This section of the site explains intellectual property, and what you can do to protect it, including learning objects or open educational resources. This section also explains how to interpret creative commons licenses for objects you wish to use.
As outlined in Memorial’s Intellectual Property policy, Memorial University instructors usually own their Intellectual Property, including the lecture notes, course outlines, study guides, visual aids, and other course materials they create.
Memorial University’s community members are expected to uphold the “highest standards of academic integrity” while adhering to Memorial’s code.
A learning object repository is a searchable, digital library of learning objects. Objects found within are free for use (unless otherwise specified). The contents range in subject, type and complexity. The role and function of learning object repositories is explained in this resource. Examples of various repositories are provided.
Linney
Linney is a learning object repository that aims to promote an atmosphere of sharing where learning objects can be searched, reused, repurposed and contributed.
Developed by Memorial University’s Centre for Innovation in Teaching and Learning (CITL), the repository began as a place to house forty years of multimedia objects and assets created by CITL and to make them available to the wider learning community. Find out more about Linney on its About page. Details relating to Linney’s contribution criteria are outlined below.
Contribution criteria
What are Linney’s contribution criteria?
Each object must:
include a learning design (learning objective, description of how it’s used in instructional event)
be digital (or able to be digitized)
be in a legible format (minimum quality)
meet file size maximum (consider file type and size)
be shareable with other communities and use creative commons by its owner
clearly identify ownership (able to provide permission to contribute)
be interoperable (playable on multiple platforms and devices)
Other Repositories
There are a variety of repositories available around the world. Some focus on specific media types, topics or audiences. OpenDOAR is a site that lists all open repositories around the world. Below, we list a few repositories that we have used at CITL over the years:
MERLOT II is repository of peer reviewed multimedia educational resources for learning and online teaching.
Metropolitan Museum offers free access to over 400 000 high res images for scholarly use. As long as the image has OASC (Open Access for Scholarly Content) in the info it is free for non-commercial use.
Rijksmuseum offers free downloads for both commercial and non-commercial use.
Linney – learning object repository supported by Memorial University that aims to promote an atmosphere of sharing where learning objects can be searched, reused, repurposed and contributed.
Wisc-Online – digital library of objects has been developed primarily by faculty from the Wisconsin Technical College System (WTCS).
References
DELT. (2006). Learning Object Repository Report: Draft (April, 2006). Distance Education and Learning Technologies. St. John’s: DELT.
Consider what teaching and learning resources are currently available (published texts, online or print journal articles, Internet sites, photographs, charts, graphics, video/audio clips and animations) and how they will be used. By searching for and selecting resources early in the design process, copyrighted resources can be identified and the process of obtaining permission can begin.
Also, choose the multimedia resources that will need to be developed to enhance learning. The instructional designer will collaborate with you to storyboard the content for these multimedia resources.
How to Find Free Copyright Material is a video tutorial about how to find material on the internet that is open for reuse. Former Memorial University Copyright Officer Nancy Simmons describes how to effectively use search tools through Google and the Creative Commons websites to search for different kinds of material based on their rights, whether they are public domain, or have licenses attached that allow users to reuse or even modify the work.
Have you already found an image but can’t remember where you got it from, or perhaps forgot to check if it’s open to use at all? Here is a video tutorial called How to Find the Source of an Image, which covers how to search using Google Images in a reverse style search. With this method, you just upload the image to the Google Images website, and Google finds all the sites that use that image, or similar images.
How to Find the Source of an Image
How to Find Copyright-Free or CC Licensed Sites for Resources
The Creative Commons search allows you to search Google, Yahoo, Flickr and other sites for material that is licensed under the Creative Commons — which usually means you can use it without charge in a noncommercial context. To find these materials for reuse you can use the Creative Commons Search. Alternatively, you could explore other repositories of media. Here are some examples.
Image*After — large, free photo collection, with images free for any use
Images of Empowerment — a free library of images celebrating women’s lives and their work from around the world.
Morgue File — a community-based free photo site with a collection of 400,000 images
Wikimedia Commons — archive of free multimedia content submitted by Wikipedia users
Potentially Free Images
Flickr Creative Commons — an index of all Flickr images for which the owner has specified a Creative Commons license (which usually means you can use it)
Khan Academy — provides a world-class education for anyone, anywhere.
Linney — learning object repository supported by Memorial University that aims to promote an atmosphere of sharing where learning objects can be searched, reused, repurposed, and contributed.
TedEd — TED-Ed is TED’s youth and education initiative. TED-Ed’s mission is to spark and celebrate the ideas of teachers and students around the world.
TedTalks — a non-profit organization devoted to spreading ideas, usually in the form of short, powerful talks.
Wisc-Online — digital library of objects has been developed primarily by faculty from the Wisconsin Technical College System (WTCS).
YouTube #Education — a YouTube channel featuring some of YouTube’s most popular educational videos.
YouTube Teachers’ Channel — created to help teachers leverage video to educate, engage and inspire their students.
For more media ideas, visit Quality Matters for a comprehensive inventory of sources for visuals, design tools, and accessibility tools and guidelines.
