Welcome once again to the so-called ‘OER Newsletter’. Presented here, for your enjoyment, are some of the resources, tools, and sites that have crossed our digital desks in the past month. One of our favorites is TinEye Labs’ “Multicolr Search Lab”…in honor of the rapidly approaching spring, we selected a pastel palette for our image search (see picture). Read on, or skip down to the Multicolr link.
Open License
MapStory [CC BY-SA 2.0]
Creative platform that allows you to start your own story or build on another one, with use of maps and time lines as a foundation. Through Creative Commons, this platform is completely free, and it allows you to “share what you know about the world we live in.”
[Link]
MIT OCW – new and improved materials [generally CC BY-NC-SA 3.0]
Resources – Chemical Demonstrations
Twelve short-form videos. From the link: “Through the magic of chemistry, Dr. John Dolhun and Dr. Bassam Shakhashiri create things that steam, fizzle, and glow. Each video also provides a deeper look into the chemistry that makes it all possible.”
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Course – The Film Experience
Includes eight full video lectures, (student) lecture notes, and a curated collection of public domain films. Take a look at the course’s second lecture on the brilliant Buster Keaton.
[Link]
Resources – Lecture notes from Modern Art and Mass Culture
ARTH208 is one of our most popular courses on iTunes U. While the lecture notes here are in outline form and might be a bit cryptic to the complete neophyte, they’ll probably be of interest to someone actively studying modern art.
[Link]
Course – The Challenge of World Poverty
MIT’s OCW has done it again, with an economics course that looks to explore the troubles of poverty. The topical lectures give a chance for economists to be hopeful for a better tomorrow.
[Link]
Great Writers Inspire
Repository of classic novels made into ebooks. Searchable by author (Jane Austen, Emily Dickinson, and Oscar Wilde to name a few), theme (Medieval, Renaissance, Modernism, etc), or the usual keyword search. -Thanks to David for the info!
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AP Environmental Science Online Course
The folks over at The Encyclopedia of Earth released this modular course covering topics on the earth’s systems, human population dynamics, natural resources, environmental quality, global changes, and environment and society. -Thanks to David for the info!
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Bardomatic from Open GLAM
Do you know your Shakespeare? Try this great new game from Open GLAM’s Open Humanities Working group. The game features a quote from the famous playwright’s plays and asks you to guess which one it came from. Idea courtesy of Crowdcrafting.
[Link]
Open Access
Instructional Science and Engineering Videos by Jonathan Hare (Vega Science Trust)
23 short videos from BBC’s Scientist, Johnathan Hare. These educational videos include fun topics like: mobile phones, paper windmills, and infrared photography. –Credit: SR
[Link]
Weed to Wonder (Cornell University, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, National Science Foundation)
Did you know that corn orignially a Mexican weed, called Teosinte? This is the story of how “human ingenuity” brought about a starch that we use for food and fuel–CORN!
[Link]
Tools
Mathics
Ever wanted to see the beautiful side of Math? Well now you can with MathJax’s Mathics! Just type in the equation and press shift+return and prepare to experience algebra in a whole new way.-Credit: ES
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DIY Book Scanner
Are you sinking in quicksand from the amount of books in your personal library? Then why not get yourself out with the Arstechnica DIY book scanner (while following all applicable intellectual property laws, of course)? It even scans 150 pages per minute and allows you to digitize your own personal library! -Credit: ES
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Quik Maps
Are you lost? Take a screen shot of the route and destination from Google Earth and then doodle your own path!-Credit: ES
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“Recording and Hosting Podcasts Using the Internet Archive” (The Chronicle of Higher Education – ProfHacker)
An English professor, from Fayetteville State University still has us hooked from Jan. 21st’s MMD post! -He has decided that he won’t let the classroom environment be forgotten, and is making his own podcasts, with scenes of a “learning environment” to act as the background to his lectures.
[Link]
Loomio
Not too hot on making decisions in a group project? Want to ensure that all voices are heard? Then make the decision to have your group use, Loomio, “an online tool for collaborative decision making!”
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Magical Maths
Ever wonder how Japanese students learn how to multiply so well at a youg age? Well the secret’s out!
psst: Magic Math Lines (AKA ‘How Japanese Kids Learn to Multiply’). -Credit: ES
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dScribe
Ever wanted to create an open license OER of your own? Interested in the “peer-based approach to sharing?” Then give why not give this course a whirl?
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Mentor Mob
Need help with a project, but not sure where to turn? The Mentor Mob has playlists to help you learn a list of links that can help you out!
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Multicolr Search Lab (TinEye Labs)
Here’s another cool way to search the images on Flickr and Creative Commons, only by color! Choose up to 5 colors and enjoy!-Credit: ES & Chad Sansing
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MindMup
This site is all about creating distraction-free mindmaps! Since you get a new URL with every saved modification, no one can change your own creation! -but they can suggest edited versions as needed.
-Credit: ES
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Kevin (Pgogy)
This neat little tool helps you attribute and/or give credit to images.
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Serious Fun
Memrise
A repost from the dim early days of OER newsletters.-Thanks to @Sara_Ackrill for the timely reminder!
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Up-Goer Five Text Editor
Test your ability to explain the hardest things using ONLY the “ten hundred most used words!” -Credit: The Chronicle of Higher Education
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AdViews: A Digital Archive of Vintage Television Commercials (Internet Archive)
Ever wondered how advertising was done in the 1950’s-1980’s? Need other ideas for a project? Check out the archives here!-Credit: SR
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Hackativity Kits
Doing some webmaking this kit is sure to be a good guide to help you on the way!-Credit: ES
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News
Common Crawl (covered by MIT Technology Review)
“Having an open, shared corpus of human knowledge is simply a way of democratizing access to information that’s fundamental to innovation.”-Gilad Elbaz, Founder. Want to build a new search engine? Check it out! -Credit: SD
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Maker Dad: Make Makers, Not Robots
Is the TV boring you? Why not give this article a read, and set-up a maker lab of your own. And get those creative juices going! -Credit: ES
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Credits
ES = EdSurge (www.edsurge.com)
SR = The Scout Report (scout.wisc.edu/scout-report)
SD = Stephen Downes’ OLDaily (downes.ca/news/OLDaily.htm)