SU Library: OER by Discipline: Chemistry and Biochemistry: Create My Own OER

Publishing Your Own OER in Four Easy Steps!

Are you ready to adapt or create your own OER? Just follow these four easy steps!

Create your OER material.
Choose an open license to publish under, such as Creative Commons, and clearly state it in your material.
Upload your OER to a website.
Watch the downloads and accolades roll in!

Okay, just kidding. The general process is correct, but we know that creating your own OER isn't that quick or simple. Read on for some tips and suggestions about how to accomplish those four "easy" steps.

Creating Your Material

Start by deciding what kind of OER you'd like to publish, what your goal is, and how much time you have.

Most people aren't ready to write an entire textbook from scratch by themselves. Instead, consider following one of these paths:

Take a lesson, lecture, activity, or assignment that you've already created and publish it as OER with an open license.
Are you already using OER in your course? Adapt and remix part or all of it (following the licensing terms on the original resource) and publish it.
Work with a colleague. A partner can be a good source of encouragement and support. This can be someone at Stevenson, or you can take a look at the M.O.S.T. Commons Hubs to find other instructors in your discipline who might be interested in working together.

Publishing Your Material

Once you've developed the material, you'll need to decide how you want to present it. OER comes in all forms and formats. It can be an eBook in .epub or .pdf format, or it can be web-based. It can be a video, an image, an audio file, or a podcast. It can be uploaded to one or more OER repositories, like the M.O.S.T., Commons, or it can be limited to students in your Blackboard course. It can be as simple as a Word document that you link out from your OneDrive. That said, you may want to try one or more of the resources listed below to get a more polished product.

Books and Guides on Publishing OER:

Authoring Open Textbooks This guide is for faculty authors, librarians, project managers and others who are involved in the production of open textbooks in higher education and K-12. Content includes a checklist for getting started, publishing program case studies, textbook organization and elements, writing resources and an overview of useful tools.
The Rebus Guide to Publishing Open Textbooks (So Far) The Rebus Guide to Publishing Open Textbooks (So Far) is a living repository of collective knowledge, written to equip all those who want to publish open textbooks with the resources they need. Representing two years of collaboration, innumerable conversations and exchanges, and a wide range of collective knowledge and experience, the Guide is a book-in-progress and will evolve and grow over time.
Self-Publishing Guide The BCcampus Open Education Self-Publishing Guide is a reference for individuals or groups wanting to write and self-publish an open textbook. This guide provides details on the preparation, planning, writing, publication, and maintenance of an open textbook.
Guide to Developing Open Textbooks This how to guide has been developed to assist teachers, teaching support personnel and educational technology administrators to: understand the value of open education, OER and open textbooks for teaching and learning; appreciate the potential value of developing an open textbook platform; select appropriate technology to build an open textbook platform, using either existing services offered free on the Internet or open-source tools, based on local needs and resources; and build, manage and maintain an open textbook platforms.

Publishing Tools:

M.O.S.T. Commons Author your material directly on the M.O.S.T. Commons website, which will publish it to the Commons
Open Author from OER Commons Open Author helps you build and publish Open Educational Resources for you and for the benefit of educators and learners everywhere. Accounts on OER Commons are free.
Pressbooks Create Author a book from scratch or adapt an existing resource. Free accounts have limitations.

Choosing Your License

Creative Commons is one of the most widely recognized and used licenses for creating and publishing OER. Creative Commons licenses give everyone from individual creators to large institutions a standardized way to grant the public permission to use their creative work under copyright law. From the reuser’s perspective, the presence of a Creative Commons license on a copyrighted work answers the question, What can I do with this work?

Whichever license you choose, make sure you clearly label it on your OER, so other people know what they're allowed to do with your work. If you upload your OER to the M.O.S.T. Commons or any other OER repository, there should be a field or section that asks you to list how your work is licensed.

The CC License options

There are six different license types, listed from most to least permissive here:

CC BY

This license enables reusers to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format, so long as attribution is given to the creator. The license allows for commercial use. CC BY includes the following elements:

BY: credit must be given to the creator.

CC BY-SA

This license enables reusers to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format, so long as attribution is given to the creator. The license allows for commercial use. If you remix, adapt, or build upon the material, you must license the modified material under identical terms. CC BY-SA includes the following elements:

BY: credit must be given to the creator.
SA: Adaptations must be shared under the same terms.

CC BY-NC

This license enables reusers to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format for noncommercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator. CC BY-NC includes the following elements:

BY: credit must be given to the creator.
NC: Only noncommercial uses of the work are permitted.

CC BY-NC-SA

This license enables reusers to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format for noncommercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator. If you remix, adapt, or build upon the material, you must license the modified material under identical terms. CC BY-NC-SA includes the following elements:

BY: credit must be given to the creator.
NC: Only noncommercial uses of the work are permitted.
SA: Adaptations must be shared under the same terms.

CC BY-ND

This license enables reusers to copy and distribute the material in any medium or format in unadapted form only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator. The license allows for commercial use. CC BY-ND includes the following elements:

BY: credit must be given to the creator.
ND: No derivatives or adaptations of the work are permitted.

CC BY-NC-ND

This license enables reusers to copy and distribute the material in any medium or format in unadapted form only, for noncommercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator. CC BY-NC-ND includes the following elements:

BY: credit must be given to the creator.
NC: Only noncommercial uses of the work are permitted.
ND: No derivatives or adaptations of the work are permitted.

From Creative Commons' About CC Licenses page.

Keeping Up with Your Material

Congratulations, you're now an author of published OER material! It may seem like the hard part is done, but one of your final rights and responsibilities is to keep up with your material. You may want to edit your published OER as you make changes, or you can publish a whole new version. You'll also want to keep in touch with other academics, students, and researchers who use your material. Some of them may want to edit or remix it themselves, or they may ask to collaborate with you on a new version. If you choose a license that allows other people to sell your work and make money off it, you may also want to monitor commercial uses and sales.

If you're not happy with the way your work is being used and reused, you can always reissue a new version with a more (or less) restrictive license.