Open Educational Resources
Contents:
Clip Art, Images, and Graphics
Open Textbooks:
- American Memory Project (Library of Congress):
The Library of Congress is the largest library in the world, with millions of books, films and video, audio recordings, photographs, newspapers, maps and manuscripts in its collections. The Library is the main research arm of the U.S. Congress and the home of the U.S. Copyright Office. The Library preserves and provides access to a rich, diverse and enduring source of knowledge to inform, inspire and engage you in your intellectual and creative endeavors. Whether you are new to the Library of Congress or an experienced researcher, we have a world-class staff ready to assist you online and in person. https://www.loc.gov/collections/ - BC Campus: Open Ed:
The B.C. Open Collection is a curated selection of open educational resources (OER) that can be accessed by educators in B.C. and beyond to use in the classroom, in an institutional learning management system, or on other teaching and learning platforms. All materials are openly licensed. This means they are free to use, customize, and share. The collection includes courses and textbooks, and new resources are being added all the time. To find out when new OER are added to the collection in your subject area, subscribe to the BCcampus newsletter. https://collection.bccampus.ca/ - Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB):
The DOAB provides a searchable index to peer-reviewed books published under an open access license. The directory aims to increase the discoverability of open access books, allowing users to freely read, download, and distribute the content. While the specific content details were not accessible, DOAB typically includes books from various disciplines and languages, contributing to the promotion of open access to scholarly works. https://www.doabooks.org/doab - GALILEO Open Learning Materials
GALILEO Open Learning Materials brings together open educational resources throughout the University System of Georgia, including open textbooks and ancillary materials. This repository is administrated by Affordable Learning Georgia, an initiative of GALILEO and the University System of Georgia which aims to reduce the cost of textbooks to students and contribute to their retention, progression, and graduation. For more about Affordable Learning Georgia, visit Affordable Learning Georgia’s website. Most works hosted in GALILEO Open Learning Materials have a Creative Commons license, allowing the reuse, redistribution, remix, and revision of these materials. To learn more about Creative Commons licenses, please visit the Creative Commons Licenses Page.
https://oer.galileo.usg.edu/english - HathiTrust – Full View Available:
In the HathiTrust Digital Library collection, you can find titles on everything from African History, Economics, and French Literature to Solar Energy, Public Health, and materials published in more than 400 languages. The digital library of 18+ million digitized items bring together the collections of more than 60 academic and research libraries from across North America and other countries. Users from around the world use the digital library for their undergraduate and graduate studies, personal research, genealogy, and professional purposes such as law and journalism.
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/ls?a=page;page=advanced - JSTOR Open Access Books:
More than 11,000 open access (OA) books from 130+ publishers, including Brill, Cornell University Press, University College of London, and University of California Press, are now available at no cost to libraries or users.
High-quality content: These titles reflect JSTOR’s high standards for quality content and are freely available for anyone in the world to use.
Ease of use: Users won’t need to register or log in, and there are no DRM restrictions or limits on chapter PDF downloads or printing. Ebooks work just like journal articles on JSTOR.
Digital preservation: The ebooks are also preserved in Portico, ensuring that they will be available to researchers in perpetuity.
Integration for libraries: Librarians can receive free MARC records and activate the titles in discovery services.
https://about.jstor.org/whats-in-jstor/books/open-access-books-jstor/ - LibreTexts:
The LibreTexts mission is to unite students, faculty and scholars in a cooperative effort to develop an easy-to-use online platform for the construction, customization, and dissemination of open educational resources (OER) to reduce the burdens of unreasonable textbook costs to our students and society. At its heart, the LibreTexts project is designed to serve as a community effort to lower the financial burden placed on students, while simultaneously encouraging educators to come together to create, and curate quality OER to help them succeed in their courses. https://libretexts.org/about-us/ - net:
ManyBooks was established in 2004 with the vision to provide an extensive library of books in digital format for free on the Internet. Many of the early eBooks are from the Project Gutenberg archives, which means you will be able to find a lot of classics on the site. ManyBooks has grown into a platform where self-publishing authors have the opportunity to introduce their work to our community and new books are uploaded to our site daily – provided they comply to our quality standards. https://manybooks.net/about - Mason OER Metafinder (MOM):
The Mason OER Metafinder offers a unique search experience that allows users to simultaneously search across multiple sources of open educational resources. This tool is designed to help educators and students find openly licensed materials across the web, enhancing the visibility and accessibility of high-quality educational content.
