OER is defined by Creative Commons as: teaching, learning, and research materials that reside in the public domain or have been released under an open license that permits their free use and re-purposing by others. In a Virginia Course Materials Survey 78% of students showed worry over the cost of textbooks and some even switched majors to ones with less costly textbooks. Creating OER would help not only students save money, but allow you to create content that supports your teaching style.
The current state of AI, according to ChatGPT: As of now, AI continues to evolve at a rapid pace, permeating various aspects of our daily lives and industries worldwide. Cutting-edge developments in machine learning, deep learning, and neural networks are driving advancements in natural language processing, computer vision, robotics, and autonomous systems. AI technologies are being integrated into diverse sectors, from healthcare and finance to transportation and entertainment, revolutionizing processes, optimizing decision-making, and enhancing efficiency. The transformative potential of AI to solve complex problems and augment human capabilities continues to shape the trajectory of technological innovation in the 21st century.
AI has proven invaluable in various domains, offering efficiency and convenience, facilitating significant time and effort savings as you engage with your OER content. Here are some ways you can use AI to assist you with creating your OER materials.
PLANNING: Generating ideas, outlines, objectives, summaries, lesson plans, discussion questions
CREATING: Content, quizzes, rubrics, gamification, checklists, feed back prompts, assignments, assessments, examples or scenarios of theories and concepts, visual aids
ENHANCING: proof reading and updating, translations, captions, mnemonics, analogies
However, always keep in mind the following challenges found with using AI:
Copyright and AI - currently the only sure thing we know is that the US Copyright Office has ruled that AI outputs are not eligible for copyright and are considered public domain. This means outputs from AI, on their own cannot obtain Creative Commons Licenses. However, if a human curates, arranges, or significantly modifies AI output, the resulting work might be eligible for copyright. Also, keep in mind that It is unethical to use copyrighted materials as input for AI, especially if it is done without permission.
The legal framework surrounding AI and copyright is likely to evolve, but while this plays out it is recommended to be transparent about any use of AI. Provide a reasonable attribution such as: "OER in the Library" by Reed S. Lot is licensed under CC BY 4.0 except where noted or something like 'All images were generated by Dall-E2 and are in the Public Domain via CC0'.
TIP: Always look at the usage and ownership of output according to the tool's Terms of Service.
Please keep in mind that using AI tools to create educational materials should always entail a Subject Matter Expert at the center of things. This is a strong recommendation from the Office of Educational Technology's Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Teaching and Learning. Also, in the Archived Webinar: Exploring Artificial Intelligence in Open Education Contexts (not so scary after all?) Dominic Slauson, Learning Experience Designer at the Palmer Art School of Business at the University of California, Irvine states, "By having that Subject Matter Expert at the center of it, we can ensure that we're leveraging it in a way that is factual, that is responsible, that is ethical, and that is contextually appropriate. So in many ways, our Subject Matter Experts are more important than ever with the advent of Generative AI. "
Something else to keep in mind is the importance of how you get the results you want from AI. Prompts can be openly licensed. You can learn more about Prompt Engineering here. And here is a great example of Prompt Engineering from Dominic Slauson:
Recommendations for getting started:
Chatgpt - currently the most popular Generative AI platform for outputting text-based content
Claude - powerful tool that allows you to upload documents as part of your prompt
Gemini - direct access to Google AI. Get help with writing, planning, learning and more.
Branchtrack - create complex and engaging simulations (1 free scenario)
H5P - open-source content creator (interactive video, course presentation, branching scenarios, virtual tour (360)
More tools can be found here:
TIP: Try asking ChatGPT or Gemini for AI tools specific to your discipline. Remember to vet the source to verify credibility and look at pricing.