Curriculum Explainer

Open Educational Resources (OER): Overview and Definition

By Sarah D. Sparks — April 12, 2017 4 min read
  • Save to favorites
  • Print

As long as there have been teachers, there has been sharing: binders of lesson plans, boxes of laminated hand-drawn math games, even recycled scraps of art projects. But with the advance of the internet and particularly online social platforms like YouTube and Pinterest, the ability to develop, share, and adapt even complex curricular materials has exploded.

From Coursera’s free college classes to EngageNY’s common-core curriculum materials to physicist Henry Reich’s Minute Physics cartoons, educational materials are available at every scale online. But what makes a particular set of materials “open,” and how can schools best use these materials?

What are open educational resources?

Open educational resources are materials for teaching or learning that are either in the public domain or have been released under a license that allows them to be freely used, changed, or shared with others.

OER may include everything from a single video or lesson plan to a complete online course or curriculum and also include the software platforms needed to create, change, and share the materials.

How is OER different from other online materials?

Many materials billed as OER do not technically fall into that category. For example, a video that has a creative commons license might not necessarily be open; the agreement may instead allow it to be freely used but not altered or repurposed, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s 2015 study of OER. Other materials allow sharing and modifications but only within a paid subscription service. That would also not be considered OER.

That does not mean OER has to be completely nonprofit. To make ongoing OER projects sustainable, some have allowed companies to offer organized “playlists” or other curated packages of materials for a fee. Other projects, such as the SciShow series on YouTube, allow donations through patronage websites such as Patreon and Subable.

Also, because there are many different types of open licenses, OER users must be careful of the fine print about how the material can be reused, adapted, or distributed.

What does federal education law say about open educational resources?

The Every Student Succeeds Act highlights “openly licensed content” in its definition of digital learning, noting that such resources can strengthen students’ educational experiences.


See Also: Special Report: Navigating New Curriculum Choices
In this special report, Education Week focuses on helping educators navigate an increasingly diverse marketplace of new—and often promising—curricular choices.


The law explicitly allows states to use federal block grants provided by Title IV to support local projects aimed at “making instructional content widely available through open educational resources, which may include providing tools and processes to support local educational agencies in making such resources widely available.”

And beginning in fiscal 2018, the U.S. Department of Education will require a majority of its competitive-grant winners to openly license any final products created with the money—such as teacher professional-development units, curricula, or any other copyrightable materials, as well as the supplemental materials needed to use them. The departments of Labor and State and the National Science Foundation have similar requirements for some of their grants.

“However, the open-licensing rule is now delayed, as the Trump administration is rethinking most rules put into place under the Obama administration.

How are open educational resources used?

The vast majority of districts that use open materials include them as formal or ad hoc supplements to an existing curriculum or program. For example, teachers may use an open lesson plan online to add an enrichment activity for students or to provide additional practice for students struggling with a concept. A teacher with a limited science lab might use open online videos to craft demonstrations of classic experiments. Users have downloaded some or all of EngageNY, the Empire State’s open library of materials aligned with the Common Core State Standards, more than 45 million times.

Some schools and districts, such as the Houston public schools, have curated collections of open materials into a single digital library to make it easier for teachers to find specific lesson plans or materials for their grade level and subject.

And a handful of districts, including one in Grandview, Wash., are moving away from traditional textbooks entirely in some subjects and instead creating digital curricula made up only of open resources. These can be updated as new materials come in, but they require significant commitment to review and catalog materials for teachers.

What are the potential downsides of using open educational resources?

Because anyone can create and distribute an open resource, individual states, districts, and even teachers generally decide whether any given OER is high quality and appropriate to a particular grade, subject, or group of students. The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics warned that OER can create equity problems if different schools within the same district use materials of different levels of quality.

Events

This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Reading & Literacy Webinar
The Future of the Science of Reading
Join us for a discussion on the future of the Science of Reading and how to support every student’s path to literacy.
Content provided by HMH
This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
College & Workforce Readiness Webinar
From Classrooms to Careers: How Schools and Districts Can Prepare Students for a Changing Workforce
Real careers start in school. Learn how Alton High built student-centered, job-aligned pathways.
Content provided by TNTP
Student Well-Being Live Online Discussion A Seat at the Table: The Power of Emotion Regulation to Drive K-12 Academic Performance and Wellbeing
Wish you could handle emotions better? Learn practical strategies with researcher Marc Brackett and host Peter DeWitt.

EdWeek Top School Jobs

Teacher Jobs
Search over ten thousand teaching jobs nationwide — elementary, middle, high school and more.
View Jobs
Principal Jobs
Find hundreds of jobs for principals, assistant principals, and other school leadership roles.
View Jobs
Administrator Jobs
Over a thousand district-level jobs: superintendents, directors, more.
View Jobs
Support Staff Jobs
Search thousands of jobs, from paraprofessionals to counselors and more.
View Jobs

Read Next

Curriculum How Digital Games Can Help Young Kids Separate Fact From Fiction
Even elementary students need to learn how to spot misinformation.
3 min read
Aerial view of an diverse elementary school classroom using digital  devices with a digitized design of lines connecting each device to symbolize AI and connectivity of data and Information.
iStock/Getty
Curriculum Opinion How Much Autonomy Should Teachers Have Over Instructional Materials?
Some policymakers are pushing schools to adopt high-quality scripted lessons for teachers. And here's why.
8 min read
The United States Capitol building as a bookcase filled with red, white, and blue policy books in a Washington DC landscape.
Luca D'Urbino for Education Week
Curriculum Middle Schools Often Prioritize English and Math Over Other Subjects. Should They?
An Illinois district is equalizing time across the four major content areas. But the decision comes with trade-offs.
5 min read
Blue gradient photo of a middle school boy and girl in science class working with beakers with an overlay of a pie chart showing a slice of the pie.
SDI Productions/E+/Getty
Curriculum Q&A How This School Librarian Transformed the Library and Got More Kids to Read
While schools across the country have shed librarians, Leigh Knapp became the first full-time librarian at her school.
7 min read
A look at the new seating librarian Leigh Knapp brought into Bethune Academy's school library in Milwaukee.
A look at the new seating librarian Leigh Knapp brought into Bethune Academy's school library in Milwaukee. Knapp became the school's first full-time librarian at the start of the 2024-25 school year, with a vision of revitalizing the library and changing the school's culture around reading.
Courtesy of Leigh Knapp