This book was modified from Biology at OpenStax.org. It was initially modified by instructors at Front Range Community College (FRCC, Colorado) in June 2019, and further modified by Katherine R. Mattaini in July 2020. Major changes made included reordering the chapters, replacing some images, and some rewording.

Introduction to Oceanography is a textbook appropriate to an introductory-level university course in oceanography. The book covers the fundamental geological, chemical, physical and biological processes in the ocean, with an emphasis on the North Atlantic region.

Introduction to Professional and Public Writing is dedicated to introducing students to a lifelong commitment of engaging with these problems that matter. As an academic discipline, Writing Studies’ contribution to engaging with problems can be applied to all areas of study and to all types of problems because we focus on the way language itself—discourse—is created and exchanged in the service of engaging problems. Writing Studies deepens students’ rhetorical awareness of how the ongoing conversations between groups of people shape and express the problems that matter. According to Aristotle, being rhetorically aware means understanding “the best means of persuasion in any given situation.” It means understanding the deep logic that explains why an author has selected a particular genre to deliver a particular message to an audience. We all know writing is hard, but we commit to writing well because of the vital work it does in the world in helping humans preserve and extend our ability to come together. As theorist Anne Beaufort writes, “[w]hat writing expertise is ultimately concerned with is becoming engaged in a particular community of writers who dialogue across texts, argue, and build on each other’s work” (18).

This book isn’t purely a textbook. Sure, it’s got information about physics, but it’s not really meant to be read like a textbook. There are tons of physics textbooks out there and frankly most of the information we teach in this class hasn’t changed in hundreds of years.

You don’t need to know any formal physics to get started with this course, but you are expected to have a strong math background (algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and some calculus) and will be expected to use those skills early and often in this course. Math is, after all, the language of physics!

In this manual, you’ll find a quick overview of the material you need to know from each section we cover, additional resources to help you better understand the material, the problems we will work on as a group in class, problems from previous course exams, problem-solving tips and strategies, and equation sheets for your own exams. Each chapter covers a general topic in the course and will include links to videos and other resources to help you with the material itself and the required math background.

Let’s get started!

This resource is intended to provide practitioners with introductory, practical content that they can learn from and adapt to better support their own campus Open Education efforts, particularly Open Pedagogy. It is not intended to be an extensive or exhaustive resource about the educational theories and frameworks out of which Open Pedagogy has emerged, as there are several other wonderful resources that cover that information. It includes a podcast series of teaching faculty interviews that will be helpful for other faculty seeking to learn more about their peers’ experiences with open pedagogy, and librarians will benefit from hearing firsthand perspectives so they can better understand the necessary support. Also included are one-shot lesson plans intended to assist academic librarians tasked with supporting faculty embarking on open pedagogy projects, however, we recognize that it often takes a village, and individuals in other roles will also benefit from these (adaptable) lesson plans.

Rothschild’s Introduction to Sociology was adapted by Dr. Teal Rothschild from the OpenStax College textbook, Introduction to Sociology 2e, which is licensed under a CC-BY license. The original textbook for OpenStax can be found here: https://openstax.org/details/books/introduction-sociology-2e

Thinking Rhetorically: Writing in Professional and Public Contexts is dedicated to introducing students to a lifelong commitment of engaging with these problems that matter. As an academic discipline, Writing Studies’ contribution to engaging with problems can be applied to all areas of study and to all types of problems because we focus on the way language itself—discourse—is created and exchanged in the service of engaging problems. Writing Studies deepens students’ rhetorical awareness of how the ongoing conversations between groups of people shape and express the problems that matter. According to Aristotle, being rhetorically aware means understanding “the best means of persuasion in any given situation.” It means understanding the deep logic that explains why an author has selected a particular genre to deliver a particular message to an audience. We all know writing is hard, but we commit to writing well because of the vital work it does in the world in helping humans preserve and extend our ability to come together. As theorist Anne Beaufort writes, “[w]hat writing expertise is ultimately concerned with is becoming engaged in a particular community of writers who dialogue across texts, argue, and build on each other’s work.”