Thing 17 - Open Educational Resources (OER)
OER provides a multitude of learning materials free to distribute, access, adapt and use to promote learning. The SSSC OER was easier to find something directly linked to my interests. The search in the OER Commons covered a wider subject area and therefore had a wide variety of materials. This made my search harder, I guess this would take practice or some sort of library catalogue would be helpful. On each site I was able to access something of interest which linked me to a free Open Univeristy training course (one of which I think I may have completed already).
I think that because these resources are free that would be of great benefit to students and also any individual with any interest in a variety of subject areas. I have not explored them enough to find out if they would stand up to all requirements of academic writing. But they certainly would be an additional, easy to access source of information. Until today I had never heard of OER so this may be another issue if people are not aware that it exists.
If it is free; free from copyright; allows you to adapt training materials to suit your organisation, I would think that is a good thing and a tool to be utilised whilst everyone is trying to reduce expenses including training budgets.
Changing the mindset and practice of how learning and training is delivered will probably be a consideration regarding its popularity or suitability.
For me this is yet another information source which could be of benefit. I guess my biggest problem now is dealing with information overload. Having so much information to hand makes the best selection harder, or questioning on whether you have enough information or should you read more. I guess that is down to discipline and personal learning style. I hopefully will get better and more confident in my decision making as I grow as a perpetual student in life, academia and work.
