In April 2016, we visited the Academic Enhancement Center at Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University in Suzhou, China. We did a keynote at their Learning and Teaching Colloquium and participated in a series of activities. The team created a great video report of our visit, including extracts from our keynote and workshops, as well as thematic snippets …
Partly out of a sense of drama and partly to make a point I sometimes find myself being dismissive of “collaboration” and “sharing knowledge”. This is why. First, social learning is first and foremost about – well – learning. Learning as a social enterprise. Say, write, or even think a word that you assume makes …
Betreaters in Canada explore the differences between teachers and social learning leaders
Should communities of practice attempt to assess or measure the value they create? The issue of measurement and assessment is a controversial one when it comes to communities. Some see measurements as community killers and some see them as the only way communities can survive in organizations. The reality of most communities is more nuanced. …
What are three key success factors for communities of practice? Communities of practice are complex social structures, whose voluntary and self-governing nature makes them quite sensitive to subtle dynamics. As a result a host of factors potentially contribute to their success (and to their failure). Any of them can become critical in some circumstances, but …
How big can a community of practice become? Being a community of practice does not depend on size. It depends on identification with the domain and enough mutual engagement to produce learning value. Of course, if a community is very small, members will likely have heard each other’s stories and opinions after a while. Without …
What level of participation should one expect in a community of practice? Participation in communities of practice is rarely a person’s main activity or job, so expected levels of participation should reflect this reality. Mainly they should reflect the level of relevance of the domain to the main activities of members. This means that levels …
How long should a community of practice be expected to last? There really is no set length of time that a community should last. In most cases, a community of practice starts without a clear sense of how long it will exist. It will last as long as members find value in their learning together. …
How long should a community take to get going? Community formation takes time, but the time it takes for a community to become fully operational varies a lot from case to case. Some communities are so ready to exist that they congeal as soon as members have an opportunity to start learning together. Members can …
What are the first three things one should consider doing to get a community of practice started? You cannot start a community by yourself. In fact you cannot start a community at all, to be quite honest about it. The only people who can form a community are the members themselves as a collectivity. But …