Learning Objects (LOs) versus Open Educational Resources (OERs)
This resource explains the difference between learning objects and open educational resources.
Learning Objects are a type of Open Educational Resource (OER). They are more restrictive than OERs in that LOs are typically reused as is whereas OERs may be reused, re-purposed or modified. Both have metadata associated with them such as the digital rights, usually with creative commons, and learning design (objective, or description of learning context).
With learning objects, you can:
reuse and
repurpose them.
With open educational resources, you are able to:
reuse,
redistribute,
revise, and
remix them.
Linney: A Learning Object Repository
The Linney wordmark
Linney is a learning object repository that aims to promote an atmosphere of sharing where learning objects can be searched, reused, repurposed and contributed.
CITL embarked on a learning object repository initiative in 2009 with the aim of assembling forty years of educational media into an accessible, searchable repository. The repository, Linney, is reminiscent of an out-building where objects for household work are kept, easily found and freely (re)used as purpose intended, or for a new purpose, by those in the community. This is the essence of Linney; it is an online repository used to house and facilitate the use of learning objects.
How was the name Linney chosen?
In the colourful history of Newfoundland and Labrador a linney, or lean-to, occupies our cultural landscape as a small shed or room attached to the back of a house and used for the storage and shelter of a range of useful items needed from day to day.
Memorial University hosts the provincial learning object repository, called Linney, which is a place for rich learning objects to be discovered and used to augment a world of projects and curriculum. It’s a place where we keep a wide range of value-added interpretation on the past through a variety of media to use as tools for better education. They are housed in much the same way as useful items are stored in a linney, where members of the household can search, reuse, repurpose, and even contribute learning objects.
The spelling of Linney is derived from the English dialect, which defines a linney as a shed attached to the back of a dwelling. It is, at once, an expression of Newfoundland and Labrador’s rich history and part of our heritage. From this past we look to the future as we harness the possibilities of our learning object repository.
Developed by Memorial University’s Centre for Innovation in Teaching and Learning (CITL), Linney began as a repository to house forty years of multimedia objects and assets created by CITL and to make them available to the wider teaching and learning community. Since then, Linney has evolved into a comprehensive repository that will be available to Newfoundland and Labrador’s K-20 public education system so that expertise and resources can be shared. Digital rights will be acknowledged through the use of Creative Commons in a self-serve model where users access, use and contribute learning objects to the repository.
What are the criteria for Linney contributions?
Contributions Criteria
Includes learning design (learning objective, description of how it’s used in instructional event)
Digital (or able to be digitized)
Legible format (minimum quality)
Meet file size maximum (consider file type and size)
Willing to share with other communities, use creative commons
Ownership clearly identified (able to provide permission to contribute)
Interoperable (playable on multiple platforms and devices)
Other Repositories
OpenDOAR is a site that lists all open repositories around the world.
MERLOT II is repository of peer reviewed multimedia educational resources for learning and online teaching
Metropolitan Museum offers free access to over 400 000 high res images for scholarly use. As long as the image has OASC (Open Access for Scholarly Content) in the info it is free for non-commercial use.
Rijksmuseum offers free downloads for both commercial and non-commercial use.
This resource explains what learning objects are and how they may be used in a learning event. It also explains the purpose of the learning design.
A learning object (LO) is a digital, open educational resource that is created to assist in a learning event. Learning and reusability reside at its core. Each learning object will have a learning design.
Why Use Learning Objects
LOs are often used in teaching of troublesome concepts or to illustrate content and engage learners. Educators use learning objects for a variety of reasons. Learning objects can:
help address a learning objective.
assist learners to solve problems or explore subject areas in different ways. This allows learners with different learning styles to explore different paths to a solution, enhancing the learning experience for all.
allow educators to give learners access to materials they may otherwise not physically be able to access.
make a lesson more engaging and interesting.
Using learning objects, and sharing with others, give educators and developers an opportunity to collaborate and engage in a community of practice to enhance learning environments and the craft of teaching.
Use In Learning
There are some arguments that learning objects lack substance, because to enable it to be reusable the context in which it was originally used needs to be minimal. This paradox refers to an object’s granularity. The more granular a learning object is, the more reusable it is in other contexts. The more integrated a learning object is, the less reusable it is in other contexts.
less granular = more context = less reusable (okay)
more granular = less context = more reusable (better)
A learning object without its educative context is meaningless. Whereas a learning object that has a clear and detailed learning design will counter this challenge. The metadata connected to an object that can help provide the context of a learning object.
Learning Design
The learning design is the description of the educational context (where and how) in which the object is used. It may take the form of an learning objective. A learning object may have more than one learning design.
McGreal, R. (2008). A Typology of Learning Object Repositories. In Handbook of Information Technologies for Education and Training 2nd Edition. Adelsberger, Pawlowski and Sampson (editors) Springer: Berlin Heidelberg.
Wiley, D. A. (2002). Connecting learning objects to instructional design theory: A definition, a metaphor, and a taxonomy. In D. Wiley (Ed.), The instructional use of learning objects. Bloomington, ID: Agency for Instructional Technology and Association for Communications & Technology. Retrieved from https://members.aect.org/publications/InstructionalUseofLearningObjects.pdf
