Humanities
94 Language Learning: OER for specific languages
Chapter table of contents
Collections
Global Storybooks Portal (CC BY-NC-SA)
A collection of early-reader books available in the official, Indigenous, and commonly spoken languages of nations all around the world. Countries represented include Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, Germany, Ghana, Haiti, Hong Kong, Hungary, Indigenous, Jamaica, Japan, Kenya, Korea, Mexico, American states (Minnesota, Washington), Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Poland, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, United Kingdom, and Zambia.
Language OER Network (CC BY)
The goal of the Language OER Network (LOERN, pronounced ‘learn’) is to showcase the work of open educators in the field of language learning and teaching (L2LT). The site also includes links to learning materials.
The Pathways Project (Various CC licences)
An initiative from the Boise State University Department of World Languages, this is a collaborative network of open educational resources including instructional language teaching materials and professional development created by and uniquely for Idaho’s K-16 language teachers and students.
Storybooks Canada (CC BY-NC-SA)
Storybooks Canada is a free open educational resource that promotes literacy and language learning in homes, schools, and communities. It makes 40 stories from the African Storybook available with text and audio in English, French, and the most widely spoken immigrant and refugee languages of Canada. These languages include Arabic, Bengali, Cantonese, German, Italian, Korean, Mandarin, Persian, Polish, Portuguese, Punjabi, Somali, Spanish, Tagalog, Turkish, and Urdu.
Journals
Reading in a Foreign Language (CC BY-NC-ND)
Published by the National Foreign Language Resource Center (NFLRC) at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa.
Second Language Research & Practice (CC BY-NC-ND)
A refereed journal of the AAUSC addressing postsecondary language education from theoretical, empirical, and practical perspectives.
Tools and resources
Bilingual Language Profile (CC BY-NC-SA)
The Bilingual Language Profile (BLP) is an instrument for assessing language dominance through self-reports that is concise, quick, and easy to use. The BLP is intended to produce a continuous dominance score and a general bilingual profile taking into account a variety of linguistic variables.
Foreign Languages & the Literary in the Everyday (FLLITE) (CC BY)
This handbook is a culmination of ideas, resources, and pedagogies that have been developed over the past several years as a series collaboration from which the FLLITE approach has emerged as a heuristic for creating lessons and developing integrated curricula from the beginning to the end of language study.
Resources by language
Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe/Salteaux)
Ojibwe Bilingual K-4 Book Series 
(Free, but not openly licensed)
A collection of 15 books dedicated to those that lost their language and those that aspire to learn Anishinaabemowin. These books are available for free to anyone worldwide. This is our contribution to the preservation and restoration of Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe/Salteaux).
Arabic
Arabic and English Sentence Patterns: A Comparative Guide
This text explores verb time, tense, aspect, and mood through comparison of Arabic and English sentence patterns. It includes examples of the Arabic patterns from classical and popular sources so Arabic students can learn by explanation and example how to formulate cohesive and grammatically correct sentence structure.
Arabic Teaching Methods (CC BY-NC)
A website that aims to support professors teaching Arabic as a foreign/second language.
A web site designed for learners and teachers of Arabic seeking materials for listening comprehension. The site provides listening materials and accompanying activities that are intended for the various levels of proficiency from Novice to Superior.
Elementary Arabic (CC BY)
An open textbook on Elementary Arabic for undergraduate students who are taking Arabic in their second semester. It addresses language structures in theme-based modules that cover the four language skills. The book can be used as a self-study resource or as the main textbook in beginning Arabic classes.
From MSA to CA: A Beginner’s Guide for Transitioning into Colloquial Arabic (CC BY-NC)
This book is for students who have studied Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) for one year or more and would like to learn colloquial Arabic basics using their knowledge of MSA. It aims at transitioning learners from Novice Mid level to Intermediate Low through presenting situations useful for living in an Arab country. The book has several features including hyperlinks, practice dialogues with open answers, cultural tips, and more.
Cree
Cree: Language of the Plains / nēhiyawēwin: paskwāwi-pīkiskwēwin (CC BY-NC-ND)
Cree: Language of the Plains is a comprehensive educational resource, offering a broad range of learning materials that is easily accessible to Cree language learners. This collection includes an updated and redesigned Cree language textbook, Cree language audio labs, and a Cree language workbook.
Little Cree Books (CC BY-NC-SA)
The Little Cree Books are the first in what the creators hope will become a large collection of online books designed for early Cree readers. These little books are designed to incorporate the vocabulary and grammatical elements introduced at each grade level in Alberta’s Cree curriculum framework and guides to implementation (K–3 and 4–6).
