This week’s Education Week featured the open content movement. (You can read the first couple paragraphs but you’ll need a subscription to see the rest. And, if you don’t have a subscription, you should get one.)  While the article suggests that the main reason for the interest in open content is that it is free and thus will save schools money, it also points to some of the other benefits of using this content.  One, in particular, struck me:

The process of content creation and sharing is also a way to build professional relationships between teachers, proponents of open content say.  And the more that teachers get their hands into content creation, the better they can teach that material.

The article goes on to quote Laura Petrides, president and founder of the Institute for the Study of Knoweldge Management in Education, a group interested in open educational resources.  She talks about being able to “harness the knowledge base that already exists” among teachers.  That’s what got my attention this morning:  a movement that respects teachers for their knwoeldge and provides them a way to share it with others.

For everyone who is busy planning professional development for the beginning of school, you might consider doing a workshop on open education resources.  Give teachers a chance to look at some of the sites below, locating materials they can use but also places where they can make a contribution.  Then, throughout the year, provide them with time to work on those contributions.  You would be building community and knowledge at the same time.  I’m doing a session for admins in a few weeks and am going to incorporate these ideas.

The article also mentions that traditional textbook publishers aren’t all that worried.  I’m not surprised.  Their seeming strangle hold on education probably makes it tough for them to see past it to the future.  (Remember, Bill Gates didn’t see much future for the Internet either.)  The spokesperson for the textbook publishers points out that they have been offering digital materials for six or seven years now.  Wow…they just don’t get it.  The open content movement is so much more than providing digital materials.  Here’s what Samuel Donovan, head of Bioquest Curriculum Consortium, had to say:

Teachers can use that work not just in their own classroom, but repurpose them, organize them, customize them, and share them back to the educational community…it creates a very different kind of professional status for teachers.  They achieve ownership and professionalism.

Once again, we hear respect for teachers in this quote, something that often doesn’t form the foundation of contemporary movements in education.  I’ve been involved in several conversations this summer where the main point was that, if we’re going to make any real differences in education, we need to fire teachers who aren’t on board.  Here’s a movement that suggests that maybe we need to respect them instead and give them an opportunity to share what they know.  I think that’s a much better way to go.  After all, it’s not like we have a long line of people waiting to sign up to be teachers.  And, those that do enter the profession often only stay for a few years.  Could making them part of this kind of knowledge building community be a possible step in the direction of retention?  I’m in the midst of planning my course for pre-service teachers in the fall and will be getting them involved in this movement as part of that.

In Virginia, the Virginia Open Education Foundation is taking a proactive approach with the legislature to begin exploring this at a state level.   I blogged about my work in this area as part of my “best of NECC” post a few weeks ago if you’re interested in what we’re doing.

Meanwhile here’s a short list of open education resources to get you started:

• BioQUEST Curriculum Consortium
• Connextions
• FreeReading
• Open Education Resources Commons