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.

<p><font size="2" face="Arial">The perspective of communities of practice affects educational practices along three dimensions:</font></p> <ul> <font size="2" face="Arial"> <i> </i><li><i>Internally</i>: How to organize educational experiences that ground school learning in practice through participation in communities around subject matters?</li> <i> </i><li><i>Externally</i>: How to connect the experience of students to actual practice through peripheral forms of participation in broader communities beyond the walls of the school?</li> <i> </i><li><i>Over the lifetime of students</i>: How to serve the lifelong learning needs of students by organizing communities of practice focused on topics of continuing interest to students beyond the initial schooling period?</li> </font></ul> <p><font size="2" face="Arial">From this perspective, the school is not the privileged locus of learning. It is not a self-contained, closed world in which students acquire knowledge to be applied outside, but a part of a broader learning system.</font></p>

<p>To test their hypothesis, the team recorded two versions of a PowerPoint lecture. The presentations differed only in the presence of animation to incrementally present information. They then showed students either the animated or non-animated lecture and then tested the students recall and comprehension of the lecture.</p> <p>The team found a marked difference in average student performance, with those seeing the non-animated lecture performing much better in the tests than those who watched the animated lecture. Students were able to recall details of the static graphics much better. Animated slides meant to present information incrementally actually require greater concentration, which makes it harder to remember content as well as reducing overall exposure time to the "complete" slide, the researchers found.</p>

<p>To test their hypothesis, the team recorded two versions of a PowerPoint lecture. The presentations differed only in the presence of animation to incrementally present information. They then showed students either the animated or non-animated lecture and then tested the students recall and comprehension of the lecture.</p> <p>The team found a marked difference in average student performance, with those seeing the non-animated lecture performing much better in the tests than those who watched the animated lecture. </p>

This issue is all about trust. Schools don’t trust students or teachers to do the right thing. Companies don’t trust employees. but the problem lies not with the technology, but with with setting expectations and ensuring those expectations are met. When a company blocks access to social media, it is blocking access to its own future growth and when a school blocks access to social media it is blocking access to a student’s future growth.

If we truly want to advance from a focus on teaching to a focus on student learning, then a strategy involving something like electronic student portfolios, or ePortfolios, is essential.