  • Loyal Books makes the world’s public domain audiobooks available for browsing in a visual and entertaining way./Loyal Books

  • Multi Language dictionaryElovivo

  • Primary Source Sets | DPLAPrimary source sets from the Digital Public Library of America. Super resources curated by literary work, date, topic, and more.

  • The Poetry Foundation, publisher of Poetry magazine, is an independent literary organization committed to a vigorous presence for poetry in our culture. It exists to discover and celebrate the best poetry and to place it before the largest possible audience.Poetry Foundation

  • VoiceThreadVoice Thread

Social Studies

  • Atlapedia Online contains full color physical maps, political maps as well as key facts and statistics on countries of the world. Atlapedia Online

  • American Battlefield Trustfrom a rather generic looking opening page, dig deeper to find free BattleApps for your iphone or android device, 4 minute videos on specific topics (in4), animated maps and more.

  • Ancient Egypt reference from The British Museum Ancient Egypt

  • Awesome Stories is a gathering place of primary-source information. Its purpose is to help educators and individuals find original sources, located at national archives, libraries, universities, museums, historical societies and government-created web sites. Awesome Stories

  • Bomb Sightan amazing view of the Blitzkrieg in London.

  • Digital Vaults Create a movie or poster using the National Archives Digital Vaults. 

  • DPLAPrimary Source Sets | DPLA Primary source sets from the Digital Public Library of America. Super resources curated by date, topic, and more.

  • Earth Cam provides webcam content, technology and services EarthCam

  • Games, videos, animals & pets, photos, countriesNational Geographic Kids

  • Google Arts & Culture The Google Cultural Institute includes amazing exhibits from museums re: history, art, and world wonders. Teacher tools are available.

  • Hip Hughes History includes brief, fun, explanatory vids re: government, us history, world history, civics and more. Hughes History Youtube Check the 30 second bill of rights here: The Bill of Rights — How to Remember the Amendments in 30 Seconds

  • History AnimatedHistory Animated: excellent narrated, animated maps and vids.

  • Ken Burns (PBS)Ken Burns PBS

  • Measuring Worth lots of economic tools and resources on comparing the worth of a dollar or pound (or a few other currencies) over extended periods of time, as well as many other tools and data sets.

  • Mission USMission US…a story-based interactive game about various aspects of US history.

  • Overlap Maps overlay a country, state, or body of water over another to compare sizes.

  • OER Project

  • PBS Teachers PBS learning media

  • The Library of Congress American Memory

  • The Library of Congress Library of Congress

  • The National Archives – DocsTeach DocsTeach

Science

  • An online, interactive Periodic Table of ElementsChemical Elements

  • Another Periodic TablePtable

  • Biology Popamazing resources for biology teachers.

  • ClassroomEarth is an online resource designed to help high school teachers include environmental content in their daily lesson plans.Classroom Earth

  • Computer animations of physical processes Physics Animations

  • CyberSurgeons simulation provides an authentic way for high school and college students to apply science knowledge and skills.Cyber Surgeons

  • EarthSky has science interviews and other audio and video content available via both broadcast and Internet outlets.EarthSky

  • Edufy provides a free platform to find, share, and edit high quality learning activities shared by other teachers with a focus on STEM education.Edufy

  • eSkeletonsDepartment of Anthropology at the University of Texas at Austin.

  • Glean search for quality math and science videos on this site.

  • Human Biodigital interactive, 3D anatomy tool with great graphics

  • JVSC Japanese Science and Technology Center includes some incredible video lessons in several areas, including the “Mind Lab” on perception, the “Earth Guide” regarding planetary science and geography, and “The Human Genome.”

  • Knotebooks provides users with the tools to create, collaborate on and share customized, self-guided physics lessons. Knotebooks

  • MITA Slower Speed of Light – MIT Game Lab MIT online physics game which illustrates conceptually challenging physics and math concepts.

  • Nanospace MoleculariumThe Molecularium: view, learn, and play with many different activities, molecular explorations, and more.

