Teachers and hackers
A while ago, I stumbled across David Hargreaves' article for the Demos think-tank, in which he argued that teachers need to be more like hackers. On the surface, there's a huge difference between the work that teachers and hackers do - but Hargreaves argued that there's much that teachers can learn from the way that hackers operate.
Hackers are hyper-connected. Innovation and knowledge spreads quickly - they quickly share what they've tried, what worked, and what didn't (as an example of this speed, many software bugs are exploited with incredible speed). There's also a huge amount of professional pride and peer-granted kudos that helps to fuel their contributions.
Hargreaves wrote about this idea in 2003, when user generated content and collaboration weren't a huge feature of the internet. Eight years later, we're actually fairly close to the model he envisaged, thanks to tools such as Twitter, blogs, and informal idea sharing and networking sessions such as TeachMeets that have arisen from these networks.
Some features of these educator networks that are similar to the hacker world: they're completely de-centralised and independent, with no encouragement from third parties (in teachers' case, government and other bodies). It's fuelled purely by teachers' love for sharing ideas and connecting with each other, along with peer gratitude and relationships. - Ideas are being shared quickly by teachers, and they're also being built upon and re-shared as adapted iterations by other educators. - Thanks to these networks and shared ethos, the way that many teachers approach their professional development and learning has changed. For these teachers, CPD is no longer a single school training day per term. It's now ambient. It's always-on, it's constantly evolving, and it's two-way.
Link to David Hargreaves' full article (the 'hackers' section is from page 53)