https://mason.deepwebaccess.com/mason__MasonLibrariesOpenEducationResources_5f4/desktop/en/search.html - Org:
The new MERLOT Smart Search extends access to learning materials well beyond MERLOT’s current curated and peer reviewed collection. Smart Search was developed to answer the pervasive and nagging question, “Where can I find OER’s?” With Smart Search users can search more than a dozen learning materials libraries to find OER’s very, very quickly!
https://info.merlot.org/merlothelp/topic.htm#t=MERLOT_Smart_Search.htm&rhsearch=OER%20MERLOT%20Search&rhhlterm=merlot%20search%20searches%20oer - MIT OpenCourseWare:
MIT OpenCourseWare is a free and open collection of material from thousands of MIT courses, covering the entire MIT curriculum.
https://ocw.mit.edu/about/ - OASIS:
Openly Available Sources Integrated Search (OASIS) is a search tool that aims to make the discovery of open content easier. OASIS currently searches open content from 115 different sources and contains 455,499 records. OASIS is being developed at SUNY Geneseo’s Milne Library. https://oasis.geneseo.edu/about.php - OER Commons:
OER Commons is an online platform featuring over 50,000 open educational resources (OER) for various educational levels, from K-12 to higher education. It offers free access to a wide array of materials, including textbooks, lesson plans, and course materials, and supports collaboration by allowing users to find, use, remix, and share content freely. The platform also provides tools for creating and customizing OER, along with training for educators to utilize these resources effectively.
https://oercommons.org/ - Open Michigan:
As a partnership of the University Library and Health Information Technology and Services, we are the home for all things open at the University of Michigan—including expertise and services for open educational resources, open data, and open publications. Open Michigan encourages scholars and students to maximize the impact of their work through open sharing. As a public institution, the University of Michigan is committed to serving our university community, the residents of the state of Michigan, and the broader world in which we live. That means making sure that publicly-funded research (and its underlying data!) is accessible to citizens, providing a platform for teachers and students to find and re-use high-quality educational materials, and educating scholars about the benefits of sharing their work with the world beyond our campus.
https://open.umich.edu/about - Open Research Library:
The Open Research Library (ORL) is planned to include all Open Access book content worldwide on one platform for user-friendly discovery, offering a seamless experience navigating more than 14,000 Open Access books. This vital infrastructure is slated to comprise the most comprehensive collection of peer-reviewed Open Access books accessible for everyone. Libraries investing in the Open Research Library contribute to the development of a dedicated infrastructure for the global research community, while participating libraries have the opportunity to benefit from a set of exclusive services.
https://knowledgeunlatched.org/openresearchlibrary/ - Open Textbook Library:
The Open Textbook Library, hosted by the University of Minnesota, offers a catalog of open textbooks that are licensed to be freely used, adapted, and distributed. These textbooks cover various subjects and are aimed at reducing the cost of college textbooks for students and educators. The content on this site is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License, ensuring that it can be shared and adapted with proper attribution.
https://open.umn.edu/opentextbooks/faq - OpenStax CNX:
OpenStax CNX (formerly known as Connexions) is a platform where users can view and share educational material made up of small knowledge chunks called modules that can be organized as courses, books, reports, etc. Although the specific search functionality was not directly accessible, OpenStax CNX is known for providing free, open access textbooks and educational materials on a wide range of subjects, supporting learners and educators worldwide.
https://openstax.org/about - Project Gutenberg:
Project Gutenberg offers over 60,000 free eBooks, focusing on older works for which U.S. copyright has expired. It is a volunteer effort to digitize and archive cultural works and to “encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks.” This resource is invaluable for accessing classic literature and historical texts without any cost.
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/ - Teaching Commons:
The Teaching Commons showcases high-quality open educational resources from leading colleges and universities and makes them available to educators and students around the world. Curated by librarians and their institutions and hosted by bepress, the Teaching Commons includes open-access textbooks, course materials, lesson plans, multimedia, lectures, k-12 materials, and more. Educators and researchers can use the Teaching Commons to discover teaching materials, adopt content for their courses, or create and share their own work. The Teaching Commons is built on the Digital Commons platform, which offers authors a powerful set of tools– including multimedia support, versioning, embedded comments, and geo-location, among others — to support the large variety of publishing needs in this growing field.