Indigenous Storybooks: Cree (CC BY-NC-SA)
Indigenous Storybooks is a Canadian website for children, families, community members, and educators. Inspired by the open-licensed stories from Little Cree Books, this project aims to make the text, images, and audio of stories available in Indigenous languages (Plains Cree and Swampy Cree) as well as English, French, and the most widely spoken immigrant and refugee languages of Canada. A story that is read in English or French at school can be read in ancestral languages by parents and children at home. In this way, Indigenous Storybooks provides access to stories in ancestral languages as well as English and French. Similarly, the audio versions of the stories can help beginning readers and language learners make the important connection between speech and text.
Czech
Reality Czech (CC BY-SA)
A Czech textbook and curriculum currently under development. Resources are expected to be completed by end of Summer 2018. In addition to a textbook, resources will include an in-class activity book, online grammar and cultural units, and printable homework exercises.
English
French
Au Boulot! First-Year French (CC BY-NC)
Au boulot! is a two-year college French program consisting of: a textbook, workbook, and 21 accompanying audio exercises; as well as a reference grammar, to be used the entire two years.
Chapeau! First-Year French (CC BY-NC)
A first-year French-language textbook that includes a textbook, a workbook, and 24 accompanying audio exercises (mp3).
Enhancing French Skills (CC BY-NC)
A website for intermediate learners of French, created for students in a three-hour semester course at the University of Texas at Austin. Students expand their knowledge of the French language and francophone cultures and continue the development of their communicative abilities by practicing the four basic skills of speaking, listening, writing and reading.
Le littéraire dans le quotidien (CC BY)
An open textbook offering a transdisciplinary approach to reading/writing at the first and second year levels of college French.
Les conversations mises à jour
A collection of authentic conversations in French that targets mostly intermediate and advanced learners of French. Each conversation highlights the shared experience of two native or near-native French speakers and provides both an oral history of that experience and a trove of cultural references.
Let’s Read French Books (CC BY-NC-SA)
Reading books is a great way to learn a language. It helps to discover the culture, to learn new words, to be exposed to different language structures in the context. But, one of the biggest challenges in the language and literature classes is to encourage the students to read. This project aims to make reading literary books easier for the students by creating an open textbook reader using Public Domain 19th century French literature. Along with the text, there are activities for students to engage with and discover the text.
Libre Accès (Licence OpenEdition)
Les Presses de l’université de Montreal se sont associées à la Direction des bibliothèques de l’UdeM pour un projet pilote de publication de livres numériques en libre accès, mais il ne s’agit pas de la seule offre en libre accès des PUM.
Sons et lettres: A French Pronunciation Method for Intermediate-level French (CC BY-NC)
Sons et lettres provides a set of classroom materials to train students to hear and produce the sounds of French and to recognize the regular spellings used to represent those sounds in print. The materials are inspired by a desire to help students feel more confident about their French pronunciation and more at home saying the many French words.
Tex’s French Grammar (CC BY)
A user-friendly guide to French grammar that combines explanations with dialogues and cartoon images.
German
Das Zentrale OER-Repositorium der Hochschulen in Baden-Württemberg (ZOERR) (Various CC licences)
ZOERR is a service within the university network Digitization in Teaching Baden-Württemberg (HND-BW). With this service, the University Library of Tübingen provides open teaching and learning materials from the university sector for Baden-Württemberg and beyond.
Der und mehr (CC BY)
This textbook is developed for use with the der | die | das German language learning website, developed by Dr. Jamie Rankin of Princeton University, with funding from a Round 15 Textbook Transformation Grant.
German Frame-semantic Online Lexicon (CC BY)
A German-English vocabulary resource that organizes words according to their meanings, rather than just alphabetically, provides detailed definitions and pointing out differences between seemingly similar German and English words, and includes a number of real example sentences for each word (from www.dwds.de) to show how it is used in context.
Grenzenlos Deutsch (CC BY-NC-SA)
This full-year curriculum mixes materials rooted in real-world, contemporary communication scenarios, multimedia content, and online learning activities and ensures that the topics of discussion in the language classroom are relevant to and reflect today’s world.
Willkommen: Deutsch für alle (CC BY-NC-SA)
An innovative first-year German language e-textbook for learning German at the college/university level. It features a task-based, communicative approach which provides students with opportunities to communicate in German in a variety of contexts and situations. Through a wide range of activities, students develop and practice their language skills which they showcase at the end of each chapter by accomplishing a specific task.
Haida
Indigenous Storybooks: Haida (CC BY-NC-SA)
Indigenous Storybooks is a resource designed specifically for children, families, community members, and educators. Inspired by the open-licensed stories from Little Cree Books, this project aims to make the text, images, and audio of stories available in Indigenous languages (Plains Cree, Swampy Cree, and Haida) as well as English, French, and the most widely spoken immigrant and refugee languages of Canada.
Hindi
Basic Hindi (CC BY)
An online, interactive, theme-based textbook for the true beginner of Hindi language. It promotes communicative, linguistic, and cultural competence. It has mixture of pedagogical approaches to fit all types of learning and teaching philosophies/styles to achieve intermediate low to mid ACTFL proficiency level within a semester.
