A Facilitated Community of Practice: Enabling Student Success in the Blended Learning Environment

Abstract

This chapter explains the implementation, facilitation and experiences of a community of practice; video-based Peer Assisted Study Sessions (vPASS), which utilised recorded lectures and collaborative learning methodologies for at-risk undergraduate students studying Mathematics for Engineers. Students who had previously failed this core subject, were invited to enrol in the vPASS mode of Mathematics for Engineers which provided a facilitated, small group learning environment. They found significant benefits in the experiences of learning together and supporting each other's learning trajectory through the challenging content. We consider vPASS through the lenses of 'mutual engagement, joint enterprise and shared repertoire' which Wenger describes as processes that contribute to communities of practice (Wenger in Social learning systems and communities of practice. Springer and the Open University, Milton Keynes, pp 179-197, 2010b, p. 72). Although this program was based in a particular subject, the principles and approaches which underlie vPASS are transferable to other discipline areas. Transforming the experience of learning from a lecture into a social meaning making activity provides students with life-long learning skills; a graduate attribute of many institutions. It can also enable students to take greater responsibility for their learning as their motivation increases and they develop effective study strategies.

Design students meet industry players: Feedback and creativity in communities of practice

“…Y. Park, 2015;Pharo et al, 2014;Power & Armstrong, 2017;Tight, 2015). As the majority of the abovementioned work takes an intraorganizational approach (i.e.…”

Cross-organisational Communities of Practice: enhancing creativity and epistemic cognition in higher education

“…Aside of enabling the necessary social learning and collaboration (collocated/remote) processes within the academic members, they also interconnect these with the industrial members of the CoP, who are inherently disparate in terms of time, space and culture. Thus, as the majority of effective CoP interventions in education evolve within the intra-organizational scope (academia or industry only) (DeChambeau, 2017;Fegan, 2017;Park, 2015;Pharo et al, 2014;Power & Armstrong, 2017;Tight, 2015), this study is significant, as it constitutes a first-time validation of a technologically-enabled, crossorganizational CoP model, that is directly embedded in the blended HE curriculum ( al., 2014). Additionally, the study responds to a critical gap in the investigation of CoPs, concerning their contribution to learning of value, particularly in specific epistemic domains, such as the Design disciplines (Amin & Roberts, 2008;Smith et al, 2017).…”