It is important to consider the pedagogical implications of OERs and the increasing availability of technologies which allow us to edit, adapt, and create materials. If, we as educators, know that all of our students can have full access to the core textbook(s), or to a collection of curated materials, then we may have potential for making much more use of these types of resources than we would if access had been limited to those who purchased copies or who managed to borrow from the library. Further, knowing that these materials can be copied, translated, edited, etc, allows us to customise them to meet the particular needs of our students and courses, rather than be constrained by the style, tone, and structure imposed by a commercially published set of materials.

Many academic staff and course teams do take such an approach and ‘hack’ content to fit their own course aims and syllabus, adapting and combining materials from different sources, replacing examples with more relevant local cases, etc. Some, go further and produce their own open textbooks or collections of materials and share these publicly or within their own peer group. It is unfortunate that many universities don't necessarily recognise such output in academic promotions (particularly those that would consider themselves as 'research intensive' institutions), but some do and the other benefits that accrue are recognition within professional communities, and personal, professional satisfaction, in addition to the enhancement of the student learning experience.

Towards active learning

A distinctive educational advantage provided by OERs is not just that they are customisable by teachers, but also by students. Thinking of Laurillard’s Six Types of Learning (below) , we may realise that, rather than thinking only in terms of content and delivery, with the student’s role to ‘acquire’ knowledge, the concept of OERs opens up a number of possibilities for active learning, via ‘Investigation’ and ‘Production’. As an example, students could be tasked with developing new, or re-purposed, OERs as part of their learning or assessment. Of course, not everything students produce as part of their learning necessarily needs to be shared beyond the course (and there may well be good privacy grounds too), but it does offer the possibility that students could feel a sense of satisfaction and achievement in contributing to wider knowledge sharing.

summary of the educational actions associated with the six learning types

Laurillard's Six Types of Learning, as used in the ABC method for Course Design

(Laurillard, D . (2012) Teaching as a design science: Building pedagogical patterns for learning and technology. London: Routledge.)

Some examples

Instead of simply being required to submit an essay or report, students could produce a book as a collection of chapters which can then be published openly using tools such as Pressbooks, Open Monograph Press (OMP), or simply shared within their peer group/cohort.

A variation on this, which is used in a number of institutions, is the production of an online Journal associated with a course or degree programme. Student roles can include editor, peer-reviewers, as well as authors. Whilst this can be done simply using standard word-processing software and/or your LMS/VLE it is also possible to use full journal systems such as the Open Journal System (OJS). One example of a journal like this which extends beyond being a simple assessment within a course is the Columbia Undergraduate Science Journal.

Students creating, editing, and reviewing Wikipedia entries. Some interesting examples include the work of the Wikimedian in Residence at Edinburgh University and student partners.
Co-creation (between students and staff) of learning materials to support courses, practical classes, projects, and other relevant aspects.
Podcasts (e.g. as in this example) or other audio content, which can be shared in the class or beyond. Similarly for video content, animations, or other multimedia production.

All of these can help build students' digital skills, confidence, and proficiency whilst combining creativity with learning. By engaging students in this way, we also address many of the competencies in DigCompEdu's domains 5 and 6.