In the latest post in his series on what distinguishes the very best language teachers, Interchange author Jack C. Richards considers the importance of membership of a community of practice.
Language teaching is sometimes considered a solitary and private activity, something we do within the confines of our own classrooms. But this is a narrow and self-centered view of teaching that fails to capitalize on the potential for learning and growth that comes from participating in a community of teachers having shared goals, values, and interests. The school or the teaching context becomes a learning community, and its members constitute a community of practice. A community of practice has two characteristics:
1. It involves a group of people who have common interests and who relate and interact to achieve shared goals.
2. It focuses on exploring and resolving issues related to the workplace practices that members of the community take part in.
In our work as language teachers, this often takes the form of collaboration with other teachers in order to better understand the nature of the teaching and learning that goes on in our classrooms, to share knowledge and skills, to bring about changes in practice when necessary, and to capitalize on the potentials that team work and group collaboration can bring about.
Membership in a community of practice in a school provides opportunities for teachers to work and learn together through participation in group-oriented activities with shared goals and responsibilities, involving joint problem solving. Collegiality creates new roles for the teacher, such as team leader, teacher trainer, mentor, or critical friend (Richards and Farrell 2005).
This collaboration can take a number of different forms (Johnston 2009). For example:
- Collaboration with fellow teachers. This often involves a focus on teaching issues and concerns, such as use of the textbook, development of tests, and course planning.
- Collaboration with university colleagues. This may involve collaborative research or inquiry into issues of shared interest, such as exploring aspects of second language acquisition or learning strategies.
- Collaboration with others in the school. This may involve working with administrators or supervisors on issues of concern to the school.
An example of how this kind of collaboration can happen is with the Lesson Study Approach that has been widely implemented in Japan (Lewis and Tsuchida 2003). As reported by Johnson (2009), teams of teachers co-plan a lesson that focuses on a particular piece of content of unit of study. Throughout the planning process, they draw on outside resources, including textbooks, research, and teaching theories, and engage in extended conversations while focusing on student learning and the development of specific outcomes.
Once the plan has been developed, one member of the team volunteers to teach it, while the others observe. (Sometimes outsiders are also invited to observe). After the lesson, the group discuss their findings in a colloquium or panel discussion. Typically, the teachers who planned the lesson focus on their rationale for how they planned the lesson and their evaluation of how it went, particularly focusing on student learning. The planning group then reconvene to review the lesson and revise it, and a different teacher then teaches it to a different class.
The cycle culminates in the team publishing a report that includes lesson plans, observed student behavior, teacher reflections, and a summary of the group discussions. These are then made available to others. Many forms of professional development can help foster the sense of a community of practice, such as reading groups, action research, team teaching, peer observation, and peer coaching. However, this may require a change in mind-set for some teachers who do not see themselves as members of a team.
For others, collaboration can be seen as a source of strength that can have valuable personal as well as practical benefits. Making the transition from seeing oneself as a self-contained independent individual to seeing oneself as a member of a community of practice is an important component of the shaping of teacher identity and an important milestone in professional development.
You can find all the references for this series of posts: References-and-Further-Reading
Read all the posts in this series:
Competence and Performance in Language Teaching #1 – Introduction
Competence and Performance #2 – The language proficiency factor
Competence and Performance #3 – The role of content knowledge (i)
Competence and Performance #4 – The role of content knowledge (ii)
Competence and Performance #5 – Teaching skills
Competence and Performance #6 – Contextual Knowledge
Competence and Performance #7 – The language teacher’s identity
Competence and Performance #8 – Learner-focused teaching (i)
Competence and Performance #9 – Learner-focused teaching (ii)
Competence and Performance #10 – Pedagogical reasoning skills
Competence and Performance #11 – Theorizing from practice
Competence and Performance #12 – Membership of a community of practice
Competence and Performance #13 – Professionalism