Community of Practice

Reflections on Community of Practice 

In his essay about Community of Practice E. Wenger made it very clear to me that learning is a social activity, at least that's what I got out of it. Building knowledge is enabled through an act of participation in some sort of learning system, like the mindlab evenings, "what is your understanding of ...", the lecturer enquired. Through the shared discussion of individuals, abstract concepts were attached with a personal perspective, were filled with an interpretation of someone, connected to personal experience. Much as E. Wenger points out that knowledge and competence grows over time and is impacted by our own experiences, both influence one another, one can't be without the other.
This brings me to my literature review which focussed on the preconditions of successful teacher collaboration in an ILE. Overlapping both areas it surprises me that Wenger's ideas were not mentioned anywhere in the studies that I reviewed, it seems so obvious to me that an essential precondition for teacher collaboration is to form a community of practice. Like Wenger the sources that I reviewed identified the same problem, like effective teacher collaboration, community of practice can't be created, only fostered. I believe this is true for both because for me two teachers and their students are already a community. In a way, success of community depends on the energy that the community itself generates, not on an external mandate (Wenger, E., 2000).
I have identified as my community of practice a number of colleagues from the senior school syndicate that voluntarily come together to discuss, share and create learning for themselves and students alike. I have to point out that these are not scheduled team meetings with all 8 teachers on the contrary. It is a group of 4 colleagues (two teaching hubs) that come together, if possible, on a weekly basis to collaborate and create new ideas and learning. I think exactly like in Wenger's example about the scientist being engaged in discourse, we as teachers do the same, given we have the time, we share, discuss and acknowledge or disagree with each other and explain our thinking and acting. For me it is as described by Wenger I only start a discourse with a specific kind of people, which I somehow have identified to be interested in my knowledge and competence and are willing to actively listen and to engage in a shared knowledge building exercise of some sort. These members of my community of practice have demonstrated the willingness to listen first or have shown a genuine interest in my competence. Both of these experiences with like minded teachers have formed how I perceive their ability to attract and engage with me. Kind of obvious again because why would anyone repeatedly try to start a learning conversation with a group of people that are showing no interest to provide any feedback or feed forward or worse commenting in a way that is negative. ENGAGEMENT, IMAGINATION, ALIGNMENT play an integral role in forming a community of practice. Engagement does not need any further explaining, people engage or they don't, you can't force it. Imagination is having the ability to see that the investment in a community will be beneficial for all members. Alignment is necessary to ensure the community will hold together because of shared values and norms, working towards a common goal. About my role in our community of practice being new to the school and bringing with me a bit of experience, I see myself as a 'broker'. I definitely bring something different to the mix, may it be that I'm educated somewhere else or just my identity. I often see things differently and I am not afraid to disagree and share my view point. This personality trait of mine is not very helpful in a primary setting because I often alienate people at first. I think, I'm too controversial for many but on the other hand the people who do work with me and get to know me better see the benefits.

 Wenger, E.(2000). Communities of practice and social learning systems. Organization,7(2), 225-246