You’ve done the work of finding OER and mapping it to your learning objectives. Now comes the technical challenge of identifying the optimal platform for editing the OER and the best method for integrating it.
An easy way to think about this choice is answering these two questions:
- How do I want my students to access course learning materials?
- How comfortable am I in learning some new technology tools?
Remember, OER gives you the ability to choose any number of ways for students to access OER. Regardless of the modality in which you are teaching, all of these options are available with OER.
Depending on the choice you make, here are some recommendations from SUNY OER Services for each access method:
The Open Web
Open courses can also be offered on the open web outside of a learning management system (LMS). This might look like an interactive syllabus with one or more links to course content each week. It could also consist of a website built specifically for a class. Considerations for this approach are:
- Managing the confidentiality of assessments and grades via available tools and apps
- Ensuring that the licensing of your materials is truly open (Creative Commons, Public Domain, etc)
- Offering the full course to those who wish to adopt it
Tools recommended for customizing and integrating OER using the Open Web:
Pressbooks
If your goal is for the broadest options for editing, sharing, and integrating your open content, Pressbooks is the optimal platform. It is an open source application, allows multiple editors on a single “book,” and can be integrated into any learning management system that supports the Learning Tools Integration (LTI) protocol. This is true for all LMSs used in SUNY currently.
Wiki
Most wiki platforms are free, easily accessible, and usable for both the instructor and learners. They present no barriers of use to collaborative open pedagogy assessments and assignments. Possible wiki options Wikidot and Pbworks.
The drawback of using a wiki to create and customize your open course or content is that these platforms cannot be seamlessly integrated into a learning management system, or easily exported and shared. Note that some LMS do have wiki tools built in.
Word-processing, Spreadsheets, Presentations, and Paper
Open textbooks are created in Microsoft Word every day. Open content can be authored and customized in any application you desire. For the purposes of customizing, integrating, sharing, engaging, you can make any platform work if you have technical savvy and/or support.
Google Drive programs (Docs, Sheets, Slides) are popular tools because of the ease of collaborative editing and printing options they permit.
Pressbooks is the most commonly used OER creation, customization, and integration platform because it was designed for that purpose. Similar platforms are available from ISKME (OER Commons); Intellus Learning; and PanOpen. So if Pressbooks is not available to you, one of these other options may be.
SUNY OER Services, in conjunction with SUNY Press, also provides a pathway for faculty seeking to provide students with a “looks-like, feels-like a textbook” for purchase in campus bookstores. Contact oer@suny.edu for more information.
Content Management/Learning Management Systems
Content Management Systems (CMS)
Content management systems are used to store and display content on a website. You can share information in almost any digital format using a CMS. A significant difference between a CMS and an LMS (learning management system) in that a CMS does not offer the tools for creating, managing, and grading assessments and assignments. However, CMSs are frequently used as open course platforms. The drawbacks of using a CMS for open course/content creation and customization is that integration into an LMS may be limited, or not available at all. Content may not be able to be readily exported and shared.
Learning Management Systems (LMS)
A Learning Management System, or LMS, is available to you and your students through your campus instructional technology. Popular learning management systems are Canvas, Blackboard and Moodle, but there are several others as well. Within the LMS, instructors may encounter OER resources that are integrated for convenient adoption into their courses. The LMS administrator and/or instructional technologist configures these options.
These resources may include catalogs of open courses shared by fellow faculty, courses available from OER vendors, links to openly licensed learning modules and resources, and/or connections to search OER repositories.
OER can also be adopted from outside the LMS from a variety of sources. Methods for integrating external OER include importing full course packages and customizing them within the LMS, copying and pasting content, linking to content on the open web, and/or integrating content via Learning Tools Integration (LTI) protocol. To learn more about LTI, visit the Basic Overview of how LTI Works from IMS Global.
Still deciding? This is the right time to reach out to SUNY OER Services, or instructional designers and/or technologists on your campus for their support and expertise in selecting a customization and integration platform.
Unless otherwise noted, this work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.