Based on my understanding, the difference between online educational content and openly licenced educational content is licencing. Online educational content is a very broad and vague term that can really mean any resource that is educational that you can find online. Openly licenced resources on the other hand are a bit more specific. This type of resource is completely free (something not guaranteed with online educational content) and is licenced to protect the creator and user. The main licencing that is used is called Creative Commons which essentially says that anyone can use a resource as long as they give recognition to the original creator, other than that, they can use it however they wish (OER Africa, 2020). There are also three distinguished kinds of openly licenced content; Open Courseware, Open Educational Resources, and Massive Open Online Courses. Open Courseware is an open course in which all the components of the course are available. Open Educational Resources are resources that have a licence on them that allows free usage. Massive Open Online Courses are online courses that have unlimited numbers of participants and are free to students.
The Open Educational Resource I have chosen to use for this assignment is Wise Owl Factory. This is a free website that provides free educational crafts, projects, experiments, and resources. Based on the evaluation guide provided by OER Africa I have reviewed the relevance, accuracy, production quality, accessibility, interactivity, and licencing of this resource. It is certainly relative to classroom activities, and the accuracy and quality of the materials are good. It is very accessible as long as one has access to the internet. As well, there are not any video resources on this site, so there is no need to worry about closed captions. and the resources that are free to print off promote participation in the classroom. Lastly, the licencing is open on this website allowing reuse of the materials.
Regarding Open Educational Resources in my own life, I can definitely see myself using them for my job. I work at an out of school care program currently and I partake in a lot of program planning. While out of school care’s main focus is not educational crafts and activities, there certainly is still a factor of learning involved whether it be teaching them a new game or explaining a new art technique. Wise Owl Factory is an open resource that I will be using in my professional life. There are many different projects and activities that can be used in order to engage children in doing something fun, but also informative.
With Valentines Day coming up, I thought this would be a fun game to play with my group at work. It doubles as colouring and BINGO as it is in black and white – two activities in one!
References
Finding Open Content Tutorial: OER Africa. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.oerafrica.org/book/finding-open-content-tutorial
Wise Owl Factory. (2020, February 5). Retrieved from https://www.thewiseowlfactory.com/