OER

As a learner and a student, I think that Open Educational Resources can be a very valuable tool if you just know where to look.  Text books, manuals, and walk-throughs are available at my fingertips for free.  As a teacher, tools like these will be just as valuable. 



While exploring Open Educational Resources online I found some resources that I can actually see myself using within my own classroom at some point.  I found a site that I can actually load and alter textbooks for free, and they are all geared towards elementary education!  I could use this site by itself or along with actual textbooks that may be provided by the school.  Textbooks in the schools however are usually out of date even before they are purchased depending on the subject.  So I could use the online text that is constantly being updated to fill in the gaps of the actual textbooks that I have been given within my classroom.

I found another tool that is geared more for organizational purposes within the classroom.  It has tips and programs to help with gradebooks, lesson plans, and you can even have it so the students can access assignments as well.  I am not sure just to what extent I could use this OER in an early childhood classroom, but like I said, it has a lot of information for teachers. 

My favorite OER that I found is actually a digital children's library.  How great would it be to bring a library into your classroom?  Many schools have things like "library day" where once a week the children can spend a half and hour in the library and they can check out one or two books at a time.  This OER can be used on several different devices, so they could access the site at home, in the classroom, or even on their parents smartphone! 

I think that resources like this are very useful to learners, students, and educators alike, and I am very excited about several that I have stumbled accross today.