Communities of Practice
A Community of Practice (or, CoP) is a group of people who come together to enhance their understanding of a particular interest, hobby or subject. By meeting regularly, these people begin to learn through interaction with each other; this is done by sharing skills, conversation and ideas. The area in which these people are interested in learning about is referred to as a domain, and interest in this said domain is what separates a CoP from other groups or communities. The word practice also implies action, therefore to be considered a CoP, a group must be actively working together to achieve their desired goal, which could be anything from increased knowledge to the success of a sporting team.
Personally, I am involved with two CoP that immediately come to mind. I am a team member of a social netball team. We meet every week and share the common goals of wanting to win games, have fun and to maintain fitness. By coming together and interacting often, we become a Community of Practice in netball. The other CoP I am involved in is an online unit I am undertaking this semester at university. I am in the unit with many different students from many different campuses, and there is much shared communication through online forums and discussions. We all have the common goal of working towards a deeper understanding of traditional and modern learning spaces, therefore, our combined knowledge and skills are all considered useful throughout the group.
I hope that as my teaching career progresses I may become a member of many more Communities of Practice.
Learning Beyond the Classroom…
When we take children out of a classroom to learn, we introduce the element of surprise, and the joy and wonder of the unknown. Taking students out into their wider community, or even just for a stroll outside in the school grounds can present opportunities to teach about local history and culture in a practical sense. As educators, it is our responsibility to ensure we have planned and connected with the content being explored during an excursion or incursion; if we are disengaged, then there’s a chance our students will be too! If we can successfully plan preparatory and follow-up work to support the learning beyond the classroom, we give our students an amazing opportunity to learn in broadened social contexts and cultural locations. By providing stimulating and dynamic opportunities for learning beyond the classroom, we allow our students to be completely immersed in learning. We give them the chance to learn content in its rightful context and we can solidify their understanding through experiential learning.
I grew up in a little country town, about 4 hours away from Melbourne. It was a great place to grow up; our excursions were more than often around the area (although I actually think we did a tour of a nearby McDonalds on one trip haha!). As we grew older, our excursions grew too. By year 6 we headed off on a trip to Melbourne for the week, which, for a group of 50-something country kids, was quite the eye-opening experience! These excursions were a way for us to see a world in which we were quite far removed from by distance, they provided immersive and productive adventures in which we would learn about the world around us and the people in it.
Learning beyond the classroom is a chance to be a part of a community of practice!
An excursion venue is often a place where students come to learn. They are presented with new people, new smells, new sounds, new visual information and of course, new experiences and factual information. To me, I think a group visit to an excursion venue should not be isolated. Children thrive knowing that they are not the only ones to have been to a place, that other kids just like them have also been and experienced the things that they’re about to. How fantastic would it be if children could contribute to some form of ‘visitor-book,’ in which they can collectively record their experiences through visual or written means for the next group of students to reflect on. This not only connects the many different students visiting the venue, but also provides the venue hosts or teaching staff with an indelible understanding of how the students have reacted and been affected by the excursion. To me, this satisfies the characteristics of a Community of Practice, and would transform an excursion venue to an ever-evolving place of learning.
References
- Johnson, J. (2009). Beyond four walls: experiential and situated learning. Teacher. (198), 18-20.
- Lorenza, L. (2009). Beyond four walls: why go beyond the bounds of school? [online]. Teacher. (198), 22-25.
- Smith. M. (2009). Communities of practice. Retrieved from http://www.infed.org/biblio/communities_of_practice.htm
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