Open Content within LibreTexts

Libraries: The foundation of the LibreTexts system is the collection of Libraries of textbooks and other textbook-style learning materials. This can include laboratories, case studies, or guidebooks. The full list of the libraries can be accessed from any page in the LibreVerse by clicking on the Rocketship Icon in the upper-left corner of the screen to visit the Launchpad. 

Question Banks: The LibreTexts ADAPT Homework and Assessment tool does cost a small amount for students to be able to have graded assignments, but the question banks are Open Content for verified instructors. With your verified instructor account, you can log in to ADAPT, create formative assessments (non-graded) for practice, and review the question banks for existing textbooks and ones created and shared by other instructors. ADAPT was built to be accessible by design. 

H5P Interactives: LibreTexts Studio is a place to build H5P materials, but also to find Open H5P materials to use either in your course textbook, or as homework in ADAPT. Peruse the collection, but do be aware that many of the H5P interactives are not accessible and many are not secure for high-stakes assessment. When used within ADAPT, alternative questions may be added to allow for accessibility. Within a textbook, authors will need to provide accessible alternatives in order to meet certain standards at various institutions. 

Open Educational Resources, or OER, are widely used as a catch-all term for "things faculty are free to use in their classrooms." However: there are nuances to what is "Open" and what we mean by "Resources." Generally, resources have a technology component, a content component, and a pedagogical component. 

Open Content is the pieces of text or media that can be utilized in many ways. Perhaps there is a flowchart that you would like to use in a textbook, or a slide presentation, or a homework question. If a piece of content is considered "open" then it has a license of some sort that allows for free use by others in any form. 

Open Source is often used with the concept of technology that runs a platform. Wikipedia is Open Source, meaning if you wanted to use their code to build your own encyclopedia-like platform, you may do so. The technology that runs the user experience and hosts the content is licensed in such a way that others may use it as-is or modify it. 

Pedagogical Approaches cannot be held under copyright. This is a strange twist to copyright laws that often gets misconstrued. A theory of how people learn, an implementation of this theory, and an order of introducing topics based on a published theory are all not content that can be under copyright. If a model is marketed and may generate sales - it may be trademarked as an approach, but this still divorces the approach from the content. 

This does mean that instructors are not welcome to adapt approaches they deem helpful to their students at their discretion. In fact: one could argue that not using a justifiably good approach to teaching their subject would be a detriment to society as a whole. 

Open Pedagogy is the idea that the act of creating educational material can be a tool for teaching. There are many ways to involve students in the creation of teaching material. Perhaps it will involve peer review, faculty review, or collaborative authorship between experts and students. The Open aspect of this is not that it's a license of the material but rather that the process of creating educational materials is not a "closed" process. Students (the learners) are involved in the creation of materials that do the teaching. In nearly every case of Open Pedagogy, however, the product of this will be an Open Content resource that can be shared beyond the exercise itself.