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Navigation North to Release New OER-LTI Tools

Having spent the last 5 years refining OER systems and tools with some of the nation’s largest Learning Resource distributors and recently conducting a body of research and analysis on educator and agency use of OER, Navigation North is preparing to release a new series of robust learning resource distribution and tracking tools.

 We examined and documented the needs facing educators and those facing campus digital learning officers and administrators when increasing the amount of digital learning resources presented to learners.

Trends show that more educators are being asked to increase their use of OER as a way to create more personalized learning options while also creating viable alternatives to expensive textbooks for their schools and students. As part of this process, educators do seek out curated educational resource repositories and resource providers they know and trust for quality materials, but also depend heavily on micro-repositories of their own curation from non-education sources and colleagues.

image of canvas page content with Smithsonian video embed
Instructor annotated video from Smithsonian Learning Lab embedded into page of Forensics course content.

Educators also look for ways to instructionally frame or scaffold those resources for their own learners. This can range from simple introductory annotation to the development of comprehensive inquiry frameworks that guide learners’ entire journeys through one or more resources.

And where more educators are stepping up to those challenges and leveraging more of their classrooms and coursework across digital learning management systems , more campus digital learning officers and administrators are faced with two unique challenges:

1. Agencies are investigating how to better find, access, and/or create and share high-quality OER repositories ensuring their faculty are utilizing diverse, vetted materials from valid collections, known programs, and trusted resource providers.

2. Agencies are also considering how to best document and monitor the growing volume of OER being utilized in terms of coursework, frequency, and outcomes to gauge effectiveness.

New CharED OER instructor and admin. management tools.

With these issues in mind, Navigation North is excited to release a new series of OER instructional integration and management tools for educators and agencies using any number of popular Learning Management Systems. Applying our knowledge, experience, and observations to a robust tool series, we intend to shape what we’ve learned and move them to the learning environments nationally in use across leading Postsecondary and K-12 initiatives.