  • NASA Kids ClubNASA kids club games

  • Nature Lab Conservation game and many other resources from the Nature Conservancy

  • Rocket Science 101 (also apple and android apps available) NASA external flash

  • Scientific Research PublishingScientific Research: amazing resource for vetted research and access to many journals. Robust Android and Apple apps are also available.

  • Shatters The free space simulation that lets you explore our universe in three dimensions. Celestia runs on Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X. Shatters

  • Smithsonian Science Education Center | Smithsonian Science Education Center (great interactivities and more!)

  • Stellarium Full-featured astronomy application for all platforms – MacOS, Windows, Linus, plus mobile devices

  • What is fat? – George Zaidan | TED-Ed Ted Ed lesson: What is Fat?

  • Who PoopedFunny but surprisingly informational game about scat…”On the Farm”, or “In Africa.”

  • Youtube The Periodic Table of Videos Periodic Videos provides amazing slow motion science videos, and many other unique YouTube located chemistry resources.

ELL and World Languages

Music and Art

CTE

Multiple Subjects

High School and College level

  • Book on pressbooks Teaching In A Digital World 3rd edition

  • CosmoLearning has tons of courses, vids, images, units and more, all available online for free Cosmo Learning

  • Connexions open source content chunks for HS and college courses.CNX

  • Merlot, open source content resources, geared to university level courses. Could easily be used by higher level HS courses. MERLOT

  • MIT Open Courseware for High School MIT high school

  • MOOCS Coursera: Coursera , edX: EDX moocs Udacity: Udacity, Udemy: Udemy

  • Open Courseware Consortium. Another open source course resource. Again geared to College/upper high school.OCW

  • OpenLearn is the Open University…free college level courses Open Learning

  • Open Learning Initiative at Carnegie Mellon University: Independent Learning  Course

  • Open Source College Textbooks.Open textbooks

  • OpenStax resource for open source college level textbooks

  • Open Yale coursesOpen Yale Courses

  • P2PU College level course content P2PU

  • Saylor Academy has free and open college level courses.

  • Tufts Open Courseware Tufts

Middle /High School

  • CK-12 CK-12 Foundation: Exceptionally well organized and usable. Free standards-aligned and customizable educational resources. This non-profit foundation is an amazing place to start your search for open source content.

  • Curriki has f2f and online lessons and lesson plans for k-12 Curriki

  • Debategraph: visual maps on nearly any debate topic. Public, constantly growing perspectives on hundreds of topics.Debate Graph

  • Discovery Streaming: Discovery Channel content available online.Discovery ed

  • Khan Academy has a VAST collection of video lessons, practice sessions, and review activities covering math from basic addition to advanced calculus. Also includes some additional subjects.Khan Academy

  • Open Culture has just a ton of material (courses, books, movies, lessons) that is freely available for educators 1700 free online courses

  • Opened IOcatalog of educational videos, games, and assessments that you can browse by topic, grade level, or Common Core standard. 

  • Pennsylvania Department of Education Standards Aligned System Portal: Karpeles documents with e-reader, lessons, PhET simulations, and much more, aligned to the PA Common Core standardsStandards Aligned System

Elementary Level

  • ABCYa.com Educational Computer Games for kids. Amazing volume of resources for each grade level, in multiple subjects. Don’t miss the animation program!ABC ya

  • Audio and video storybooks, activities, karaoke, and much, much more for elementary students.   Learn with Homer

  • Curriki has f2f and online lesson plans for k-12 Curriki

  • FluencyTutor many leveled passages, students record and download. Teachers can then complete running records from recordings. Free for basic functions. Premium includes online analytics and online running record support.

  • K-2 Student Interactives – UEN and 3-6 interactivesUtah Education Network: lots and lots of resources and interactives.

  • Kinetic City from the American Association for the Advancement of Science provides games, activities, challenges geared to elementary students.Kinetic City

  • Opened IO catalog of educational videos, games, and assessments that you can browse by topic, grade level, or Common Core standard. 

