Knowledge Management

SchoolMate.NET enables teachers individually and school staffs collectively to analyse student and organisational knowledge through a number of access points. However before attempting to address the question of knowledge management and SchoolMate.NET, it is appropriate to develop some understanding regarding knowledge management.

To define 'knowledge management' is to separate the two parts of that term.

Knowledge
Knowledge is part of the hierarchy made up of data, information, knowledge and wisdom. Data are raw facts. Information is facts with context and perspective. Knowledge, says Drucker (1994) is information that changes something or somebody, either by becoming grounds for actions, or by making an individual or organisation capable of different or more effective action. Wisdom is understanding which knowledge to use and for what purpose.

Management
Management is part of another hierarchy that includes supervision, management and leadership. Supervision is dealing with individual tasks and people, and works at the operational level of an organization or sub-unit. Management is dealing with groups and priorities at the tactical level. Leadership is dealing with purpose and change at the strategic level.

A good working definition of knowledge management must be true to both concepts.

Knowledge Management
Knowledge management is the way that SchoolMate.NET schools create, capture and re-use knowledge to achieve organisational objectives. Knowledge management caters to the critical issues of continuous improvement and organisational adaptation in times of increasingly discontinuous environmental change. Essentially, it embodies organisational processes that seek the co-existence of data and the information-processing capacity of information technologies, and the creative and innovative capacity of human beings.

Many schools are beginning to consider the possibilities of knowledge management and are constructing a learning environment that nurtures:

• Knowing - What (identification of issues)

• Knowing - How (solutions and applications)

• Knowing - Who (building social capital)

• Knowing - When (just in time strategies)

• Knowing - Where (building social networks)

• Knowing - Why (deep understandings).

(Adapted from Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, 2001.)

The weakest point of most schools is the lack of continuous knowledge about learning, teaching and assessment. Supporting and maintaining those aspects of teaching and learning that are deep and that endure, that foster sophisticated understanding and lifelong learning for all, defines the core of sustainable education. SchoolMate.NET enables schools to:

• Gather Internal Experience

• Develop an Organisational Memory

• Apply the Learning

• Integrate Learning into Strategy and Policy and

• Develop Mechanisms for Drawing Conclusions.

Click here to view 'Developing Knowledge Ecosystems to Support a Knowledge Ecology'

Return to philosophy

home | benefits | philosophy | company | contact | support | downloads
© 2005 SchoolMate.NET Pty Ltd | privacy statement