“He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.”
Thomas Jefferson
What does OPEN mean?
In his TEDxNYED on Youtube (2010), David Wiley explains quite simply and easily what openness means. It defines open as follows: „generous, sharing, giving.
He emphasizes that open has to do with sharing and formulates it as follows: „Teaching materials were freely shared“.
For a long time I felt threatened by sharing, I am still reserved. Giving away my material with the uncertainty of what will happen with it still makes me cautious. But if one starts from the aspect as Thomas Jefferson formulated it, then knowledge is increased and not taken away. Like a candle from which you can get fire/light to light a new one. The result is a sea of light. The knowledge is carried on and increased, but also further developed.
As a teacher I teach, go into dialogue with the students and give learning material to the students. Through the exchange I already share my knowledge, but I also get knowledge back from the students. A give and a take. They process this knowledge on the basis of their previous knowledge and develop it further in their sense and I do it the same way as a teacher. So the more open we are, the better education we can do.
This means by Dave Wiley (2010) „A successful Educator share most thoroughly with the most students!“
What role does Creative Commons CC play in this process? CC licenses support a culture of sharing and development. As an author, I can still share, but I have a say in whether my work can be shared, modified, and reused. „Some rights reserved“. Dave Wiley (2010) names the four activities: Reuse, Redistribute, Revise, Remix. A good solution, which gives me the possibility to share, but also to specify what can and cannot be done with my product. Gives me a good feeling because my product is protected in a certain way. The CC licenses are a concept located between the copyright and the public domain. This also gives me an idea of what kind of openness I find myself in.
In this sense, I am and will remain involved with the topic of „Openness“ and „Creative Common“. My formulated goal is to lose more and more of my reservations and to share learning material.
Short TED-talk by Dave Wiley https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rb0syrgsH6M (Zugriff 21.11.2018)
http://www.creativecommons.ch/wie-funktionierts/ (Zugriff 21.11.2018)