  • Planet Nutshell Short video resources in Math, Science, Net Safety, and more. For Teachers – Planet Nutshell

  • Teacher LED Whiteboard/ipad resources for elementary and middle school. Mostly math. Some primary letter/number material.Teacher led

200 Educational Resources

Research

Determining if a Resource is OER, Creative Commons Licensed, or Public Domain

  1. Look for the Creative Commons button somewhere on the page,

  2. Look for a link to the Creative Commons website in the page’s source code (in Firefox do CTRL-U to show the source code and CTRL-F to bring up the “find” dialog – you’re looking for a link that includes the creative commons  domain and the phrase ‘rel=”license”‘), or

  3. Look around the website for the copyright or terms of use statement (hopefully this will include Creative Commons or the public domain), or

  4. If worst comes to worst, find contact info for the author and email them to ask about how the content is licensed

  5. Use the Public Domain Calculator to determine if a piece of work is in the Public Domain

Please be aware that if no copyright information is given on a resource, it is still copyrighted.  You cannot cut/paste/copy material from websites and use it on our courses unless it is OER, Creative Commons licensed, Public Domain.  If a resource is copyrighted, you can always link to it.  Linking externally to materials does not violate copyright.

Attributing Resources

All current CC licenses require that you attribute the original author(s). If the copyright holder has not specified any particular way to attribute them, this does not mean that you do not have to give attribution. It simply means that you will have to give attribution to the best of your ability with the information you do have. Generally speaking, this implies five things:

  • If the work itself contains any copyright notices placed there by the copyright holder, you must leave those notices intact, or reproduce them in a way that is reasonable to the medium in which you are re-publishing the work.

  • Cite the author’s name, screen name, user identification, etc. If you are publishing on the Internet, it is nice to link that name to the person’s profile page, if such a page exists.

  • Cite the work’s title or name, if such a thing exists. If you are publishing on the Internet, it is nice to link the name or title directly to the original work.

  • Cite the specific CC license the work is under. If you are publishing on the Internet, it is nice if the license citation links to the license on the CC website.

  • If you are making a derivative word or adaptation, in addition to the above, you need to identify that your work is a derivative work i.e., “This is a Finnish translation of the [original work] by [author].” or “Screenplay based on [original work] by [author].”

In the case where a copyright holder does choose to specify the manner of attribution, in addition to the requirement of leaving intact existing copyright notices, they are only able to require certain things. Namely:

  • They may require that you attribute the work to a certain name, pseudonym or even an organization of some sort.

  • They may require you to associate/provide a certain URL (web address) for the work.

If the resource is in the public domain, please include at attribution at the bottom of the page that specifies the URL the item was pulled from and “Public Domain”

Examples of Attributions

Example 1

Attribution: Egyptian Architecture Egyptian Architecture – Karen’s Whimsy in the Public Domain

Example 2

Saint Marie-Bernarde Soubirous (born Maria-Bernada Sobirós; 7 January 1844 – 16 April 1879), was a miller’s daughter born in Lourdes. From 11 February to 16 July 1858, she reported 18 apparitions of “a small young lady.” Despite initial skepticism from the Catholic Church, these claims were eventually declared to be worthy of belief after a canonical investigation, and the apparition is known as Our Lady of Lourdes. 

Attribution:  Bernadette Soubirous – Wikipedia.  Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. See Terms of Use for details.

Example 3

The Big Idea

The universe has many remarkable qualities, among them a rather beautiful symmetry: the total amount of motion in the universe is constant. This law only makes sense if we measure “motion” in a specific way: as the product of mass and velocity. This product, called momentum, can be transferred from one object to another in a collision. The rapidity with which momentum is exchanged over time is determined by the forces involved in the collision. This is the second of the five fundamental conservation laws in physics. The other four are conservation of energy, angular momentum, charge and CPT. (See Feynman’s Diagrams for an explanation of CPT.)

Key Equations and Definitions

Attribution:  ck12 People’s Physics Book, James H. Dahn CC-BY-SA 3.0

 
 

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