chmod 777 education
In 2005, a few months after Tim O'Reilly crafted the term Web 2.0 and the discussion about Web 1.0 vs Web 2.0 emerged, IBM's James Snell wrote a short post explaining his view about the Web 2.0 concept. He used a brief Unix/Linux command—chmod 777 Web—to convey the message that Web 2.0 is all about granting users full-access privileges to the Web.
His thought-provoking comments got us thinking. What would happen if we executed a "chmod 777 education" command to provide openness to education?
In operating systems like Unix/Linux, using the chmod 777 command allows users full access to classes. In an educational context, using the chmod 777 education command would require educational agents agree that learning should be open to all, allowing everyone with some interest in a subject to be able to learn, discuss, and use it.
However, this scenario is not so much a technological issue as an educational one. The sheer use of Web 2.0 technologies in education does not imply the fair, complete, and automatic implementation of core underlying principles of chmod 777 education, such as openness, collaboration, participation, and sharing.
A good example of this is the use of social media tools and applications in some educational settings where the teacher restricts participation and sharing to a small community of students, thus leaving behind the broader—and increasingly more important—student-learning contexts, communities, and resources.
chmod 777 education advocates embrace the full openness of educational tools and contexts, allowing students, teachers, and the larger learning community to enroll in collective knowledge construction activities, without restrictions. Purporting learning as a communal and social activity, this networked and participative approach to education intends to encompass and empower all educational agents, switching the locus from passively following and consuming to responsibly and actively recommending, sharing, and contributing to broader and diverse learning communities.
This approach also represents new boundaries for education, setting the stage for a more open school-a "no-walls school" as pointed out by Attwell and Wesch. The chmod 777 education concept stresses the metaphorical wall-lessness toward a new cognitive and social openness that results from empowering educational agents and making room for a new spirit of interactivity, participation, and collaboration.
Finally, we're also talking about new contexts for education. The openness purported by chmod 777 education promotes a dilution and active remix of the different learning contexts where educational agents are present.
Are you ready to hit "Enter"?
About the Authors
Carlos Santos is an assistant lecturer and Ph.D. student in the cmmunication and arts department of the University of Aveiro, Portugal. He is the executive coordinator of labs.sapo/ua research and development lab. His personal blog can be found at http://napraia.blogs.ca.ua.pt.
Luís Pedro is an assistant professor in the communication and arts department of the University of Aveiro, Portugal, where he is involved in research activities in the Multimedia Communication Master Degree program, and in the Multimedia in Education and in the Information and Communication in Digital Platforms Doctoral programs. His personal blog can be found at http://nitratodocaos.blogs.ca.ua.pt.
