Do we have a professional and moral obligation to share?
Ok people, I have a confession to make – My name is Ashley and I love sharing knowledge with others and having people share my knowledge with me. Now that we have gotten that out of the way, I was reflecting on this notion today.
People who know me know that I love to hear stories. I love it when somebody shares something that they are doing in their classroom. Even if I don’t think it ‘adds value’ to my life, it is still fun to hear. I am also an ‘idea manipulator’. I will see or hear about an idea that somebody else is implementing with their kids and modify it to suit my needs.
But my question is do we have a moral and professional obligation to share? I know that some people find this very difficult. I feel that as educators we do. We should be sharing out wealth of knowledge and resources to aid the wider educational community to have kids do great things.
I would be interested to hear people’s thoughts on this.
hi – I’d never really thought of sharing as an obligation, but you’ve got me thinking. I am a sharer by the way, in terms of ideas, resources, assessments and activities. I hope that by sharing that I can help others, or perhaps even inspire them to try something a different way. I also have the selfish hope that others will share back – even perhaps feel obligated to share back. Haven’t got much love that way (except from a small number of other sharers who probably would have shared with me even if I hadn’t shared with them).
I love reading / being shared to?? other people’s experiences in the classroom too – what has got well, what hasn’t, what risks they are taking. And I love the possibility that twitter provides to share the buzz when something does work. It is inspiring. I love when my twitter friends share their lives with me – it makes them more real & I feel that I know many of them. And who doesn’t love having friends?
But back to obligation, and the thoughts in my head now.
We study history to learn from other people’s mistakes and their successes, don’t we? If we can learn from others, we all grow. Maybe there should be some obligation.
Thanks for all the sharing you do – esp by twitter which is where I found you & feel like I’m getting to know you. Take care.
D