An introduction to the four POUR principles that make for a more accessible experience in learning materials.

Please join the Community College Consortium for Open Educational Resources (CCCOER) for a free and open webinar on Designing for Open Pedagogy. Open Pedagogy was first introduced by Lumen Learning co-founder David Wiley, as a way to capture how the use of OER can change educational practices. He relates that using OER in the same way as traditional textbooks is like driving an airplane down the road - it is missing out on what open can provide for student and teacher collaboration, engagement, and learning.

This one-pager summarizes Digital Promise's vision for Artificial Intelligence in education. Digital Promise is focused on AI in education to foster a future where every person engages in sustained and impactful experiences of powerful learning that lead to a life of well-being, fulfillment, and economic mobility.

This online, shared Diigo group is an example of one strategy for collaboratively archiving, aggregating, aligning and curating open and free resources. This group was actively used from 2014-2017 to supplement another team project to curate custom CK-12 Flexbooks for all Middle School Science modules. Items were archived and shared here to be vetted for inclusion by other faculty as well as district level Science Coordinators.Some of the advantages to using Diigo in this way are as follows:

Diigo allows an extension to be easily placed directly into the Chrome or Safari browser, thereby making it handy at the very point of discovery of the resource. There is no need to copy a URL and then go elsewhere to open another tool or service for entry. In working with faculty on such projects, we have found that limiting the number of steps between discovery of a resource and its ultimate inclusion in student-facing products is valuable.
This approach also allows a very transparent running archive for the entire team, allowing your content experts to do their thing in an effective manner.
Some of the details that make this effective are the ability to comment on submitted resources, thus generating a running conversation, direct editing of submissions for accuracy and alignment, etc.
We also utilized the ability to employ a common group dictionary of tags. This is important so that tags are useful and not splintered into many such as: “7thGrade,” “7th Grade,” “Seventh Grade,” and so on.
Annotation and markup is also available right at the point of discovery, and this markup also shows clearly in the running archive of the shared group.
The service is free to use, and even the group function is free as long as the group is public-facing. In the spirit of #GoOpen, this more than fits.
All of the work can also be exported for long-term archiving if this is a need.

One key thing to note, is that we actually used state standards as tags as well. At the time, this led to the potential for a very laser-focused conversation regarding whether or not resources truly facilitated work directly on the standard, or just “in the area of the standard,” which can be a concern at times. However, these were not NGSS standards at the time, and I want that to be clear. These are all solid resources for the application, but the alignment would certainly shift when cross-walking to NGSS.
(two sample screenshots below)

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On May 25, 2023, #GoOpen held a public webinar titled, "Educators Using OER to Identify and Remediate Bias."  This session focused on using OER to engage all learners through an interactive Climate Education experience and was facilitated by ISKME professional learning specialist, Joanna Schimizzi, and consultant, Christina Spears, with moderator, Amee Evans Godwin.

This report from European Schoolnet Academy explores how professional development for teachers needs to change in the age of AI. From fostering an understanding of AI applications in education to equipping teachers with the requisite skills to leverage these technologies, our analysis aims to provide insights into how professional development can empower teachers to navigate the complexities of the changes brought about by AI.

With the closing of schools because of the COVID 19 pandemic, schools and districts have pushed instruction online.

The following reflects the distance learning plan for the Grossmont Union High School District. It establishes the tone and expectations for teachers. Additionally, we provide templates and guidance.

In 2022, the #GoOpen movement transitioned from a federal initiative to launch the #GoOpen National Network, a national community of educators and leaders who use and support open educational resources and practices (OER/OEP) to equitably improve teaching and learning for all.

This resource offers enduring value and guidance for districts choosing to transition to the use of openly licensed educational resources to improve student learning in their schools. Openly licensed educational resources (OER) enable districts to reallocate significant funds currently spent on inflexible, static learning materials to resources and activities that accelerate the transition to digital learning. These include implementing new professional learning programs for teachers, developing a robust technology infrastructure to support digital learning, and funding new leadership roles for educators who curate and create openly licensed educational materials.

GoOpen Michigan is a community of educators and learners who access and contribute free, openly licensed, high-quality digital resources to enable equitable transformative learning experiences.

On April 4, 2023, the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pension (HELP) Committee sent a letter to the Education Community seeking input on policies that the Committee should consider during the reauthorization of the Education Sciences Reform Act, including the Educational Technical Assistance Act and the National Assessment of Education Progress Authorization Act, from early learning through postsecondary education.To inform the Committee's work, they invited input on several specific questions.  In response, the #GoOpen National Network composed and submitted this letter in an effort to help the Committee recognize the pivotal role that Open Educational Resources can and should play in promoting and supporting student success.  The letter also highlights four specific ways that ESRA can support the use of high-quality OER by students, families, and educators.

#GoOpen Launch Packet: Phase 1

#GoOpen Districts that choose to implement openly licensed educational resources when existing resources are due for renewal start by putting together a team of people at the district level to review and evaluate the resources and what is needed. The team decides which content areas and grade levels might be appropriate candidates for replacement by openly licensed educational resources. The team then decides whether to curate existing resources, create new ones, or implement a combination of the two. It also decides how they will organize and incorporate the new resources into the district’s digital learning infrastructures.

#GoOpen Launch Packet, Phase 2: In selecting and organizing an implementation team, #GoOpen Districts identify key stakeholders from across the district to play important roles in creating, curating, and leading the transition to openly licensed educational resources. Once selected, the #GoOpen team works together to determine the appropriate roles and responsibilities for each member of the team and to organize its work.

#GoOpen Launch Packet, Phase 3: #GoOpen Districts that implement openly licensed educational resources at scale need a robust and comprehensive infrastructure for learning that supports high-speed access to resources and devices for both students and teachers in school and at home. In determining their district’s digital readiness, #GoOpen teams take infrastructure into consideration in the early stages of planning to ensure that the infrastructure is reliable and secure, and that every student has equitable access to the resources.

This Launch Packet is designed for districts that have decided to implement a systematic approach to incorporating openly licensed educational resources into their curriculum by becoming a #GoOpen District. This is Phase 4 of the systematic approach.

#GoOpen Launch Packet, Phase 5: Professional learning opportunities ensure sustainability and scalability of openly licensed educational resources. Going open allows for tremendous flexibility in teaching approaches for your educators. Many current #GoOpen Districts implement professional learning that focuses on personalized and blended learning paradigms even before considering openly licensed educational resources. This planning makes the transition to openly licensed educational resources a logical next step. As your teachers become more confident in these approaches and in creating, curating, and sharing openly licensed educational resources, you will reap the full benefits of this transition.

This is a guide to good practices for college and university open-access (OA) policies. It's based on the type of rights-retention OA policy first adopted at Harvard, Stanford, MIT, and the University of Kansas. Policies of this kind have since been adopted at a wide variety of institutions in North America, Europe, Africa, and Asia, for example, at public and private institutions, large and small institutions, affluent and indigent institutions, research universities and liberal arts colleges, and at whole universities, schools within universities, and departments within schools.

A rubric designed by the Grossmont Unified High School District to be used when assessing the quality of resources.

Open Education Week is an ideal time to hear from our community members who are leading open education initiatives on their campuses and across their states to reduce costs for students and empower faculty to enhance learning in their classrooms. We will hear from two OER librarians and a faculty member who are successfully growing awareness and adoption of open educational resources. They will share the successes and challenges of coordinating statewide efforts and influencing their colleagues to adopt OER in their courses.