Week 10: How might Wenger's notion on practice communities relate to Prensky's on education?

Wenger coined the phrase ‘community of practice’ and used it to describe 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”. This particular group of people has a ‘common interest(s)’ which enable them to enjoy discussions and each other’s ideas/opinions. This can be applied to education when you think of the group or community they are ‘learning’ more about it and how to take part in the group effectively and accordingly. He looks at the idea of learning not only taking place at schools/colleges but also with hobbies/activities and in the workplace. Wenger’s idea could also be applied to aspects of learning which are not only online but in meatspace face to face communication also.

Alternatively Prensky looks into the ideas of digital learning and the internet. Prenksy suggests the idea of a digital divide between digital natives (students) and immigrants (teachers). He suggests that digital education is lacking in teaching thus creating this divide between natives and immigrants. The natives have been brought up with this new method of learning, whereas the immigrants (teachers) have to try adapt and try to bring this type of learning in with the older methods to enable students to remain interested in what is being taught, whilst enabling their skills/and abilities to develop with society.

Both Prensky and Wegner look at the idea of educational online learning. There is also the idea of making education enjoyable. Both theories look at the idea of learning taking place in groups. This could relate to the idea of communities of practice being created to help discuss particular topics revolving around certain subjects that are being learnt. However they look at the idea of group work in separate ways: Prensky looks at the idea of digital natives being able to communicate learn in groups via SNS, IM and other digitally native ways. Whereas Wenger looks at face to face communication and he believes that there are various statuses within a community of practice. He implies that groups have an advantage from a leader. There is a link in perhaps Prensky’s digital natives (students) could create some form of community of practice to express their own ideas about their work to each other, resulting in learning away from immigrants (teachers). However, Prenksys immigrants could involve themselves in these ideas if they learnt how to use digital technology more effectively in education and learning allowing them to grasp new skills and abilities which will not only entice the digital natives into continue learning but to also allow themselves to obtain these methods and use them on a day to day basis.