Guides: Open Education: Open Textbooks

What Are Open Education Resources (OER)?

Open Educational Resources (OER's) are teaching, learning, and research resources that are free of cost and access barriers, and which also carry legal permission for open use. (SPARC)

Finding Open Textbooks

Mason OER Metafinder (MOM)

MOM is the "Google for OERs" because it simultaneously searches across the obvious OER repositories (e.g., MERLOT II, OAOpen.org, OER Commons, OpenStax CNX, etc.) but also sites like HathiTrust (full-view materials only), DPLA, OERs at Internet Archive, and Project Gutenberg.

OASIS
Search for open access and openly licensed textbooks.
Mason OER Metafinder (MOM)
Search across twenty-two different sources of open educational resources.
Google Advanced Search (with "Usage Rights" filter)
Use the "Usage Rights" filter on Google's Advances Search (and Advanced Image Search) to find Creative Commons-licensed works.

Textbook Repositories

BC Campus Open Textbooks
British Columbia Ministry of Advances Educations' Open Textbook Project makes open textbooks available in BC's 40 highest-enrolled academic subject areas.
Digital Commonwealth
Explore historical collections from libraries, museums, and archives across Massachusetts.
Digital Public Library of America
Scholarly researches use DPLA to fine open access sources from archives across the country.
Directory of OER repositories
OER repositories from around the globe!
MIT Open Courseware Textbooks
OER Commons
OER Commons is a public digital library of open educational resources. Explore, create, and collaborate with educators around the world to improve curriculum.
OpenStax
Peer-reviewed textbooks that meet standard scope and sequence requirements.
Open Textbook Library
Browse textbooks by subject.
Saylor Bookshelf
100+ books on introductory subjects and business topics.
Writing Across the Disciplines Clearinghouse
Contains books related to the study of writing, rhetoric, and composition, as well as a number of books on the practice and pedagogy of writing. It also contains a number of landmark publications in writing studies.
LibreTexts

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Open Education

What Are Open Education Resources (OER)?

Finding Open Textbooks

Textbook Repositories