Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Tables and Figures
- Contributors
- Series Foreword
- Preface and Acknowledgments
- Foreword: Virtual Communities for Learning and Development – A Look to the Past and Some Glimpses into the Future
- Building Virtual Communities
- Introduction: On Conceptualizing Community
- Part One Types of Community
- Part Two Structures and Community
- 5 Evolution of an Online Education Community of Practice
- 6 Building Social Networks Via Computer Networks: Creating and Sustaining Distributed Learning Communities
- 7 Mask and Identity: The Hermeneutics of Self-Construction in the Information Age
- 8 WISE Learning Communities: Design Considerations
- Part Three Possibilities for Community
- Afterword: Building Our Knowledge of Virtual Community: Some Responses
- Afterword: Building, Buying, or Being There: Imagining Online Community
- Index
- References
5 - Evolution of an Online Education Community of Practice
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 November 2009
Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Tables and Figures
- Contributors
- Series Foreword
- Preface and Acknowledgments
- Foreword: Virtual Communities for Learning and Development – A Look to the Past and Some Glimpses into the Future
- Building Virtual Communities
- Introduction: On Conceptualizing Community
- Part One Types of Community
- Part Two Structures and Community
- 5 Evolution of an Online Education Community of Practice
- 6 Building Social Networks Via Computer Networks: Creating and Sustaining Distributed Learning Communities
- 7 Mask and Identity: The Hermeneutics of Self-Construction in the Information Age
- 8 WISE Learning Communities: Design Considerations
- Part Three Possibilities for Community
- Afterword: Building Our Knowledge of Virtual Community: Some Responses
- Afterword: Building, Buying, or Being There: Imagining Online Community
- Index
- References
Summary
[Teachers] have no time to work with or observe other teachers; they experience occasional hit-and-run workshops that are usually unconnected to their work and immediate problems of practice. [Effective professional development cannot] be adequately cultivated without the development of more substantial professional discourse and engagement in communities of practice.
–Darling-Hammond & Ball (1997)One important role for technologies is as the backbone for an invigorated, vibrant professional community among educators. This will not happen, however, without considerable effort to design the technologies and the social structure of their use with this objective made explicit.
–Hawkins (1996)The concept of community of practice has become a major theme of teacher professional development (TPD) research and practice. Advocates argue that communities of practice (CoPs) can be powerful catalysts for enabling teachers to improve their practice (Lieberman, 1996; Rényi, 1996). A growing body of TPD policy research (e.g., Loucks-Horsley et al., 1998; Darling-Hammond & Ball, 1997) is beginning to converge on a common set of effective professional development characteristics that stem largely from CoP concepts. For example, Lieberman's (1996; Lieberman & McLaughlin, 1992) research on teacher networks builds on CoP concepts of social networks (Wellman, 1997) and community gathering places (Oldenburg, 1997). Lieberman (1996) describes how informal retreats and dinner meetings help build professional relationships and socialize new members into the fold, thereby solidifying teachers' commitment to the community.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Building Virtual CommunitiesLearning and Change in Cyberspace, pp. 129 - 158Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2002
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