The Open University (OU) has recently launched a web site to give the public free access to its course materials. All the OU materials are available to use, take away, amend and reuse for free under a Creative Commons license. Visitors to the website can collaborate to create new ‘open access' materials and upload them to share with others.

While this may be mainly of use to adult learners there may well be material of use for specific courses or leisure interests for school students, or for staff wanting to upskill themselves or pursue a personal interest.

For example the top 10 units currently identified are:
Start writing fiction
Animals at the extremes: the desert environment
Judges and the law
Essay and report writing skills
Exploring distance time graphs
Early development
Nucleic acids and chromatin
Obesity: balanced diets and treatment
Writing what you know
The importance of interpersonal skills

You will even find one unit called ‘Encouraging book talk in the school library' in the Education section.