Reflection #2 – Open Education Resources (OER)

Picture Attribution

Photo by Gustavo Fring on Pexels. https://www.pexels.com/photo/a-man-teaching-his-students-7156113/

What?

During class on September 25th, we discussed Open Education Resources and how we can implement them into our classrooms one day. Through this we learnt the defintion of copy right which esentially means if you create something digitally you hold copyright for it. Additionally, we learnt about Creative Common which many teachers would search for when looking to pull from various resources for lessons. If you see the CC (Creative Commons) logo you are allowed to include them in lessons as long as you attribute (give thanks) to the source. I found this lesson super valuable because as students we are always so worried about copyrighting resources we do not have the right to use. As someone that is going to be a first year teacher in the next few years, I feel more relaxed knowing their are so many valuable resources out to help teachers in supporting their students.

So What?

It was very important for us as future educators to know what is too far in using additional resources. By having this education on Open Education Resources we as teachers are able to find the resources available to us and not overstep in terms of privacy. The rule of thumb we learnt about is if something is not publicly available you can not share it in lessons. For example Netflix you have to sign up for whereas YouTube is publicly available and safe to share with your class. I will use this information moving forward into my career as an educator by incorporating Open Education Resources into my teaching practice.

Now What?

As I move forward in the career of education I will do my part in furthering my research in open education. I will begin this by going to the resources Micheal mentioned in our lecture. Some of these resources are Google, Teachers Pay teachers, Chat GPT, Twinkl, and OER Commons. The points my classmates brought up I found particularly interesting. They mentioned that in their Link2Practice, their mention teachers were using Chat GPT to form step my step instructions and math worksheets. I find Chat GPT is put in such a negative light but I do believe as someone that struggles with simply getting pen to paper with assignments or tasks. I feel I could benefit in having a simple conversation before beginning lessons I will put together in my class. I understand that their are co-workers you may be able to consult this information with but those resources are not always available and Chat GPT could be a great second option. I will apply what I learnt in this lecture about Open Education Resources by using open education resources in my lessons and share various resources with student. Saying this I do not want to pick resources that are not accessible rather I will find resources that are free, inclusive and appropriate for various learning needs.