Communities of Practice (JLS)

Created by

Jonathan Scharff, jschar1@students.towson.edu

Lisa Wojcik, Lwojic1@students.towson.edu

Shana Scott,, sscott84@yahoo.com

Introducing:  Communities of Practice

 Image source:  images.google.com/imgres

     Communities of Practice is a learning theory that deals with the act of acquiring knowledge socially and developing and furthering common practices of a social and cultural nature by interacting and collaborating with others who have the same goal.  A cognitive anthropologist, Jane Lave, and her colleague Barbara Rogoff around the year 1985 originally brought up the expression of Communities of Practice.  The phrase was determined from studies dealing with the learning that went on during conditions such as apprenticeships.  Around 1991, after conducting five different apprenticeship studies involving tailors, meat cutters, midwives, alcoholics and quartermasters, Etienne Wenger and Jane Lave established the concept of legitimate peripheral participation. 

Information source:  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_of_practice

      Legitimate peripheral participation describes how those who are new to a community begin their membership by performing tasks that are considered peripheral and even though they are identified as easy and safe, they are still important to the success of the community as a whole.  These types of activities help new members learn different aspects of the community such as vocabulary, how the community is organized and tasks.  Just like it is with a new job, each member spends a certain amount of time working on peripheral tasks and are eventually given harder and more important jobs to do as they learn from the initial ones.  Legitimate peripheral participation also suggests that the best way for someone new to a community to better themselves is to have the ability to spend time observing those considered experts at what they do.  Using the understanding of the phrase legitimate peripheral participation, Etienne Wenger and Jean Lave established what was called Communities of Practice.

Information source:  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legitimate_peripheral_participation

     Etienne Wenger and Jean Lave proposed that the best way to learn in a Community of Practice was by situated learning.  Situated learning refers to acquiring knowledge while in the environment where that knowledge will eventually be used.  Etienne Wenger and Jane Lave both believed that learning should be done in a social atmosphere where information can be gained through interaction with others, instead of merely receiving knowledge by way of one person lecturing another. 

Information source:  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situated_learning

     There are several characteristics that need to be evident for a Community of Practice to be present.  We will discuss those characteristics shortly, but before we do, let’s look at the contributions that Jane Lave and Etienne Wenger gave to the theory.

The Theorists and Their Contributions to the Theory

Jane Lave

 Image source: www.si.umich.edu/ICOS/Presentations/041699/JeanLave.jpg

 Jane Lave

     Jane Lave is a social anthropologist working at the University of California, Berkley.  The main reason she got involved with the idea of Communities of Practice is because she is extremely interested in social theory.  She has done numerous research studies associated with social theory including ethnographic and ethnohistoric projects. 

Information source:  geography.berkeley.edu/PeopleHistory/faculty/J_Lave.html 

     As a theorist of Communities of Practice, Jane Lave has spent most of her time and research trying to convince the education community and others associated with the process of learning to re-evaluate their traditional ideas on how individuals learn and learning itself in relation to every day situations in society.   Information source:  www.infed.org/biblio/communities_of_practice.htm    

     Jane Lave has also written and coauthored a number of books on the topic of social theory including, Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation, which she worked on with Etienne Wenger, Understanding Practice and Cognition in Practice.  As of now, Jane Lave is working on her new book about being an apprentice in Liberia. 

Information source:  geography.berkeley.edu/PeopleHistory/faculty/J_Lave.html

Etienne Wenger

 Image source:  www.youtem.com/module2/wenger_files/EWintrophoto_data/EWinformal.JPG

Etienne Wenger

     Etienne began his career as a teacher and eventually went on to earn his Ph.D. in the field of artificial intelligence.  Not only is Wenger considered to be a major researcher of the topic of Communities of Practice, but he is also well known for bringing the theory to places outside of the schools such as organizations by conducting workshops and speaking on the topic of Communities of Practice.  He has also written or helped write several books and articles discussing the idea such as, Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity, Cultivating Communities of Practice: a Guide to Managing Knowledge and Situated Learning.  Beyond his authorship, Wenger has founded an organization called CPsquare.  He uses CPsquare to help different organizations understand the meaning and application of the Communities of Practice theory.

Information source:  www.ewenger.com/bio/index.htm

Please note

When accessing the above link it gives you a set of links to choose from that all have the same url as the initial link given.  When looking to verify the information in the above paragraph please choose the following links:  A short bio and a long bio.

Characteristics of the theory

Strengths and Weaknesses

Association with directed or constructivist instruction?

Application of the Theory (an example of the theries use in the classroom)