The readings and
videos from this week had me thinking about my school and whether we had a true
Community of Practice which according to Wegner (2000), “a community of
practice is defined 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.”
Short answer to this
question would be yes, in some parts we do. The long answer is a little more
complicated. If I am to be honest, there are small groups within school that
are a CoP but overall we do not do it as often as we should. In saying that we are continuing to grow and MIndlab has had a positive affect on this with many teachers that have completed or are on this journey,
Topic 1: Collaborative Teaching
Where ever you go in education collaboration is an important and ever
growing topic of interest.
I have been a part of small collaborative teams in my short time as a
teacher and I have had great experiences, but in thinking about this more, a
lot of this work could be seen as being more cooperative learning than
collaborative. Next year is a big year for myself and a colleague of mine. Because
of the classrooms we are moving too we have made the decision to do more
collaborative teaching, sharing the planning, teaching, grouping etc. We have
already had many discussion about this, we have gone into other schools to see
how they are doing this, and we have the backing and support of our leaders in
school. It is a new and at times scary thought process but so exciting as well.
We will be starting off small (with maths being the focus) but hopefully extends
to all areas of learning. While we both have our own children that we have to
report to, make OTJs and meet with parents etc, the ultimate goal being that our
collaborative approach will support our students and our own growth through
professional learning, discussions and a shared vision of where we are wanting
the students to be.
Topic 2: Student and whanau voice, working with whanau
A topic that would align to my own passion is to have learning that is
more meaningful to my students and their whanau. To me this means getting
student and whanau voice on what they want to learn/be taught. This part would
be outside the core subjects that would be taught, the topic type areas that
sometimes can be to teacher centered.
This also means working closely with whanau in a more meaningful way,
allowing them to understand more of how we teach/what is taught in class so all
teachers in our stakeholders life are on the same page, so there is less
confusion between what the students are learning at school and home. Whether it
works, who knows but it is something I wish to try.
Reference
Reference
Wenger, E. (2000). Communities of practice and social learning systems.
Organisation, 7(2), 225-246.
