Geeks, Gurus and Gadgets

What   is a community of practice? Wenger (2000) says that a community of practice is not necessarily professionally focused, and is defined by joint enterprise, shared repertoire and mutual engagement.    For the purpose of this project, however, I need to acknowledge my professional colleagues because as Knox (2009) states that this is an important characteristic of the community I will need to support me. Who are my communities of practice? What is happening in terms of the inquiry topics I might focus on? First and foremost, my mindlab colleagues, both within my school and local schools, are an important and supportive community for me. They have similar values around the importance of 21 st century skills and learning, which is one of the areas I would like to focus on. Along with Hawea Flat, Wanaka Primary and Cromwell Primary, we are all part of the New Pedagogies for Deep Learning (NPDL) cluster and are in different places on the jou...

Description Throughout my Mindlab journey, I have been excited by many of the innovative practices covered. The big one for me, as a connected educator who perceives herself as having a future focused disposition, is Changing the Script – rethinking the roles of learners and teachers. Perhaps the most intriguing part of this, is not changing the script for myself – but how I feed this forward to my students. We, the teachers, are not the fountain of all knowledge anymore, as the ubiquitousness of technology is surpassing this old concept of education. Many of my students believe in a number of misconceptions. ·       Learning is about them being ‘fed’ information ·       Mathematical learning is about getting the answer right ·       Sharing information, answers, strategies is not okay ·       Research and inquiry is about finding the answers from google as qu...