This section focuses on some of the best OA and OER RESOURCES for both Students and Scholars:
OER= OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES all FREE
OA = OPEN ACCESS -- all FREE
NEW!
(This Search Strategy Worksheet should be used before searching specific databases -- in order to produce the best search results)
Licenses are explained here and here
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"It's September - the perfect time to put on your virtual sneakers and stop by the Open Textbook Library where you can browse more than 1,300 openly licensed textbooks in math, law, computer science, engineering, medicine, humanities, and more.
Open textbooks are available to download, print, and adopt without extra permissions. And all are offered at no cost to you thanks to the dedication and generosity of the open education global community. Welcome to AY2023-24!"
Image by Scott Webb is licensed by Unsplash |
Critical Thinking in Academic Research
by Robin Ewing and Cindy Gruwell
Published by Minnesota State Colleges and Universities (CC BY-SA)
Critical Thinking in Academic Research - 2nd Edition provides examples and easy-to-understand explanations to equip students with the skills to develop research questions, evaluate and choose the right sources, search for information, and understand arguments. This 2nd Edition includes new content based on student feedback as well as additional interactive elements throughout the text.
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| Closing the Gap
Prince George's Community College Implements Open Educational Practices in Introductory Psychology
Participating in the Open Education Network's Certificate in Open Educational Practices (OEP), Victoria Taylor and Jeffrey Potter recently implemented an OEP pilot study in eight sections of Psychology 1010 at Prince George's Community College in Largo, Maryland. Their goal: to close the gap in student readiness for reading, understanding, and conducting research in general psychology courses.
Read their takeaways in our profile.
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| Apply Today
The Open Education Network is now accepting applications to participate in our 2024 certificate programs:
Certificate in Open Education Librarianship
We're accepting applications from higher education librarians through October 20, 2023. See the Call for Applications for details.Certificate in Open Educational PracticesWe've issued the Call for Applications and encourage faculty/librarian teams to apply by October 27, 2023.
Image by MarcosSphotography is licensed by Pixabay. |
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2023 Open Education ConferenceNovember 7-9, 2023
Quick reminder! Don't miss this year's Open Education Conference, a virtual event with keynote presentations by Brock University's Rajiv Jhangiani and The Ohio State University's Jasmine Roberts-Crews. Register now for the early bird rate!
Event by Popular is licensed CC BY 3.0. |
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Frequently Asked Questions:
How does the Open Textbook Library handle different versions and editions?
As a referatory, our goal is to connect faculty with the most recent edition. Most authors and publishers keep an archive of past versions and editions. Other questions? Visit our FAQ.
Question by Keval Rajeshbhai Jethwa is licensed CC BY 3.0. |
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Image by PhotoEnduro is licensed by Pixabay
About the OEN
The Open Education Network (OEN) is a global community of more than 1,600 higher education institutions working together to transform education to be more equitable, affordable, and accessible through open education.
Focused on action, our community advances open education in ways that are collaborative and sustainable, including through the Open Textbook Library.
Sound like the OEN community could be a good fit for you? |
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"Open Education Network promotes equity, access and student success through open educational resources and practices."
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NEW SEARCH ENGINE FOR FREE, OPEN ACCESS BOOKS:
Browse in the OAPEN LIBRARY by Subject here
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES ON OA AND OER MAY BE FOUND HERE
FREE OA DATABASES MAY BE FOUND HERE
A SEARCH ENGINE TO LOCATE FREE ACADEMIC TEXTBOOKS MAY BE FOUND HERE: https://bit.ly/FTEATEXT (created by Stephen Perry)
AMAZING FREE RESOURCES
(INCLUDES HOW TO AVOID PLAGIARISM, as well as how to format footnotes, and references in an academic paper using a variety of the most popular Style Manuals)
AND FOR UA STUDENTS, STAFF AND FACULTY: A RELATED RESOURCE OF INTEREST
UA= University of Arkansas, Fayetteville (AR.)
CRS REPORTS -- provides updated, meticulously and thoroughly researched reports and documents on Foreign Affairs, U.S. Foreign Policy, reports on countries of the world. CRS also includes research on Climate Change; Resources for Grant Seekers; the political, economic and foreign policy implications of COVID-19; and Nuclear Power, and hundreds of other research studies. Reports are authored and researched by professional Librarians, who are subject experts on a topic or a country. This is a fantastic resource for students of Foreign Policy and Diplomacy, Political Science, Economics, Health Policy, and many other fields of study.
The Congressional Research Service (CRS) recently published the “Legal Sidebar” report (7 pages; PDF),
“The Death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg: Initial Considerations for Congress.”
CRS also published (27 pages; PDF), Confirmation of U.S. Circuit and District Court Nominations During Presidential Election Years: Frequently Asked Questions.”
