Reviews

It is important to have other perspectives in your OER. You can invite peers and students to complete reviews of the completed or nearly completed projects. Reviews are intended to provide constructive and helpful feedback to make the resources more valuable. Reviewers are acknowledged for their work on the acknowledgments page in the front matter.

Peer Review Criteria

The following criteria will be used to guide the evaluation of open resources:

Adapted from:
OER Evaluation Criteria by Affordable Learning Georgia licensed under CC-BY 3.0.
B.C. Open Textbooks Review Rubric by BCcampus licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license.
Clarity & Readability
  • Is the content, including any instructions, exercises, or supplemental material, clear and comprehensible to students?
  • Is the content well-categorized in terms of logic, sequencing, and flow?
  • Is the content consistent with its language and key terms and provides adequate context for any jargon/technical terminology used?
Accuracy
  • Is the content, including diagrams and other supplementary material accurate, error-free, and unbiased?
  • Are there any factual, grammatical, or typographical errors?
  • Are there broken links or obsolete formats?
Adaptability & Longevity
  • Is the resource up-to-date, but not in a way that will quickly make the text obsolete within a short period?
  • Does the resource provide an appropriate context for Canadianization (Ontario or Canadian content and examples)?
  • Is the text written and/or arranged in such a way that necessary updates will be relatively easy and straightforward to implement and adapt?
Comprehensiveness
  • Is the content presented at a level appropriate for higher education students?
  • Is the content thorough? Does it meet the needs of a course at this level?
  • Does the resource cover all areas and ideas of the subject appropriately?
Accessibility
  • Is the content accessible to students with disabilities through the compatibility of third-party reading applications?
  • If you are using Web resources, does each image have alternate text that can be read?
  • Do videos have accurate closed-captioning?
  • Are students able to access the materials in a quick, non-restrictive manner?
Diversity and Inclusion
  • The text reflects diversity and inclusion regarding culture, gender, ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, sexual orientation, education, and religion. It does not include insensitive or offensive language in these areas.

Review Process

Reviewers can choose to review the whole resource or part of the resource.

Reviewers are invited to use the tool Hypothes.is. Hypothes.is is an annotation tool that allows comments to be made directly in the e-book and make them visible to other reviewers and the author.

Review Instructions

  1. Confirm participation in the review process by emailing oer@fanshawec.ca.
  2. You will receive an email invitation to access the book. Click the link to accept the invitation.
  3. Set up a Hypothes.is account. Review the Setup instructions (skip the step on the browser extension download as this tool is already enabled) 
  4. Review the textbook and make comments as you go using Hypothes.is. in the PRIVATE group that was set up for the book (see image below).  Keep in mind the general review criteria listed above.
Click on the groups in hypothesis to make sure you are using the private group set up for the book and not the public group

 

Once the review is complete, you are encouraged to also complete the review form. If you would like to be mentioned in the textbook as a reviewer, provide your information in the form.

Simplified Student Review Rubric

Adapted from: OER Student Review Process by Fanshawe’s OER Design Studio is a derivative of A Learner Review Template for Reviewing OER by Kim Carter- Conestoga College licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 license
Description Needs Improvement Good Exceeds Expectations
Complete I think that information is missing because I am unsure what I should be learning. All information is given, and I know what I am supposed to be learning. Examples and/or descriptions are complete; I do not think I am missing information.
Clear I am unsure what I should learn from the topic; the examples and descriptors are unclear. It is clear to me what I am supposed to learn about this topic. Examples and descriptions connect to what I am supposed to learn about the topic.
Concise There are too many words with sentences saying the same thing in a slightly different way. There are just enough words, and the sentences are clear. The sentences are short and to the point, with examples and media that ensure I know the point of what I am learning.
Cohesive The topics jump around and do not follow a logical and in-order presentation. I am not sure how the topic matches the chapter content. The topics follow a logical order with the entire chapter and chapter outcomes. The topics are logical and in order, and the flow of the chapter from start to end makes sense to me.
Courteous The tone of the writing comes across as angry, too matter-of-fact, or confusing. The tone of the writing is pleasant to read. The tone of the writing is pleasant, and I want to learn more.

See Appendix 6: Student Review Instructions

 

License

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Fanshawe OER Development Guide Copyright © 2023 by Fanshawe College is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.

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