OER stands for Open Educational Resources. These are generally learning materials licensed under a Creative Commons license. Various licensing options are available to meet the needs of diverse authors and content.Anyone can use these materials without concerns of copyright infringement. However, in many cases CC BY or Attribution will be necessary to comply with the terms of the license. This means citing the source; this section provides four citation methods.

This module aims to familiarize users with Creative Commons licenses and empower them to generate openly licensed content.

This is important in higher education because as costs continue to rise, students are placed under increased economic burdens to purchase expensive, often single-use textbooks. With OER, faculty have the option of selecting no-cost, openly licensed content to minimize these financial burdens.

As librarians, instructional designers, and instructional technologists, OER matters because we can significantly minimize textbook costs, which can increase student outcomes, retention, and motivation.

Overview of Part 1 Content

• Basics of Copyright
• Anatomy of Creative Commons License
  • Quiz #1
• Attribution Statements and Citations
  • Applied Assessment #1
• Using Creative Commons Work
  • Quiz #2
• Part 1 Assessment