Strengthening Educators’ Self-Efficacy for OER in Adult Basic and Literacy Education: Evidence from Three Studies

Personalized learning materials can enhance motivation and learning success in adult literacy and basic education, where learner groups are highly heterogeneous and teaching resources often require adaptation. Open educational resources (OER) offer a promising approach to enabling such personalization through legal reuse and collaborative improvement. However, OER creation and dissemination in adult basic education remain limited because potential material creators, most often educators, face substantial individual and structural barriers, including legal uncertainty, limited time, low organizational support, and low self-efficacy. This article evaluates low-threshold professional learning approaches within the context of the federally funded German PAG II project, which developed a repository for educational resources in adult basic and literacy education. Three studies were conducted. Study 1 ( N = 14) served as a needs assessment and examined professionals’ OER-related attitudes, perceived resources, self-efficacy, and training preferences. Building on these findings, two online training formats were developed and evaluated: short “Coffee Lectures” (Study 2; N = 41) and a more comprehensive workshop-based training (Study 3; N = 35). Across both training formats, participants’ self-efficacy regarding OER-related competencies increased substantially, with particularly strong gains for Creative Commons licensing and legally secure use of images and graphics. Follow-up data were limited, and behavioral outcomes related to material submission could therefore not be assessed conclusively. Nevertheless, the findings suggest that while accessible training can strengthen educators’ capacity and self-efficacy, sustainable OER dissemination in adult basic education likely requires complementary organizational and structural support.