https://teachingcommons.us/about.html - World Digital Library:
The World Digital Library (WDL) is a project of the U.S. Library of Congress, with the support of UNESCO, providing free access to significant primary materials from countries and cultures around the world. The collection includes books, manuscripts, maps, newspapers, journals, prints, photographs, sound recordings, and films, showcasing the achievements of all countries and cultures to promote cross-cultural awareness and understanding. The WDL collection is presented in its original languages, with descriptive metadata translated into multiple languages, making it a rich resource for global cultural heritage.
https://www.loc.gov/collections/world-digital-library/about-this-collection/
Public Domain Audiobooks:
LibriVox: LibriVox is a unique online library of audiobooks that are all in the public domain. It relies on volunteers from around the world to record chapters of books, which are then made available for free. This platform is an excellent resource for anyone looking to access classic literature and other educational materials in an audio format. The range of genres available includes novels, history, poetry, and more, making it a versatile source for readers and listeners of all tastes. https://librivox.org
Diagrams and Graphs:
- Google Charts: Google Charts provides a wide array of interactive charts and data tools that are web-based. It’s a powerful, free resource that enables developers and content creators to visualize data on their websites dynamically and engagingly. From simple line charts to complex hierarchical tree maps, the tool offers a variety of chart types. https://developers.google.com/chart
- Kaggle: Kaggle is a platform for data science competitions, datasets, and learning resources. It hosts competitions where data scientists compete to provide the best models for data analysis and prediction. Kaggle also offers access to a vast amount of datasets and notebooks, making it a valuable resource for anyone looking to practice or improve their data science skills. https://www.kaggle.com
- Public Domain Vectors: Public Domain Vectors offers a large collection of vector graphics that are free to use for any purpose, including commercial uses. The site features a wide range of vector images in various categories, making it a useful resource for graphic designers, web developers, and anyone in need of vector graphics. https://publicdomainvectors.org
Clip Art, Images, and Graphics:
- Flickr Creative Commons: Flickr Creative Commons is a section of the popular photo-sharing site Flickr that allows users to find photos that have been released under the Creative Commons license. This license enables the use of photos for free, under certain conditions, and is a fantastic resource for bloggers, educators, and content creators in need of high-quality images. https://www.flickr.com/creativecommons
- FreeImages: FreeImages offers a vast collection of stock photos that can be used for free, providing an essential resource for designers, bloggers, and anyone in need of high-quality images for their projects or presentations. https://www.freeimages.com
- Pexels: Pexels provides high-quality and completely free stock photos and videos contributed by talented creators. With a robust search functionality and a wide array of categories, Pexels is a go-to source for visuals for both personal and commercial use without the need for attribution. https://www.pexels.com
- Pixabay: Pixabay offers an extensive library of over 1 million stock photos, videos, vector graphics, and illustrations, all free for commercial use with no attribution required. This platform is highly appreciated by content creators, web designers, and anyone in need of high-quality visuals. https://pixabay.com
- io: StockSnap.io features a wide range of high-resolution photos that are free to use. The site adds hundreds of images daily, ensuring fresh content is always available. It’s an excellent resource for finding stunning stock photos for websites, blogs, and other marketing materials. https://stocksnap.io
- Unsplash: Unsplash offers a collection of over a million free high-resolution photos contributed by a community of photographers. This platform has become a popular source for beautiful, free images and photos that you can download and use for any project. https://unsplash.com
Multi-Purpose Platforms:
- Internet Archive: The Internet Archive is a non-profit library offering free access to books, movies, music, and millions of archived web pages. It serves as an essential resource for researchers, historians, and the public in search of historical collections and archives. https://archive.org
- Wikimedia Commons: Wikimedia Commons is a database of 59 million freely usable media files to which anyone can contribute. It is an invaluable resource for finding images, sounds, and videos that can be freely used and shared. https://commons.wikimedia.org
- Digital Public Library of America (DPLA):
The DPLA offers free digital access to over 49 million images, texts, videos, and sounds from across the United States. It has launched The Banned Book Club to ensure readers have access to books that have been banned in certain locations, making e-book versions available via the free Palace e-reader app. DPLA serves as a comprehensive resource for primary source sets and research guides, supporting a wide range of educational and research activities.
https://dp.la/
Sounds, Music, Sound Effects:
- ccMixter: ccMixter is a community music site where you can find music that falls under the Creative Commons license, allowing for free use and adaptation in new creative works. It’s a fantastic resource for finding background music or samples for new compositions. http://ccmixter.org
- FreeSound: FreeSound offers a large database of audio samples and recordings shared by a community of users. It’s an excellent resource for anyone in need of sound effects, ambient noises, or samples for music production and sound design. https://freesound.org
- Incompetech: Incompetech provides a wide array of royalty-free music composed by Kevin MacLeod. The site is well-organized, allowing users to search for music based on genre, mood, or even specific instruments, making it a go-to resource for filmmakers, game designers, and content creators. https://incompetech.com
- Audionautix: Music composed and recorded by Jason Shaw and licensed under Creative Commons for use in audio visual projects.
