On Wednesday I met with Robert Jones to check out his FreeMIS on-line management information system. As I explained on Wednesday Robert is an advocate and user of open source software. I’d never heard of open source but since Wednesday I’ve been doing a little more homework. It is a remarkable concept – develop something share it with others – for free!, who then improve it and then pass it on to others – for free! No wonder some of the big software companies are frightened. It rang a bell for me this morning when Graham Whitehead talked about encyclopedia britannica and the fact that knowledege is developing so quickly that a paper based version is no longer useful. I linked this with the
wikipedia idea where people put information up on a site, which is self-monitored, and the info can be edited, added to and enhanced by other users. In a sense this is open source knowledge management. I then wondered does this have any potential for education and the development and delivery of the curriculum? Open source education? What would it look like?