Unit 6: COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE
After having a look at the material provided and some communities of practice, I would like to highlight the first points that came to my mind: Autonomy and motivation. Some time ago, we were discussing about what comes first: the motivation or the autonomy. This discussion was not finished… but according to my own experience, motivation could come first. I enrolled in a couple of CoP’s because I found them appealing, attractive, interesting, relevant for my context but especially because I felt I could be an active participant.
Once you join, it is necessary to explore and find in this amount of resources which could be helpful for you as teacher or learner. At this point, I can say that a CoP has a relevance in education (teaching and learning) since your role is a “mixture”; as teacher, you are LEARNING from your peers and you take advantage of the resources and tools there for your TEACHING practice. Likewise, for students is a way to promote scaffolding through this mixture of roles. This is the other issue that came to my mind: The opportunity to allow learners to identify their knowledge and the ways to improve it, to help others (peers), and to provide food for thought for teachers. Their voices would be listened to. A CoP is for students a strong and concrete opportunity to be active participants.
Exploring some CoP’s, I can say that Colombian English Network (http://www.colombianenglishteachers.net/ ) is not just a Ning community. It is somehow a CoP for teachers. Everyteacher who joins in is encouraged to contribute with their knowledge, resources, successful experiences. Perhaps through the different groups created there, people can join taking into account the interests. I am not sure if there are collaborative projects. I think this an aspect that makes the difference between a CoP and a social network.
Reference
Wenger, E. (2006). Communities of practice: A brief Introduction. Retrieved from
http://www.ewenger.com/theory/index.htm