http://www.audionautix.com/
- Internet Archive Live Music Archive: All music in this Collection is from trade-friendly artists and is strictly non-commercial, both for access here and for any further distribution. This collection is maintained by the etree.org community.
http://www.archive.org/details/etree
- Pixabay: Pixabay offers a vast library of free-to-use media, including images, videos, and sound effects. The sound effects section of Pixabay is particularly useful for finding a wide range of audio clips that can be used freely in various projects. These sounds are available under a simplified license, which typically allows for both personal and commercial use without the need for attribution. This makes Pixabay an excellent resource for creators looking for high-quality, accessible sounds to enhance their multimedia projects.
https://pixabay.com/sound-effects/search/free-to-use/ - UppBeat: UppBeat focuses on providing royalty-free music and sound effects primarily aimed at content creators. The platform is designed to offer high-quality audio tracks that are ideal for use in videos, podcasts, and other digital content formats. While UppBeat offers a selection of free tracks, it also has premium options that require a subscription. The free-to-use section comes with some limitations, typically requiring credit to be given. UppBeat distinguishes itself by catering specifically to the needs of creators looking for contemporary and appealing audio tracks to elevate their creative projects.
https://uppbeat.io/
Videos:
- Pexels Videos: Pexels Videos provides high-quality and completely free stock videos contributed by talented creators. This resource is invaluable for anyone looking to enhance their projects with dynamic video content.
https://pixabay.com/images/search/video%20search/ - Pixabay Images: Pixabay also offers a significant collection of free stock images.
https://pixabay.com/images/search/image%20search/?manual_search=1
Virtual Manipulatives:
- Mathigon’s Polypad – Offers a wide range of virtual manipulatives, including dynamic geometry, graph plotting, and data science tools. It is described as the ultimate mathematical playground. https://mathigon.org/polypad
- Didax – Provides a collection of free virtual manipulatives, from number lines to base ten, pattern blocks to place value disks, giving educators and families access to digital resources that aid in understanding. https://www.didax.com/math/virtual-manipulatives.html
- Free Math Manipulatives at EdTechPicks.org – Lists virtual manipulative websites that work on any device or browser, addressing the issue of older sites that depended on Flash and Java applets. https://edtechpicks.org/2020/06/virtual-manipulatives/
- Mashup Math – Offers a free library of virtual math manipulatives for grades K-8, providing students with opportunities to explore math concepts. https://www.mashupmath.com/virtual-math-manipulatives-free-library-for-grades-k-8
- com – Features a huge collection of virtual manipulatives, including algebra tiles, Dienes blocks, Cuisenaire rods, and more, designed to support a variety of math concepts. https://mathsbot.com/manipulativeMenu
- PHET Interactive Simulations, Desmos, Didax, NCTM Illuminations, and others listed on Teaching Channel offer free online manipulative resources that range from interactive simulations to graphing calculators and virtual counters. These tools are designed to help visually solidify mathematical concepts across various grades, offering activities and resources for both early learners and intermediate grades. https://www.teachingchannel.com/k12-hub/blog/10-free-online-manipulative-reosurces-to-add-to-your-math-toolbox/
- A Dash of Research offers a curated list of over 200 free virtual manipulatives from various sites, covering a wide range of topics and types. This resource allows educators to browse and select the most suitable tools for their teaching needs, with options to leave ratings and comments on manipulative pages to aid other educators in making informed choices. https://www.dashofresearch.com/virtual-manipulatives
- TTAC ODU (Training & Technical Assistance Center at Old Dominion University) emphasizes the role of virtual manipulatives in building conceptual understanding in mathematics. This resource spotlights how these tools can be integrated into classroom instruction across all grade levels as part of the Concrete-Representational-Abstract (C-R-A) learning cycle. It features free virtual manipulative apps from various platforms, including Math Learning Center apps, Illuminations Interactives from NCTM, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt iTools, and Glencoe/McGraw-Hill virtual manipulatives, which cover a broad spectrum of mathematical concepts. https://www.mashupmath.com/virtual-math-manipulatives-free-library-for-grades-k-8
