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International Conference on Blended Learning

ICBL 2020: Blended Learning. Education in a Smart Learning Environment pp 114–125Cite as

A Review of Open Access Textbook Platforms

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Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNTCS,volume 12218))

Abstract

Open educational resources or OER have been gradually evolved as a major source of learning materials. As one form of OER, open access textbooks can be used as official textbooks for classroom-based learning as well as online learning and distance learning. Through a review of six open access textbook platforms, this paper investigates the operation model of open access textbooks, including their set-up, sourcing and updating of contents, open licenses, usages, review and quality assurance. It is revealed that open access textbook platforms were usually initiated by universities and non-profit organizations, partnering with philanthropic foundations and government bodies. The 5Rs (retain, re-use, revise, re-mix and re-distribute) provision via open licenses is the distinguished advantage of open access textbooks, especially in enabling adaptation to cater for specific teaching and learning needs. Peer review is the common practices for ensuring the quality of textbooks. It is evidenced that open access textbooks together with other forms of OER have successfully driven the effective sharing of educational resources to make education well accessible to all.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Open University of Hong Kong, Good Shepherd Street, Homantin, Kowloon, Hong Kong

    Simon K. S. Cheung

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  1. Simon K. S. Cheung
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Correspondence to Simon K. S. Cheung .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. The Open University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China

    Simon K. S. Cheung

  2. University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand

    Richard Li

  3. Kasetsart University, Bangkok, Thailand

    Kongkiti Phusavat

  4. Kasetsart University, Bangkok, Thailand

    Naraphorn Paoprasert

  5. City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon, Hong Kong

    Lam‑For Kwok

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Cheung, S.K.S. (2020). A Review of Open Access Textbook Platforms. In: Cheung, S., Li, R., Phusavat, K., Paoprasert, N., Kwok, L. (eds) Blended Learning. Education in a Smart Learning Environment. ICBL 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 12218. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51968-1_10

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51968-1_10

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-51967-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-51968-1

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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