ABSTRACT

Open Educational Resources aim to offer learning to all, yet the language level used in resources could be a barrier to many potential learners. This paper examines the readability of 200 OER courses in English from two major OER course platforms. We compared the means of readability metrics between these OER courses at different educational levels and subject categories that the platforms offer using inferential statistics as well as cluster analyses. Results prove that there is a progression of difficulty between lower and higher educational levels with introductory courses being easier to read. However, the analysis also highlighted that more than 86% of the courses require an advanced level of English language proficiency. On the other hand, subject matter does not appear to be linked with the readability of the courses. This study contributes further to the current discussion of the inclusiveness of OER and the factors that hinder its universal use. The study addresses a gap in the literature as, to our knowledge, no other studies have analysed the linguistic accessibility of OER English learners and consideration of the meaning of the educational levels assigned to OER courses has been limited.

摘要

开放教育资源旨在为所有人提供学习机会，但资源中使用的语言水平可能成为许多潜在学习者的障碍。本文考察了来自两大 OER 课程平台的 200 门英语 OER 课程的可读性。我们使用推论统计和聚类分析比较了平台提供的不同教育水平和学科类别的这些 OER 课程的可读性指标的方法。结果证明，较低和较高教育水平之间存在难度递增，入门课程更容易阅读。然而，分析还强调，超过 86% 的课程需要高级英语语言能力。另一方面，主题似乎与课程的可读性无关。这项研究进一步促进了当前关于 OER 的包容性和阻碍其普遍使用的因素的讨论。该研究解决了文献中的一个空白，因为据我们所知，没有其他研究分析过 OER 英语学习者的语言可及性，并且对分配给 OER 课程的教育水平的意义的考虑是有限的。