Students’ Awareness and Usage of Open Educational Resources (OER) as Learning Tool in their Course Studies at the University of the Philippines Open University (UPOU)

The abundance of technology nowadays is contributing to the development of learning practices. This gives learners greater opportunity to find, access, and use resources to benefit learning. Open educational resources (OER) are one of the few educational developments that emerged with technology. While it is true that there are a lot of OERs available on the internet, it is unsure how many learners are aware of their existence. This research aimed to identify how many students are aware of OERs, where they use OERs, and whether the educational institution encourages OERs. The researchers surveyed several students within the University of the Philippines Open University. The survey included learner demographics, statistics on learners' awareness and usage of OERs, learners' OER access locations, and the challenges they encounter when using OERs. The survey showed that the learners, regardless of age, are aware of OERs. They mostly access videos, research, and journals on web pages and Wikis. They find the OERs accessible and relevant, but reliability and visibility are challenging.

Afro-American Historiography: Sociolinguistic Analysis of Black American Writing

Afro-American Historiography: Sociolinguistic Analysis of Black American Writing Oppression and liberty have oppositionality with each other but the latter emerges out of the former if patience, fortitude, discipline, unity and faith endure. It is true that where discrimination exists, revolt is only an inch below the surface. The Africans who were enslaved by the Americans never fully adjusted to slavery for accepted its inevitability. Inspite of all the inhuman atrocities inflicted upon them which made many to yield, the enlightened sons of the soil continued their struggle. Their constitutional struggle was not only for existence/ survival of the race but also for their recognition as honorable citizen of America. They fought against bigotry, racism, injustice, brutal violence, lynching, terror, and death in this democracy. The efforts made by this oppressed class, the ups and downs of their socio-economic status during previous two hundred years and the odds against success in the struggle are little known, especially in international circles. It required great struggle for the Afro-Americans to become a part of the main stream of social, economic, political, educational and judicial system of America. To cope with their inability to achieve their target, they developed ways to express their enthusiasms for freedom. Their pursuit of liberty differed in various parts of the country depending upon the following factors: conditions of the respective plantation; the rich past cultural heritage of the blacks; political upheavels and civil war in America; racism and segregation; contact with the Caribbian Africans struggle for human rights and American constitutional frame work struggle for human rights. The rise of the national protest organizations like the NAACP, The National Urban League, The Congress of Racial Equality, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Students Non-violent Co-ordinating Committee and other such organizations provided a collective leadership to the Black Americans for racial equality, civil and political rights, economic and educational advancements. Afro-Americans full blooded by repponded to slavery in accordance with the proposals and rhetoric of leaders from their own ranks. This research focuses on the socioliguistic analysis of the speeches of eminent African Americans who made the Blacks realize pride in their cultural heritage, enhance their confidence and self image and develop consensus, appropriate behavior and living standard. The future rests on their ability to become more inclusive than exclusive, more open than closed and more egalitarian than elitist.