Session Information
16 SES 04 B, ICT-Based Collaborative Learning
Paper Session
Contribution
During the last decade, with the rapid developments in information technology, virtual environments have become important places for groups to collaborate, share and develop themselves. Online communities of practice is one of the ways that enables group collaboration and practice. According to Wenger, McDermont and Snyder (2002),
a community of practice is not just a Web site, a database, or a collection of best practices. It is a group of people who interact, learn together, build relationships, and in the process develop a sense of belonging and mutual commitment. Having others who share your overall view of the domain and yet bring their individual perspectives on any given problem creates a social learning system that goes beyond the sum of its parts (p. 34).
Wenger, et al. (2002) explains communities of practice in three fundamental dimensions: domain, community and practice. The domain creates common ground and a sense of common identity. A well-defined domain legitimizes the community by affirming its purpose and value to members and other stakeholders. The domain inspires members to contribute and participate, guides their learning, and gives meaning to their actions (p.28).
The community creates the social fabric of learning. A strong community fosters interactions and relationships based on mutual respect and trust (p.28). According to Ishaya and Macaulay (1999) trust is “a characteristic for collaboration where members believe in character, ability, integrity, familiarity and morality of each other” (p. 145). According to Rotter (1967, 1980), absence and presence of trust affects the efficiency, adjustment, and even survival of any social group (cited in Bulu and Yildirim, 2008, p.133).
Wenger, et al. (2002) defines practice as a set of frameworks, ideas, tools, information, style, language, stories, and documents that community members share (p.29). A shared practice supports innovation because it provides a language for communicating new ideas quickly and for focusing conversations (p.38).
This study investigates trust, professional practice and sense of belongings in an information technology teachers’ online community of practice. Although there are extensive number of online communites of practice and research studies done about them, there are few studies that examine the trust, professional practice and sense of belongings which are the essential building blocks of an online community of practice. Another important aspect of this study is that IT teaching at K-12 education is a relativeley new teaching profession. The IT teachers’ community lacks the accumulated resources and ways of practices in the field. Therefore, this study will contribute both to the literature and to the practice in the field in this respect. The research questions that constitute this research study are:
1. How do the members of IT teachers’ online community of practice perceive the professional practice in the online community?
2. How do the members of IT teachers’ online community of practice perceive the trust in the online community?
3. How do the members of IT teachers’ online community of practice perceive the sense of belongings in the online community?
4. How do the members of IT teachers’ online community of practice perceive the technical quality in the online community?
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Bulu, S. T., & Yildirim, Z. (2008). Communication Behaviors and Trust in Collaborative Online Teams. Educational Technology & Society, 11 (1), 132-147. Ishaya, T., & Macaulay, L. (1999). The role of trust in virtual teams. Electronic Journal of Organizational Virtualness, 1, 140-157. Rotter, J. (1967). A new scale for the measure of interpersonal trust. Journal of Personality, 35, 651-655. Rotter, J. (1980). International trust. American Psychologist, 35, 1-7. Wenger, E., McDermott, R. A., & Snyder, W. (2002). Cultivating communities of practice. Boston: Harvard Business School Press. Retrieved January14, from http://books.google.ca/books?id=m1xZuNq9RygC&printsec=frontcover&dq=cultivating+communities+of+practice&hl=tr&cd=1#v=onepage&q=&f=false.
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