Chapter 4. Find and Evaluate Resources

Chapter 3 in Review

In Chapter 3 you revisited your course planning to identify content gaps and set your goals. Hopefully, you found the exercise helpful and you now have an idea of what you will be looking for once you begin your search. We also discussed the different paths you can take in looking for resources, whether you are looking for an entire textbook, a collection of chapters, or individual resources.

Finding Resources

You are finally ready to start looking for resources. But where should you start? While there are free (e.g., links to websites, YouTube videos with standard licenses) and open (e.g., CC licensed resources, public domain resources), we'll focus this week on looking for open resources—those that you can retain, reuse, revise, remix, and redistribute. We'll also cover different types of resources. Watch this six minute video for an overview.

NOTE: The video above suggests that you COMPILE your potential resources as you conduct your searches for potential content. Feel free to download and use the Source Tracker spreadsheet (.xlsx) we developed to help you document and keep track of your findings. Include everything that looks interesting, ranging from images to books. The information you should document  includes what is necessary to attribute and find the original source of the resource, which is Title, Author, Source, and License (see Chapter 2.) There is also an added field for "alt text" for images to make them accessible.

Open Textbooks

Wouldn't it be nice if there was one place you could go to research and find all available open textbooks? Unfortunately, we're not quite there yet. But, as the OER community continues to grow, people and organizations have started to create repositories. It's probably just a matter of time before the repositories merge and soon pare down to a few if not one. Think of how there used to be many internet search engines, but now almost everyone uses Google. We start by covering in more depth, the two sites recommended in the Finding Resources video you watched above.

Open Textbook Library

The Open Textbook Library contains over 1,000 open textbooks as of spring 2022. These textbooks are licensed under Creative Commons, have been reviewed by college and university faculty, and can be downloaded at no cost. All textbooks are developed and used at institutions of higher education and many are affiliated with a scholarly society or professional organization. The following video will demonstrate how to find textbook on the Open Textbook Library website.

OER Commons

One of the organizations leading this effort to collect and organize OER is the OER Commons. You can search this repository by Subject and Grade Level. OER Commons includes content for all levels of education starting with K-12 through graduate school and also includes career technical and adult education materials. OER Commons also has a support center. The following video will demonstrate how to search for content on OER Commons.

OpenStax

OpenStax is a nonprofit based at Rice University. Their materials were funded by large grants from philanthropic foundations such as the Hewlett Foundation and the National Science Foundation, and they strategically focus on the highest enrolled courses in higher education. Although it does not have a large collection of textbooks, OpenStax is well respected and all textbooks are openly peer reviewed. Impact data show 63 percent of higher education institutions in the US use their textbooks. They work with The National Association of College Stores, so you can order hard copies at your bookstore. Most textbooks have OpenStax ancillary materials available or ancillaries shared by other faculty members. The best way to get to know their materials is to apply for an Educator user account. They will confirm your position with the University of Hawaiʻi and in a few days send you login information. This way you will be able to review book details, instructor resources (e.g. LMS cartridges, tests, slides), and student resources (e.g. videos, notetaking guides).

Other Repositories

Here are several other repositories and aggregators that we recommend looking through before conducting an open search on the internet.

• BCcampus supports the post-secondary institutions of British Columbia. Their open textbook project began in 2012 to create a collection of open textbooks aligned with the top 40 highest-enrolled subject areas in the province. A second phase began in spring of 2014 in which an additional 20 textbooks targeting trades, technology, and skills training would be developed.
• Mason OER Metafinder (MOM) simultaneously search OER repositories. Created by George Mason University’s Mason Publishing Group. Because it is a real-time search, it can take a bit longer than searches of pre-indexed content; however, as compensation the results returned are absolutely up-to-the-minute for each search target. Additional results continue to trickle in as the search continues running and you begin examining your results.
• San Bernardino Valley College hosts a webpage that lists OER by discipline.
• OERTX Repository is a digital repository of OER used by institutions of higher education in Texas and across the country.
• Open Educational Resources Used in Various Colleges and Universities is a webpage maintained by Dr Larry Green from Lake Tahoe Community College that contains lists and links collected from the CCCOER (Community College Consortium for Open Educational Resources) listserve conversations and a few other sources.
• Open Kapiʻolani Resources is maintained by Kapiʻolani Community College Digital Initiatives Librarian and provides a list of sites where one can find books, courses, course materials, images, and videos.

While this may already seem like an overwhelming list of places to search, this could just be the beginning. You may find the same materials listed in multiple locations, and that's okay. At this initial stage of searching, we recommend you start documenting your findings using the Source Tracker discussed above, or another method of your choosing. You could even take a few notes for each resource. But don't start evaluating or judging them. Consider this like brainstorming—add everything to your list and don't exclude any resources just yet. Later in this lesson we'll talk about evaluating resources and will provide you with a rubric to go back and evaluate the sources you find.

Not finding much?

If you've gone through all of the repositories shared here and you haven't found much, you may need to do an internet search.