Hindi in America Video Collection (CC BY)
A video collection of Hindi speakers answering questions about their experiences living in the United States.
Hul’q’umi’num’
Hul’q’umi’num’ (Cowichan) Language Resources (Not openly licenced)
A collection of resources developed by the Cowichan Valley School District to support Hul’q’umi’num’ language revitalization at an elementary level.
Indigenous – general
Native Languages of Texas (CC BY-SA)
Texas was home to a variety of Native American tribes, including the Apache, the Comanche, the Caddo, the Coahuiltecan, the Karankawa, the Kiowa, the Kitsai, the Tonkawa, and the Wichita. Their history and way of living shared similarities, but they were also different.
Italian
Tutt* a tavola! Volume 1 and Volume 2 (CC BY-NC)
This two-volume set is intended for Elementary Italian over two semesters. In general, each chapter addresses three to four grammatical topics and includes a vocabulary section related to a cultural theme with the vocabulary incorporated into the grammatical presentations and exercises. There is also a short reading in each chapter regarding different aspects of culture and language to address those questions of diversity and inclusion that are often missing from textbooks.
Japanese
Beginning Japanese for Professionals: Book 1 (CC BY-NC)
This textbook is designed for beginning learners who want to learn basic Japanese for the purpose of living and working in Japan. Unlike textbooks written primarily for students, whose content largely centers on student life, this book focuses more on social and professional life beyond school.
Beginning Japanese for Professionals: Book 2 (CC BY-NC)
This textbook is designed for beginning learners who want to learn basic Japanese for the purpose of living and working in Japan. Unlike textbooks written primarily for students, whose content largely centers on student life, this book focuses more on social and professional life beyond school.
Beginning Japanese for Professionals: Book 3 (CC BY-NC)
This textbook is designed for beginning learners who want to learn basic Japanese for the purpose of living and working in Japan. Unlike textbooks written primarily for students, whose content largely centers on student life, this book focuses more on social and professional life beyond school.
Preadvanced Japanese (CC BY-NC)
This textbook is designed for students who have intermediate competency in Japanese, roughly at Level 2 on the ILR (The Interagency Language Roundtable) proficiency scale, and are working on reaching Level 3. This textbook can be used for self-study, as part of online course, and in a traditional classroom setting. It is comprised of four chapters, intended to be covered in one term of a quarter system.
K’iche’
Chqe’tamaj le qach’ab’al K’iche’! (CC BY)
This beginner-to-advanced level online course for K’iche’, a Mayan language of Guatemala.
Korean
Korean Through Folktales (CC BY-NC)
Korean Through Folktales consists of four chapters and each centers on a famous Korean folktale. Through the selected folktales and various activities offered in the book, students can gain cultural knowledge and insights into traditional and cultural values while they are given linguistic lessons to reinforce their acquired skills and to apply the learned materials in an integrated approach. This book is designed to accompany 1st-year, 2nd-year, and 3rd-year Korean courses.
Malayalam
Malayalam Resources (CC BY-SA)
This is a collection of classroom materials, curricular plans, lesson plans and other resources designed to facilitate teaching and learning Malayalam, from the Department of Asian Studies and South Asia Institute at the University of Texas at Austin.
Mandarin
Gateway to Chinese (CC BY-NC)
This site offers a collection of free interactive language learning resources for beginning Mandarin Chinese. Students now have the option to practice pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar, listening, and reading skills at their own convenience.
Nahuati
Nahuatlahtolli (CC BY-SA)
This self-paced course is based on the Nahuatl variant from the Huasteca of Veracruz that is spoken in Chicontepec, Veracruz, Mexico. The principal aim of this course is to develop the student’s oral, written, and comprehension abilities primarily through the study of grammar, listening, and reading.
Portuguese
Bate-Papo (CC BY)
An introduction to Portuguese.
Brazilpod (CC BY)
A collection of teaching materials created at the University of Texas at Austin for the study of Portuguese.
ClicaBrasil (CC BY-NC-SA)
Here you will find Portuguese language resources that highlight aspects of Brazilian culture. These materials are designed for intermediate to advanced students, but are accessible to everyone. Each unit includes videos of Brazilians from all walks of life speaking naturally about their lives and their country, and numerous activities and exercises available in PDF files.
Português para principiantes (CC BY-NC-SA)
This media-rich beginners text is designed to provide learners with a solid grammatical basis for using Brazilian Portuguese as well as regular opportunities to practice and improve their ability to read, speak, and understand the Portuguese language as it is used in contemporary Brazil.
