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Open Author helps you build and publish Open Educational Resources for you and for the benefit of educators and learners everywhere.

Learn more about creating OER

Groups provides a flexible environment to organize, create, share, and discuss resources with others in your network. Collaborate with group members, tag and add resources to shared folders, create your own collections, all within a public or private group.

Groups

Search through collections curated by our digital librarians

Collections

Common Core resources organized for your needs

Common Core

Hubs

A Custom Resource Center

Projects, districts, states, and initiatives make use of Hubs to bring groups of educators together to create, organize, and share OER collections that meet their common goals. Explore Hubs

Microsites

Custom Digital Libraries

Microsites are custom, flexible sites that include all the features available on OER Commons. Microsites allow your users to search resource collections using a custom taxonomy at a unique URL. Contact Us

Our award-winning OER Professional Learning programs support instructors and curriculum specialists to gain the necessary skills required to find, adapt, and evaluate high quality open materials.

In-person and virtual OER workshops help focus instructors to develop a "commons" mindset, to experience the benefits of open processes using the platform's tools, collaborative features, and workflows. This can include using Open Author for creating, remixing, and publishing shared curriculum.

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How to Search OER Commons

View all How-to videos

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OER Commons is a dynamic digital library and network. Explore open education resources and join our network of educators dedicated to curriculum improvement.

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Better Sharing, Brighter Future

"Twenty Years of Creative Commons (in Sixty Seconds)" by Ryan Junell and Glenn Otis Brown for Creative Commons is licensed via CC BY 4.0 and includes adaptations of the multiple open and public domain works. View full licensing and attribution information about all works included in the video on Flickr.

Creative Commons is an international nonprofit organization that empowers people to grow and sustain the thriving commons of shared knowledge and culture we need to address the world's most pressing challenges and create a brighter future for all.

Learn more

The nonprofit behind the licenses and tools the world uses to share

For over 20 years, Creative Commons has supported a global movement built on a belief in the power of open access to knowledge and creativity. From Wikipedia to the Smithsonian, organizations and individuals rely on our work to share billions of historic images, scientific articles, cultural artifacts, educational resources, music, and more!

Wikipedia

55+ million articles

Every one of Wikipedia's 55 million plus articles are shared openly and freely using a CC license.

The Met

492,000+ images

All images of public-domain works in the Met's collection are openly available under Creative Commons Zero (CC0).

Khan Academy

100,000+ lessons

Many of the lessons found on Khan Academy are openly licensed under CC-BY-NC-SA.

Wikipedia

55+ million articles

Every one of Wikipedia's 55 million plus articles are shared openly and freely using a CC license.

The Met

492,000+ images

All images of public-domain works in the Met's collection are openly available under Creative Commons Zero (CC0).

Khan Academy

100,000+ lessons

Many of the lessons found on Khan Academy are openly licensed under CC-BY-NC-SA.

Wikipedia

55+ million articles

Every one of Wikipedia's 55 million plus articles are shared openly and freely using a CC license.

The Met

492,000+ images

All images of public-domain works in the Met's collection are openly available under Creative Commons Zero (CC0).

Khan Academy

100,000+ lessons

Many of the lessons found on Khan Academy are openly licensed under CC-BY-NC-SA.

Latest News

Open Culture
Cropped, Open Culture Strategic Workshop by Filipa Alfama, CC BY 4.0

One year after Creative Commons (CC) hosted an exploratory Open Culture Roundtable, in Lisbon, Portugal, which initiated the Towards a Recommendation on Open Culture (TAROC) global initiative, nearly 50 stakeholders from all continents gathered again for a strategic workshop, in Lisbon in May 2024. In this blog post, we share a snapshot of key highlights.

About CC

Open Culture, Open Heritage

About CC, Community

About CC

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Open Culture
Cropped, Open Culture Strategic Workshop by Filipa Alfama, CC BY 4.0

One year after Creative Commons (CC) hosted an exploratory Open Culture Roundtable, in Lisbon, Portugal, which initiated the Towards a Recommendation on Open Culture (TAROC) global initiative, nearly 50 stakeholders from all continents gathered again for a strategic workshop, in Lisbon in May 2024. In this blog post, we share a snapshot of key highlights.

About CC

Open Culture, Open Heritage

About CC, Community

About CC

Images Attribution
view

Le Sortie de l'opéra en l'an 2000 by A. Robida - Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division - Public Domain.

" An Original Theory or New Hypothesis of the Universe. Plate XXXI. ". By Thomas Wright. Public Domain

" Community Needs Care" by Camila Leão for Fine Acts x OBI is licensed via https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/.

CC staff photos are licensed under CC BY 4.0. Gratitude to Sara Jordan Photography.

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Creative Commons is an international nonprofit organization that empowers people to grow and sustain the thriving commons of shared knowledge and culture we need to address the world's most pressing challenges and create a brighter future for all.

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This webinar includes speakers from schools in the UK where Google Classroom was adopted to bridge the gap caused by the Pandemic.

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Must one unplug to properly observe reality?

Going without a phone for any extended period of time seems to be the modern-day equivalent of a vow of silence. Two months ago I 86'd my phone for 60 days to see if my world would keep spinning (it did). People were shocked, appalled, and flat-out worried.

I'll skip the trite Matrix references regarding unplugging from the grid, and simply say I learned more about myself than I intended. I couldn't have done so without disconnecting for a while, without stepping back and actually thinking about my life in a deliberate, uninterrupted way.

