Open Educational Resources (OER) for Course Reading Lists

Open Educational Resources (OER) are becoming an increasingly popular option for complementing traditional learning materials and replacing high-cost academic textbooks. Leganto allows faculty to easily incorporate OER into course resource lists, providing instructors flexibility in their course content and saving students money on course materials. Instructors can create lists that only include OER, or that include OER alongside library materials, open access content, and other resources freely available online.

Leganto resource lists are shared with students, giving them streamlined access to high-quality educational materials and reducing their overall cost of learning.

Putting OER and Library Resources in the Classroom

Comprehensive Course Resource Lists, Including Open Educational Resources

With Leganto, instructors can create course resource lists comprised of all types of materials, including print and electronic items from their library’s collections, Open Educational Resources, and other resources available on the web. Instructors can use this diversity of options to meet their individual teaching needs, while ensuring students have access to all necessary resources.

Highlighting Open Access Search Results

The Ex Libris Central Discovery Index (CDI) includes multiple Open Access and OER collections – such as Open SUNY, OpenStax, and Open Textbook Library – which are fully discoverable in Leganto, alongside library-owned and library-subscribed content. Instructors can choose to filter Leganto search results specifically for such open access material, making it easier to build open resource lists.

Harvesting Open Educational Resources

With the Leganto CiteIt! tool, instructors can quickly and easily harvest Open Educational Resources for their resource lists from a variety of sites dedicated to open resource sharing (including Open Textbook Library, OER Commons, and OpenStax). Once instructors choose such OER, they are automatically added to the Leganto resource list, including their Creative Commons license information.

Open Educational Resource recommendation

Resource Recommendations

Library staff, instructional designers, peer instructors, students, and other partners can recommend Open Educational Resources directly through Leganto, contributing to a culture of collaboration. In addition, Leganto automatically scans OER collections that the institution has activated in the Ex Libris Central Discovery Index (CDI) and suggests relevant resources to instructors. Instructors can view all recommendations and add selected OER to their course lists.

Creative Commons for course resource lists

Creative Commons for Course Lists

Leganto reading lists do not need to be limited to use in a single course. Instructors can choose to share their reading lists with librarians and other instructors within and outside the institution, as well as with students and prospective students. To protect their intellectual property, instructors can assign a Creative Commons license to such shared reading lists.