The US Department of Education is continuing its work to determine how online communities of practice (COPs) may help teachers improve their practice. For the past year, the Department’s Offices of Innovation and Improvement (OII) and Educational Technology (OET) have been researching several critical issues that may influence the effectiveness of online COPs. During this research, the project has uncovered consistent themes about how to scale up online communities and improve their quality to better support teachers. These themes include:
1. Building it doesn’t necessarily guarantee they’ll come. To get traffic and quality participation and support, online COP builders need to “simultaneously pursue several approaches, both acknowledging the multi-tasking nature of engagement on the Web and considering the possibility that exclusively virtual experiences may not adequately address all professional development needs.”
2. Engagement distributed among social media. By playing to the strengths of multiple, sometimes competing social media tools, participating teachers can integrate COP activities into their daily information gathering and communicating with colleagues. For example, Twitter can be used for synchronous discussion, while LinkedIn can be used for substantive and sustained discussion.
3. Peer-to-peer and small-group problem solving. Nodal conversations, where a COP manager helps to match members with common problems and then organizes online conversations for them to go in-depth, appear to be having success in some online COPs. The nodal conversations “are shortening [the participants’] learning curve and exponentially strengthening their capacity to build neighborhoods of opportunity.”
4. Combining in-person and online engagements. Online conversations can play a critical role in beginning conversations within the COP, but cannot entirely replace face-to-face support. Research is scant on the blended COP model, but OET is conducting ongoing design research on this intersection across multiple contexts.
5. Getting a green light from policymakers to make the most of COPs. COPs work most effectively when educators are engaged regularly. However, some local policies restrict teachers’ abilities to be online during the work day. Pilot projects at schools in New Jersey and California appear to be having success with building in daily online COP engagement into teachers’ schedules.
This year, the Department of Education plans to ramp up its research and projects revolving around online COPs. In May, EPIC-ed, an online COP that “will provide a dynamic environment for educators to collaborate, share expertise, and have access to resources to strengthen their ability to plan, implement, and sustain technology-enabled learning initiatives.” Also, a second COP focused on dropout prevention and recovery will be launched later in the year.
To read more, please visit http://www.ed.gov/oii-news/feature-what-role-can-online-cops-communities-practice-play-achieving-teacher-excellence