This is what I learned during my two months of quiet time:

We have weird expectations. I realized I needed to get rid of my cellphone for a while when I felt pressure to respond to text messages, email, and social media throughout the day. We all have different expectations. You might expect a response in an hour, someone else might expect a response in ten minutes, another person might expect a response the same day. These expectations are arbitrary. When I eliminated my ability to immediately respond, I was able to toss everyone's expectations into the ether.

Meaningful conversations. Without the banality of ephemeral text conversations, my face-to-face conversations have become more meaningful: when I'm spending time with my closest friends and loved ones, I now have more to discuss in earnest. I enjoy these conversations more than ever.

People are supportive and understanding. When we make changes in our lives, we're often afraid of what people will think. Will they think I'm crazy, stupid-out of touch? People are more supportive and understanding than we think-particularly the people closest to us. Especially when we discuss our changes with them, and let them know we're making the changes so we can live happier lives: our true friends want us to be happy.

We program ourselves. Without knowing it, our daily activities have a profound impact on our future selves. I used to reach for my BlackBerry every few minutes no matter where I was-even at the urinal. Even when the phone wasn't with me, I had programmed myself to reach for it. What an obscene Twitch!

We can reprogram ourselves. We can change these patterns. When we remove a habit from our lives, we become acutely aware of how that habit affected our lives-this is true for any habit: smoking, overeating, etc. It took 22 days for me to reprogram the Twitch, 22 days of pausing to notice why I was Twitching. After 22 days I no longer felt the urge to immediately react; I no longer felt the need to pacify myself with transitory activities like texting or responding to emails during every moment of "downtime."

Downtime is a misnomer. We used to have precious interstitial zones in which we could find momentary solace: airports, checkout lines, waiting rooms, and other transient sanctuaries. No longer is this the case. Now everyone seems to be on their phones during these fleeting moments: they are attempting to be more productive or interactive, but perhaps stopping and thinking will be more effective.

The world goes on. Without a cellphone, without the Internet, without a television, the world keeps turning. You can test anything for a short period of time to see if it's right for you: it's not difficult to give up anything when you live in the real world. There wasn't a single time when I actually needed my phone in the last two months-there were times when it was inconvenient, times when I had to fight through the frustration-but that was a small price to pay to reprogram the Twitch.

Yes, I'll return to using a cellphone for practical purposes-GPS, necessary phone calls, the dictionary app I missed dearly, a memo pad, and a few other useful apps-but I'll use it differently moving forward: I'm not going to use it to check email anymore, I'm not going to use it to send text messages while standing at a urinal, and I'm not going to use it as my primary means of interacting with the world. My cellphone usage will be more intentional than before-my phone will be a tool, not an appendage.

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Reprogramming the Twitch | The Minimalists

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Must one unplug to properly observe reality? Going without a phone for any extended period of time seems to be the modern-day equivalent of a vow of silence. Two months ago I 86'd my phone for 60 days to see if my world would keep spinning (it did).

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The world will keep on turning even if you turn off your phone.

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The rhythm of life is not unlike a heartbeat. When everything is running smoothly, a balanced existence oscillates from productive to phlegmatic.

These days, however, with our tweets and likes and mentions and comments and posts and and and ... it's difficult to find a healthy tempo.

Our steady sine wave has collapsed into a fallow flatline. Go, go, go. Never stop never stopping.

But what if we need to stop? A heartbeat is a heartbeat precisely because it stops before it beats again.

A meaningful life is no different. So, The Minimalists are experimenting with intermittent stopping. We're calling it "Screenless Saturdays," and you're welcome to join us.

You might call it a techno sabbatical, a digital detox, or a social-media diet, or you might simply think of it as a break, a breather, a repose from the frenzied world around you. Whatever you call it, there are at least three ways to experiment with Screenless Saturdays:

Social-Media Fast. Avoid all social media all day Saturday.

Digital Downtime. Avoid your computer screens, too.

Truly Screenless. Avoid all glowing screens. Yes, even your phone.

Which choice would provide the ideal respite? That's the path worth walking.

Whichever path you choose, take three minutes before you go to bed on Saturday to jot down the ways in which you enjoyed the day differently without the pall of the digital world dulling your neurons.

How did you spend your day?
How was it different?
How did you feel?

Tell us about your experience on Twitter. Just don't ping us on a Saturday-we won't be around to see it.

Infographic: Screenless Saturdays

Click to Pin

Subscribe to The Minimalists via email.

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The rhythm of life is not unlike a heartbeat. When everything is running smoothly, a balanced existence oscillates from productive to phlegmatic. These days, however, with our tweets and likes and mentions and comments and posts and and and ... it's difficult to find a healthy tempo.

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Social media can help you kill time and feel connected. Where do our priorities lie in terms of time to accomplish things we care about? If we eliminate social media, we may find time we didn't think we had before. D'Avella explains how a social media detox did not result in him falling off the face of the world, even as a creator that relies on a social audience to get by.

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Is Google Classroom an LMS killer? This short video below is less than four minutes and easily explains how create a class, quizzes, assignments, and more.

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Set up classes, host virtually, create content, give feedback and more

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Harvesting personal data from citizens online -- where do we draw the lines? When is technology such as facial recognition good for mankind and when does it infringe upon privacy? As technology like this becomes more mainstream and accessible, is it realistic to think that it can be legislated?

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Facial Recognition: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

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I believe that a degree is typically a good thing at the end of the day. There are penalties in our society for those opting out of the traditional college experience, but do the penalties always outweigh the cost of attendance? There is no doubt that college administration has become inflated as tuition costs have risen to historic highs. In a post-pandemic world, can those straining to make ends meet continue to justify this step in the American dream?

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Is College Still Worth It? | Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj | Netflix