You can narrow a Google search to find openly licensed resources:

1. Conduct your search on the Google website.
2. Once you see the list of search results, Click on the Settings link in the bottom right of the screen (location may change over time).
3. Choose Advanced Search from the settings menu
4. Scroll down the page to the Usage Rights drop down. Click on the field to see the filter options.
5. Select your desired license and then perform your search.

What do the usage rights permit?

• Not filtered by license: results will contain all content, including content that are "all rights reserved" copyright protected.
• Free to use or share: you may copy or redistribute its content if the content remains unchanged
• Free to use or share, even commercially: you may copy and redistribute its content, even commercially
• Free to use share or modify: you may copy, modify, or redistribute in ways specified in the license
• Free to use share or modify, even commercially: be sure to select an option that includes the word "commercially" if you want to use content for commercial use

Regardless of the usage right you select to conduct your advanced search, always double check the usage rights after finding a resource.

IF what you need is copyrighted with all rights reserved, consider asking the author for permission to use their work. You can also ask your librarian whether they can purchase copies to put on reserve or purchase an e-book with the appropriate access license for your course.

If you are still not able to locate any resources after searching the internet, please contact the class facilitator via the Email tool.

Open Courses and Course Materials

In this section we'll provide some places where you can find entire courses and course materials. Think of course materials as building blocks.  It could be a syllabus, a lesson plan, activity, presentation, worksheet, quiz, test—you get the idea.  While videos and images certainly are course materials, these will be covered separately.

• Saylor Academy offers full-length courses at the college and professional levels, each built by subject matter experts.
• Skills Commons is the official repository of all deliverables from the US Department of Labor (DOL)’s Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training (TAACCCT) Grant Program. This program has thus far made grants to nearly 800 community and technical colleges nationwide.
• Merlot II is a peer reviewed collection of open educational materials, including course assignments. Merlot is an initiative of the California State University system.

Again, if you are looking for an open course (or specific course materials) and can't find it in one of the repositories shared above, try an internet search.

Images and Videos

Inevitably you will want to use images and videos in your teaching materials. Remember that you should assume all images on the internet are "all rights reserved" copyright protected unless you can find out otherwise (usage terms, licensing info, etc.). In this section we'll go over some repositories and search strategies to help you find open images and videos.

Images

• Pixabay, Pexels, Unsplash, and Openclipart are repositories that provide images and clipart that are either openly licensed or in the public domain. Be sure to read the usage terms/licensing information so that you provide proper attributions if necessary.
• PikWizard offers high quality images that you can download and re-use for free. You will find licensing and attribution information posted posted to the right of any picture that you select from search results. You can even edit images in PikWizard to tailor them for your use.
• #WOCinTech Chat, Images of Empowerment, and Disabled And Here have diverse and inclusive images. See Open Kapiolani for more sites.
• Conduct an advanced image search in Google to filter results by usage rights.
• Use the Openverse search engine  (formerly Creative Commons Search) to search other sites, such as Google Images or Fotopedia, using a Creative Commons filter.

Videos

• Filter your search results for CC licensed videos on YouTube. To check the licensing of a YouTube video, expand the description under the video and look for the license info. A standard YouTube license allows you to link (and embed if code is provided), but the video is copyright protected. If it has a Creative Commons license, it is licensed under a Creative Commons CC BY license.
• Conduct a search for CC licensed videos on Vimeo.
• Wabash University Lilly Library Open Streaming Video Collections is a curated page of freely accessible collections of online video such as BBC Online Media; AP Archive Video; Civil Rights Digital Library; Frontline, NOVA, Great Performances, and other PBS collections; the Moving Image Internet Archive; National Film Board of Canada; the Smithsonian Institution Collection; and YouTube Movies.
• Your librarian may be able to show you subscriptions that your library has to streaming video services, such as Kanopy or Alexander Street. These are copyrighted materials but your institution has paid for the subscription.

Public Domain

Last but not least, there is a rapidly growing and immense collection of public domain materials that archives, museums, and libraries are digitizing and making available as public domain. There is no need to think about copyright, attribution, and licenses. Open Washington gives an excellent recap of Public Domain. Here are a few resources to check:

• Smithsonian Open Access: Millions of the Smithsonianʻs images are available for download, sharing, and reuse, including 3 million 2D and 3D digital items. This includes images and data from across the Smithsonian’s 19 museums, nine research centers, libraries, archives, and the National Zoo.
• New York Public Library Public Domain: The Library makes it possible to download high resolution images directly from the Digital Collections website.
• Library of Congress: This page features items from the Library's digital collections that are free to use and reuse. The Library believes that this content is either in the public domain, has no known copyright, or has been cleared by the copyright owner for public use.
• Europeana: Digitized materials placed in the public domain by museums and libraries in Europe. Here are the Public Domain Usage Guidelines.

Evaluating Resources

Now that you've created a list of possibilities, let's go back and evaluate them to start narrowing down your possibilities. To help you be as objective as possible, and to make sure you are consistent in what you are evaluating about each resource, we've developed a rubric-like worksheet for you to use. But, before we share the rubric, we'd like to discuss a very important factor of the evaluation - accessibility.

