Types of OER

OER can be divided into as many ‘type’ categories as there are needs within the education sector. While assets – such as worksheets, lesson plans, lesson resources, reference articles, and so on – are perhaps an obvious category, the term also encapsulates Open Courseware (OCW). While there is no consensus regarding OER ‘type’ categories, Creative Commons12 has a useful list that includes the following types:

• Digital Learning Objects (individual digital assets);
• Digitized Object libraries (online collections of assets);
• OER Encyclopaedias (collaborative written reference materials);
• Open Online Archives (repositories of collected OER);
• Open Textbooks (free and adaptable texts);
• OER Courseware (open online university courses and programmes);
• OER Courses (short courses);
• Open Course Archive (Library or index of courses);
• Online tools that support the Open Community.

Other organizations, such as Montgomery College, also include media type categories:

OER can be separated, by content type, into four groups: text led, video led, animation led, and multiple media. Types of open educational resources include: full courses, course materials, modules, learning objects, open textbooks, openly licensed (often streamed) videos, tests, software, and other tools, materials, or techniques used to support access to knowledge.

It is useful to keep these category types in mind when searching for OER on the internet, as each type or category will generate different results. For example, object libraries are more likely to identify individual assets, an OER encyclopaedia will elicit definitions and descriptive content, while OER courseware repositories will have course materials loosely linked together so that one could, theoretically, run the course again.