Finally, an updated version of the CRS report (28 pages; PDF), “Supreme Court Appointment Process: President’s Selection of a Nominee” was published today.
Presidential Transition Act: Provisions and Funding (11/13/2020)
(What precisely is supposed to happen in the Transition process between the President who loses -and the new President-Elect? This new CRS Report details the process well, clearly, and notes funding mechanisms.)
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES ON PRESIDENTIAL TRANSITION:
Consult the Center for Presidential Transition, most especially their Publications and Resources section
In addition, for recent articles and OpEds on the topic of Presidential Transition, consult Harvard University's THINK TANK SEARCH ENGINE, and use the search term "Presidential Transition" - without the quotes.
"For an index of CRS products, click the SEARCH button without entering a search term."
CREATING YOUR OWN CUSTOMIZED SEARCH ENGINE: HOW TO DO IT
CREATING YOUR OWN CUSTOMIZED SEARCH ENGINE.docx
CSE SEARCH ENGINE PPT FOR A CUSTOMIZED SEARCH ENGINE 2022.pdf
"I’ve been teaching critical thinking for many years, and I’ve developed a short, free, Creative Commons-licensed text that’s useful for a brief (maybe 3 week?) critical thinking section in any intro philosophy or composition course (or really, just about any course; it’s been used at my college by professors from a number of departments.)"
Exercises_for_Critical_Thinking_I.docx
These exercises were written to accompany a course in critical thinking. Everything starts with a question so it's important to be able to formulate good questions.
The exercises are divided into five sections:
- The scientific approach which is one way to answer our questions and the approach that we use in these exercises.
- Argumentation which focuses on writing, analyzing, and evaluating arguments that use premises to support our conclusion.
- Causal arguments which discuss formulating and testing causal arguments using experimental design and survey design.
- How to use survey design to test causal claims. These exercises use the 2018 General Social Survey (GSS) and a statistical program, Survey Documentation and Analysis (SDA), which was written at UC Berkeley. Both the GSS and SDA are freely available wherever you have an internet connection.
- There is a brief introduction to SDA at the end of these exercises.
- Common errors in critical thinking.
There are several ways you could utilize these exercises. Each of the exercises is independent of the other exercises which means that you could pick and choose
whichever exercises you want to use. Or you could use the exercises in their entirety. You may want to add to or delete from materials within these exercises.
You have permission to make changes, additions, and deletions as you think best.
A Critical Thinking Cheat Sheet:
CRITICAL THINKING: AN INFORMATIVE CHEAT SHEET: a cheatsheet for critical thinking (Feel free to distribute this handout to classes.)
(THESE ABOVE DATABASES ARE EXCELLENT FOR ACADEMIC, SCHOLARLY and PERSONAL RESEARCH -- THE VAST MAJORITY OF ARTICLES ARE IN FREE, FULL-TEXT FORMAT)
(See also Media Literacy for related material and resources)
DISSERTATIONS AND THESES (HOW TO FIND -- FORE FREE - THE COMPLETE, FULL TEXT OF MANY RECENT DISSERTATIONS IN THIS NEW WORLD OF OA)
(PLEASE NOTE: these free Dissertation Search Engines are most certainly not comprehensive -- but -- using them efficiently can allow retrieval of many recent Dissertations. HINT: One needs to use all of the Search Engines in this listing to retrieve maximum results)
"Standard Ebooks, "is a volunteer driven, not-for-profit effort to produce a collection of high quality, carefully formatted, freely accessible, open source, and free public domain ebooks that meet or exceed the quality of commercially produced ebooks."
E-MAIL ETIQUETTE:
The second one, Email Etiquette Reminders can be viewed online as a Canva document or downloaded here as a PDF.
ALSO LITERACYPACK - for many other excellent, very practical, ESL WEBSITES
Here are examples of the many ESL resources for both Teachers and ESL Students to be found in the above ESL WEB SITE:
and
and
("College ESL Writers: Applied Grammar and Composing Strategies for Success is designed as a comprehensive
grammar and writing etext for high intermediate and advanced level non-native speakers of English.")
EVERYDAY CONVERSATIONS: LEARNING AMERICAN ENGLISH: Everyday Conversations.pdf
and
IN THE LOOP: A Reference Guide to American English Idioms
and:
READING AND COMPREHENSION WEB SITE WITH LESSON PLANS and UNIT OBECTIVES
and:
and:
Using Articles (for multilingual writers)
and:
ALL THINGS GRAMMAR, WITH THOUSANDS OF WORKSHEETS
and
FREE RESOURCES FOR STUDENTS STUCK AT HOME DURING SCHOOL CLOSURES: FREE ONLINE RESOURCES FOR STUDY AND TEACHNG
RESOURCES FOR KIDS STUCK AT HOME DURING SCHOOL CLOSURES.docx
(UPDATED -- MANY NEW OER EDUCATIONAL HUBS INCLUDED IN THIS LATEST REVISION, plus a new Children's Book on the Coronavirus -- with how to explain COVID-19 to Kids. )
(Updated May 2022 with many free scholarly articles about film and film topics)
NEW SEARCH ENGINE FOR LOCATING FREE ACADEMIC TEXTBOOKS
(Includes Plagiarism Prevention)
(My eternal thanks to the professional Librarians writing these guides --LIBGUIDES are the BEST way to begin the research process)
LITERATURE:
Invitation to World Literature – hosted on Discovery Education
- Read beneath the surface of 13 great works of world literature that have traveled the globe with this multimedia course for teachers, students, and lifelong learners.
