Contribution of Teacher Enquiry topics to my Communities of Practice

Contribution of Teacher Enquiry topics to my Communities of Practice

Descriptive

When I think about Communities of Practice I realise that doing the Mindlab course for the past 19 weeks Is like being in a COP. For me getting to know the 2 other staff members from our school doing the course and all the other Primary and High school teachers on the course has been the best part. Wenger (1998)

Defines a Community of Practice as a group of individuals participating in communal activity, and experiencing/continuously creating their shared identity through engaging in and contributing to the practices of their communities. 

Comparative

The 3 of us from our school worked in different subject areas Maths,Social Studies and Technology, however,we all were working on using Digital for learning in the classroom and trying to use Collaboration to increase achievement in our subject areas. We came together once a week and shared our experiences in our subject areas with what we were trying each week. We also encouraged one another with the Digital Apps we were trying and I personally improved my Digital app use in the classroom purely from the stories and experiences of the other 2 in our COP. I can safely say I am now sold on Padlet as digital tool in the classroom for collecting student voice based on Aron's success stories.

Critical Reflection

In teaching we are always making plans to get together to talk about stuff but life gets in the way and Department meetings come up and all sorts of things hinder us so it was great having that set time once a week for Mindlab where a group of like minded people (COP)got together and shared their journey sometimes it was nice and gentle storytelling and sometimes it was thought provoking but it always made me think about my teaching practice and what does that mean for for my students. (Wenger, McDermott & Snyder, 2002, COP is a groups of people who share a concern, a set of problems, or a passion about a topic, and who deepen their knowledge and expertise in this area by interaction on an ongoing basis. Our group from my school shared our Digital and Collaboration journey by doing the last assignment together which was really enlightening and showed that you do not have to be in the same subject area to be in a Community of Practice. Moving forward I now am more confident in using and trying new Digital apps like Peardeck and Padlet and also have created more lessons where the students have to collaborate in different groups rather than with just their friends.

References

Wenger, E. (1998). Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Wenger,Mcdermott&Snyder (2002)Cultivating communities of practice: A guide to managing knowledge. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.