Accessibility

Using digital content makes it easy to distribute content. However, accessibility for students with disabilities can also be one of its greatest challenges. Accessibility describes the degree to which a person can access products, services, devices or environments. Accessibility in education is not only morally and ethically the right thing to do; it is also a Federal mandate. Website and digital content accessibility is mandated for public institutions under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. When selecting and using digital course content, it is critical to think about and plan for accessibility from the start.

Until recently, the existing federal and state laws did not clearly require educational materials be accessible from the point of creation, and was only required if/when a student with a documented disability had a need for accommodation. However, this changed when the United States Access Board updated the accessibility requirements for information and communication technology (ICT) in the federal sector covered by Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 on Jan. 18, 2017. Section 508 now requires all public facing online content be WCAG 2.0 Level A and Level AA compliant, and any non-public facing content (e.g., intranet content such as that within course management systems) must be compliant, if it falls under one or more of nine categories. Educational and training materials is one of the nine categories.  To read more about the 508 refresh, please view the 508 refresh page on UH's Accessibility website.

When evaluating resources for accessibility, first check to see if the hosting site or the resource itself has a statement about the resource's accessibility compliance. If none is available, you'll need to manually check for things.  Although there are numerous accommodations, we'll focus on the most common, based on content type.

Watch the video below from the BCcampus. The presentation slides are also available for downloading.

Visual Content

For content meant to be seen, you need to consider people who have sight related limitations. This includes having poor eyesight, a color vision deficiency, or being completely blind.  Many people with visual disabilities opt to use screen reader technologies that read aloud on-screen content. To make content accessible to students with visual disabilities, look for the following:

• Images have alternative text (Alt Text) or captions. Alternative text provides a short text description of non-text content which will be displayed if the item cannot be displayed or seen. To check for alt text, you can check the source code if you are familiar with html coding. Otherwise, try right clicking on the image to see if it is included in the image info.
• High color contrast of text to background. Consider that reading black text on white has the highest contrast and is therefore the easiest to read, while something like this "can you read this?" has low contrast and is much more difficult to read.
• Text does not use color alone to convey meaning. Consider readers who may have color deficiency. Using color alone to convey meaning may be difficult. For example, "click on the red icon  to stop and the green icon  to continue." If both icons are identical, someone who is red-green color deficient (the most common color deficiency) would have difficulty distinguishing between the two. Also, if a blind student were using a screen reader, you'd need to make sure that the ALT Text is provided so that the screen reader will read out which is red and which is green. A better solution would be to use different icons, or use words rather than icons.
• Links should be descriptive.  Links such as click here are not helpful to those using screen readers. Screen reader users can use a command to skip from link to link, with the link text being read aloud. If the screen reader just reads, "click here" out of context, the user will not know where "here" is. Create descriptive links that are meaningful out of context.

Audio Content

For content meant to be heard (including videos), you need to consider people who have hearing related disabilities. To evaluate the accessibility of audio content, look for the following:

• Accurate closed captions are available for the video. Note: If you are evaluating a YouTube video, do not just rely on auto-generated captions. You need to check that the captions are accurate.
• A text transcript is available for audio only content such as a podcast or an audio recording.

PDFs and Presentations

PDFs and presentations are particularly tricky to evaluate. Although you can check the visual content items (font size, contrast, use of color, etc.), other issues are difficult to check without a screenreader or the proper software. Issues include the use of header styles for formatting (rather than using a large, bold, colored font to distinguish headers), having a proper reading order set for screenreaders, and having ALT Text for any images. For PDFs, it is crucial that it was created using a program (Word, Adobe Acrobat, etc.) and not just digitized using a scanner. Scanned PDFs function as images and would need to have the appropriate ALT Text. For now, if a PDF or presentation does not have accessibility information, mark it as "unknown/not sure" on the rubric.

Want to learn more? Additional Accessibility Tips and Resources

• Basic Accessibility Tips from the University of Illinois
• Creating Accessible Course Materials from the Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges
• McMaster University Web Page Checklist (Interactive checklist for WCAG 2.0 Level AA)
• W3C WCAG 2.0 Checklist (HTML)

Evaluation Rubrics

UHCC Rubric for OER

You will be using a review form with criteria based on rubrics developed by Open Education Network and John D. Shank (Penn. State Berks) to help you sort through and evaluate the resources you have found in your searches. It is available below as a Google Doc (clicking on the link will prompt you to make a copy in your Google Drive account), and as a Word Document.  If you need an alternate format, please let us know.

• Google Doc Rubric
• Word Doc

Attributions: 

• Video: "How to Find and Evaluate OER" by Abbey Elder is licensed under a CC BY 4.0.
• Video: "OER Commons: How to search on OER Commons" by UH Online Innovation Center is licensed under a Standard YouTube License.
• Video: "Introducing the Open Textbook Library" by David Rose is licensed under CC BY 4.0.
• Original Content from "Open Education Resources (OERs)" by TRU Libraries is licensed under  CC BY 4.0.
• Video: "Everyone is Different!" by UX Mastery is licensed under a Standard YouTube License.
• Video: "How to Create Inclusive and Accessible OER" by Canadian Association of Research Libraries is licensed under CC BY 3.0.
• Presentation: "Accessibility in OER" by BCcampus is licensed under CC BY 4.0.