Practice:OCL4Ed/Pathways/Why open matters (Part 1)/Permission to teach

=Permission to teach=

Teaching is not a lost art, but the regard for it is a lost tradition.

To share knowledge is the heart of education. In teaching, learning and research it is also common practice to build on existing knowledge, ideas and concepts. In education this reuse is facilitated by a culture of sharing. Building on existing knowledge (i.e., reusing content for new learning) is part of the DNA of being an educator. Consider for example:


 * In the sciences, pre-knowledge is a conceptual building block for understanding new concepts. For example, the order of operations is pre-requisite knowledge to solving algebraic equations. For example, learners need to know that when an addition expression is located inside brackets it must be evaluated prior to the evaluation of a multiplication expression located outside of the brackets.
 * The literature review is an important step in the research process to review the critical points of current knowledge including substantive findings as well as theoretical and methodological contributions to a particular topic.
 * Educators regularly rely on copyrighted materials in their teaching. For example, in advertising and marketing courses it would not be possible to teach effectively without access to published media and advertising.

While the general copyright exceptions and limitations may provide some relief for educators to legally use copyrighted materials which is all rights reserved in their teaching under fair usage or fair dealing, very often this is not enough.