Week 19 - Community of Practice








Week 19 - Community of Practice
Descriptive Stage
For this task I have chosen two topics which I feel go hand in hand and that I feel quite inspired about.

  • Implementing Technology innovation in the classroom.
  • 21st Century Skills


What is a Community of Practice (COP)?
According to Cultivating communities of practice: Making them grow (Knox, B. 2009), a COP is ‘a group of people who share a passion for something they know how to do, who interact regularly in order to learn how to do it better.’ This allows people in the COP to create, expand and exchange knowledge, allowing individual capabilities to be further developed.
There are three underlying elements that contribute to the definition of a COP as defined by Wenger (2000); joint enterprise (domain), mutual agreement (community) and shared repertoire (practice).
By engaging in a COP with fellow teaching peers, this would allow me another avenue to follow and share technology innovations and tap into otherwise unknown resources in terms of new and innovative apps and ways in which they can be integrated into teaching and learning (Voogt. 2010). As the ITL Research suggests; that as Teachers and educators, we have to be ‘active and engaged knowledge-builders’ (ITL, 2012), taking on the very skills that we are teaching and trying to instill into our learners everyday - we need to lead by example.
 
Comparative Stage
There is a small group of school colleagues that are currently doing Mindlab, and through this we have become the early adopters of digital technology and innovation at our school, and without consciously doing so, we have set up and been participating in our own COP. Unfortunately, we are teaching different year levels, so our input and end goals differ slightly, however we interact regularly, either face to face, online or through other digital mediums, share our knowledge, and adapt it to suit our levels as best as we can. We have been collaborating by using each others strengths and knowledge in particular fields of expertise to achieve our individual goals.
Research shows that in order for a COP to be successful, it needs to be fluid and organic and be oraganised around what matters to the participants in order to achieve a common goal (Dooner, Mandzuk & Clifton, 2008). Perhaps, being such a small group with different goals and learning needs there is potential for the COP to lose momentum and fade out. We have been collaborating whenever possible, however it has been difficult when we are all teaching different year levels, junior, middle and senior school. This highlights another interesting issue of “task interdependence” (Jehn, 1995, cited in Dooner, Mandzuk & Clifton, 2008) in our potential COP, where the levels of help and collaboration can only go so far in achieving the groups individual goals and needs (Dooner, Mandzuk & Clifton, 2008).
Sunnyhills CoP in full swing.
Critical Reflection
Personally speaking, I work better through collaborating with peers, bouncing ideas with like minds, and sharing resources and innovations. I think the benefits of sharing our knowledge and collaborating has had a positive effect on my learners and I am feeling ‘braver’ to try new things in the classroom. I would like to extend our CoP and collaboration further afield in the school and especially within my syndicate as I can see great benefits for all. I believe that if I continue my journey of self-reflection and through participating in the many various CoP’s available, this will continue to support me in my current digital technologies practice and implementing these in my classroom and hopefully stay on this newfound path and break ‘old habits’.


References
Cambridge, D., Kaplan, S. & Suter, V. (2005). Community of practice design guide: A Step-by-Step Guide for Designing & Cultivating. Retrieved from URL: https://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/NLI0531.pd…
Dooner, A.-M., Mandzuk, D., & Clifton, R. A. (2008). Stages of collaboration and the realities of professional learning communities. Teaching and Teacher Education, 24(3), 564–574. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.TATE.2007.09.009
ITL Research. (2012). 21CLD Learning Activity Rubrics. Retrieved from  URL: https://education.microsoft.com/GetTrained/ITL-Research
Knox, B. (2009, December 4).Cultivating Communities of Practice: Making Them Grow.[video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhMPRZnRFkk
Voogt, J. & Roblin, N. (2010). 21st Century Skills Discussion paper. University of Twente. Retrieved from http://opite.pbworks.com/w/file/fetch/61995295/White%20Paper%2021stCS_Final_ENG_def2.pdf

Wenger-Trayner, E., & Wenger-Trayner, B. (2015). Introduction to communities of practice: A brief overview of the concept and its uses. Retrieved from http://wenger-trayner.com/introduction-to-communities-of-practice/

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