- The following courses include a wide range of resources with in-depth breakdowns from scholars, background and reading support, an interactive timeline, translations, and additional resources for further teaching and studying.
(See also DIGITAL LITERACY for related material and resources)
OTL: A PowerPoint, by Ms. Michelle Reed, @U TEXAS ARLINGTON, discusses the OPEN TEXTBOOK LIBRARY: http://bit.ly/OTL11 (My thanks and gratitude to Ms. Reed)
Licenses noted in the above Powerpoint are explained here and here
Open collections of Open Access (OA) Textbooks:
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LibreTexts - Open textbooks across multiple disciplines created by faculty from institutions spanning the U.S.
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Open SUNY Textbooks -State University of New York’s collection of faculty authored and peer-reviewed open textbooks.
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OpenStax Textbooks - AP-level open textbooks spanning multiple subjects that are developed and peer-reviewed by educators.
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Open Textbook Library - Peer-reviewed collection of hundreds of open textbooks spanning multiple subjects. All textbooks are quality reviewed by faculty from a variety of institutions.
REFER TO THIS GOOGLE DOC FOR OTHER OA COLLECTIONS:
(PLEASE SEE APPENDIX B)
PHOTOS: SEE COPYRIGHT FREE PHOTOS ABOVE
Many additional Preprint Search Engines are found in this article, appearing in College and Research Libraries News (October 2019)
Discovery and scholarly communication aspects of preprints: Sources for online information
FINDING AND SEARCHING FOR PREPRINTS
SEARCH OSF PREPRINTS
PREPRINT FAQs
Preprints, Science and the News Cycle (JSTOR)
The importance of a preprint repository
By: Praveen Chaddah, Current Science, Vol. 111, No. 6 (25 September 2016), pp. 979-980
SEARCHING FOR COVID-19 INFORMATION USING PREPRINTS
ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND ARTICLES ABOUT PREPRINTS
Feel Free to use for your classroom needs.
RESEARCH: ELEMENTS OF RESEARCH FOR STUDENTS
(Students just initiating the Research and Writing Process would be wise to start here; also please consult the Research Tutorials and Research Tutorials from University Libraries)
Covers Authoring Techniques for Accessible Office Documents: Word Processing Applications
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Google Docs
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Microsoft Word 2013, 2016, and 2019
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Microsoft Word for Mac 2011, 2016, and 2019
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Microsoft Word 2010
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Microsoft Word 2008 for Mac
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Microsoft Word 2007
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Pages for Mac
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OpenOffice Writer and LibreOffice Writer
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Authoring Techniques for Accessible Office Documents: Spreadsheet Applications:
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Google Sheets
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Microsoft Excel 2010, 2013, 2016, and 2019
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Microsoft Excel for Mac 2008, 2011, 2016, and 2019
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Microsoft Excel 2007
- EXCEL MADE EASY
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Numbers for Mac
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OpenOffice Calc
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Authoring Techniques for Accessible Office Documents: Presentation Applications
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Google Slides
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Microsoft PowerPoint 2010, 2013, 2016, and 2019
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Microsoft PowerPoint for Mac 2008, 2011, 2016, and 2019
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Microsoft PowerPoint 2007
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Keynote for Mac
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OpenOffice Impress
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PDF Production Applications:
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Adobe InDesign CS6 and CC
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Adobe Acrobat 11 Pro and DC
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Adobe Acrobat 10 Pro
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Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro
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Document Accessibility Resources
APP STATE = APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY, BOONE, NORTH CAROLINA, USA
(OCW=OPEN ACCESS FOR UNIVERSITY COURSES --
Many of these resources offer either free Lecture Notes and / or free video lectures of an actual University course, as well as free videos of actual University lectures -- this is useful for Educational Advising, and for International students wanting to learn more about the University experience in the U.S.)
More Information and Lesson Plans on How to Evaluate Web Sites and How to properly assess the credibility of Information found on the Internet: ASSESSING THE CREDIBILITY OF WEBSITES
WEB SITE CREATION: HOW TO CREATE A SIMPLE YET EFFECTIVE WEBSITE:
HOW TO CONSTRUCT A BASIC WEBPAGE VIA PBWORKS 2020.pptx
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