Maximizing Value from Professional Learning Networks

More than one week

Novice

Course details

“Communities of practice are formed by people who engage in a process of collective learning in a shared domain of human endeavour. In a nutshell: Communities of practice are groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly.” - Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Trayner (2015)

Learning is changing. And teachers’ professional learning is no exception to this. Teacher learning in the form of continuing professional development increasingly takes place in networked and collaborative settings – boundaries for professional development are disappearing because of what technology now makes possible. Our learning is much less likely to be limited to a single geographic location or time of life. We are becoming very much a networked profession.

But how can we get better value from the various communities of practice and learning networks we choose or are guided to join?

It helps to know that there are many different types of communities of practice and learning networks for a start; and that a considerable body of research in recent years has helped identify the characteristics and practices that make such learning experiences more meaningful and useful to teachers and other involved in education.

The course Maximizing Value from Professional Learning Networks sets out to introduce participants to the most interesting and in some cases surprising findings on how networks actually work… and how we can tell the better ones from the rest. The course aims to help participants become more ‘network aware’ and so gain a better appreciation of the collaborative and active nature of the learning that takes place in good networks and how to take advantage of this.

It also introduces a framework that can be used to help gauge personal learning and development within a networked community or network – which will be useful to teachers thinking about setting up their own learning networks whether local to a school or reaching far beyond a single geographical setting.

Duration and workload

Start date: Monday 6 March 2023
End date: Wednesday 22 March 2023

Duration: 2 weeks and 2 days
Workload: 8-10 hours

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You can access the modules by enrolling in the course
It is no longer possible to take part in the final activity and receive a certificate of completion
Please note that user support for this course is no longer provided

Target audience

This course will be of interest to teachers from across the range of school education as well as education professionals who lead and support learning networks and communities of practice that allow teachers to learn together, formally or informally.

Learning objectives

As a participant in this course, you should expect to:

Learn about the characteristics and features of good Professional Learning Networks (PLN)
Examine the practices and the nature of a number of strong learning networks and communities from across various counties and subject areas;
Consider the interactional and psychosocial variables that contribute to the personal and professional learning experiences provided by PLNs and learning communities;
Explore how to capture the value of the learning experiences provided by networks and teacher communities of practice;
Reflect, discuss and share opinions on key topics of the 21st century teacher education and development through the course learning tasks offered at the end of each module and the final module task.

Offered by

This content is offered by the European Commission. The European Commission is the European Union's politically independent executive arm. It is alone responsible for drawing up proposals for new European legislation, and it implements the decisions of the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union.