Open Education Resources (OER) are teaching and learning materials that educators are encouraged to use, share and often repurpose free of charge. By utilizing Creative Commons (CC) licensing, creators can specify whether or not their work can be remixed and repurposed, used commercially, requires attribution, and if derivative work must be released under similar licensing. The common goal is to create and share free material that supports learning.
OER take the form of textbooks, lesson plans, learning aids, and more. Many robust platforms and communities have sprung up in this shared effort, including Open Illinois.
There are six different types of licenses to choose from, depending on what you want to let other people do with your work. If you do not wish to place any restrictions, you can use a public domain or CC0 license.
It is easy to put a CC license on your work. All you have to do is choose a license and then clearly communicate this choice. Include a link to the appropriate license when possible.
A bit of text stating and linking to the license in a copyright notice is plenty, like this:
© 2022. This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 license.
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