Open Content, Creative Commons and Electronic Book Effects on Teaching and Learning

This week's readings were new material for me so they required some repeat reading but hopefully I can communicate coherent thoughts on the topic!  According to the MNC 2011 Horizon Report K-12, www.nmc.org/pdf/2011-Horizon-Report-K12.pdf,  open content is sharing information, instructional practices and experiences.  The report presents it as a cost effective alternative to textbooks where understanding, insight and experience may be shared.  They indicate students get skills related to finding, evaluating, interpreting and repurposing resources for subjects they are studying.  Some other benefits to students include availability of many more resources and access anytime online.  Open content may be more learner-centered if instructors offer several types of sources-video, text, audio or others.  A link in the 2011 Horizon Report K-12, opensource.com/open-source-way, states open content leads to an open exchange of ideas and information, collaboration, creation, and problem solving.  It may bring together diverse ideas and allow people to share work.   In my view open content may be a great resource for the classroom but there are problems.  There is a lot of material to search through and it obviously needs to be relevant and factually correct.  If teachers share online via video what they are doing in the classroom everyone may see their work thus possibly setting themselves up for an unwelcome response.  This will probably not be the case in most instances but there is that chance.  Teachers need to get the approval from their school too before they collaborate.  Selections of online resources will need to be made for most students.   Overall I think open content may be very helpful to teachers, students and school administrations.  Some schools like Open High School in Utah have adopted open content, go.nmc.org/wesdn.  Open content may include online textbooks available for free to schools so there is the potential for large cost savings.

Sources of open content include individuals, corporations, libraries, universities and other institutions that have made books and other information available for viewing and use by others.  One issue mentioned in this week's readings is orphan books, those books abandoned by the author and publisher.  I have run across books I wanted to read that were no longer obtainable but I did not really know much about orphan books.  There are a lot of legal issues I really do not understand but I think it would be helpful if these books were made available to the public.  This may be simplistic due to costs and copyright law.  In regard to Google and Orphan Works in our readings I do not like it there is a monopoly control over online access to a large body of orphans.

Another category of resources for the classroom is free content.  Wikipedia describes it as a work that has no significant legal restriction on its use, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_content.  In contrast, they describe open content as not having conventional copyright restrictions.  They also state that open content licenses rely on a copyright holder's power to license their work, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_content#Major_open_content_repositories_and_directories.

Creative Commons helps authors and others contribute to open content.  Creative Commons is a mechanism to help anyone who owns copyright- or database-protected content to waive those interests and place them in the public domain, http://creativecommons.org.  The licenses available through Creative Commons allow creators to choose how restrictive the release of their work should be.

After reading about open and free content I think it is necessary for everyone to try to find out what type of content they are using in the classroom, follow the licensing rules if appropriate and to make sure they site the source of the material.  Otherwise the copyright police may show up.

Electronic books, whether they are free, open or purchased content, are becoming more prominent in classrooms. In the NMC 2011 Horizon Report K-12 it states electronic books are not always just  copies of printed books, some have visual interfaces that include multimedia, www.nmc.org/pdf/2011-Horizon-Report-K12.pdf.  This would be great for visual learners.  Advantages of ebooks include portability, size and weight.  Who has not seen kids lugging huge backpacks full of books?  In the 2011 Horizon Report they mentioned that Ball State University has a class where future teachers used Kindles to experience firsthand how electronic books can be used in teaching and learning, www.nmc.org/pdf/2011-Horizon-Report-K12.pdf.  As more classrooms use electronic readers hopefully more universities will offer similar coursework.