Recursos Educacionais Abertos (Various CC licences)
O Projeto Recursos Educacionais Abertos desenvolvidos para a Melhoria Acadêmica (REAdME) busca dar apoio à divulgação das ações de ensino, pesquisa e extensão que estão sendo desenvolvidas na UFPE para enfrentamento da Covid-19. Isso é feito por meio desta Comunidade, que tem o objetivo de possibilitar a disponibilização e o acesso aos Recursos Educacionais Abertos (REAs) produzidos na UFPE.
Spanish
Acceso (CC BY-NC-ND)
Acceso is intended as a complete, interactive curriculum for intermediate-level learners of Spanish.
¡Bienvenidos! (CC BY)
This textbook was developed as part of a Round 15 Textbook Transformation Grant.
Curso de Escritura en Español (CC BY-NC-SA)
The materials in this project are specifically designed for a third-year Spanish Writing course, offering guidance to instructors on how to develop each of the four modules that constitute the course: Description, narration, argumentation, and exposition.
Español abierto (Various CC licences)
Open educational resources for the Spanish classroom maintained by the Center for Open Educational Resources and Language Learning (COERLL) at the University of Texas at Austin.
Heritage Spanish (CC BY)
On online community created to help Spanish instructors share and find teaching resources.
Heritage Spanish – Professional Development Modules (CC BY)
An ongoing TeCHS project aiming to provide relevant information and resources to promote, expand and celebrate heritage Spanish teaching and learning.
La hora del cuento en español (CC BY-NC)
La hora del cuento en español is a collection of children’s stories in Spanish authored by Kwantlen Polytechnic University (KPU) students and edited by KPU Faculty Constanza Rojas-Primus and KPU alumna Sofía Rodríguez. The first part of this collection is a selection of stories written by KPU Spanish 1100 students between Fall 2017 and Spring 2019. The second part of this collection is a selection of stories written by KPU Spanish 1101 students between Fall 2020 and Spring 2022. All stories are narrated by Constanza Rojas-Primus and have been translated into English by Sofía Rodríguez. The illustrations in the cover and first part of this collection are artwork of KPU student Cheyenne Pokeda.
Mi idioma, mi comunidad: español para bilingües (CC BY-NC-ND)
For Heritage Language Leaners of Spanish that centers on students’ experiences with language, identity, and belonging in the Midwest through real-world applications. It uses a project-based approach that outlines how students engage in real-life applications by exploring culturally relevant topics in language use, arts, festivals, food, ethnography, oral history, digital lives, and the university. Through multimedia such as podcasts, videos, neighborhood maps, and music, we promote interactive exploration of culturally relevant content while supporting students’ language maintenance and growth.
Open Educational Resources for Spanish (Various CC licences)
From the ASCCC OERI Resource Page for Spanish: This space is intended to provide faculty in the discipline with a collection of resources that have been subject to a peer-review process and/or that have been selected for use by faculty in the California community colleges.
Social and Regional Dialects of Spanish (CC BY-NC-ND)
An advanced undergraduate-level course that is written in Spanish.
SOS Spanish Basic Grammar Toolkit (CC BY)
Spanish Corpus Proficiency Level Training (CC BY-NC-ND)
Video recordings of Spanish learners of different levels answering several questions, a written transcript of what they say, and exercises that will guide you interactively to notice features about their talk, as well as answers to those exercises.
Spanish in Texas (CC BY)
The purpose of the Spanish in Texas project is to profile Spanish as it is spoken throughout Texas today and to provide open learning tools that allow students, teachers, and the general public to explore Spanish language variation. A central goal of the project is to encourage users to view local varieties of Spanish and their speakers as important resources for learning about language and culture.
Yo puedo: para empezar (CC BY-NC)
Many say, “I have studied Spanish for years and don’t know how to speak or write it,” while others are a bit anxious about taking a second language for the first time, but all are overwhelmed by the expensive textbooks and online packages that don’t seem to be practical or relevant. We sought to change these common complaints by creating materials that take a new approach to learning a second language based upon the skills that we deem most useful and that will enable our students to confidently express themselves in Spanish.The text is designed for beginning Spanish language students.
Yo puedo: segundos pasos (CC BY-NC)
As you begin the equivalent of a second semester Spanish course with these materials, some of you might think about how long it has been since you studied Spanish while others may come to the class with some background knowledge. We want you to know this book has been designed with many types of learners in mind. Our goals were to address the need for students to achieve the ability to communicate in written and spoken form.
Yorùbá
Yorùbá Yé Mi (CC BY-NC-ND)
An interactive, communicative, introductory, multi-media program intended to provide college/university students with basic listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills of language learning in Yorùbá. It exposes the learner not only to Yorùbá language in meaningful situations but also to the culture of the Yorùbá-speaking people of South-western Nigeria.
Media Attributions
- BC Map © Adamwashere is licensed under a CC BY-NC-SA (Attribution NonCommercial ShareAlike) license
