Continuing development throughout our careers is essential if we are to reach our full potential, enhancing both our professional competence and our personal fulfillment. Based on a Community of Practice perspective, this presentation demonstrates how various Internet facilities can facilitate induction and participation in peer networks to support our professional development. In order to provide a practical guide for colleagues to make use of, this presentation surveys a range of resources available on the Internet, including discussion boards and online teaching resources, before focusing on the role of the newsgroup as a community of practice. With particular reference to the TESL-L list, it is demonstrated that engagement with such a community can provide a channel for development, leading from peripheral to full participation. We also survey the online resources established by the ELT community in Greece, and offer practical suggestions for ways to benefit from these, ranging from participation in a discussion group to accessing research published on the web and publishing our own articles in online journals. The conclusion is that by sharing our own practice with fellow-practitioners we can provide ideas and resources for colleagues to use, while gaining valuable feedback which stimulates new cycles of action research. This ongoing process of development helps each of us to approach the question: How can I become the best teacher that I can be?

1. Teacher Development Via the
Internet
Peter Beech

2. The Practice of Teaching
• providing instruction
• developing productive relationships with
colleagues and administrators,
• establishing productive relationships with parents
• establishing productive relationships with pupils
• maintaining continuous professional growth and
development
• transforming schools
http://www.ced.appstate.edu/intercollege/3850/readings/cop.html

3. Development / Training
“A functioning teacher development group
will be a teacher-led peer group which
sets its own agenda. A teacher training
group, by its nature, will not be a peer
group, will have an outstanding agenda
and will be conducted or initiated by ‘an
authority’.”
Paul Davis
http://www.hltmag.co.uk/feb99/mart1.htm

4. Teacher Development
Continuing development throughout our
careers is essential if we are to reach
our full potential, enhancing both our
professional competence and our
personal fulfillment.

5. Our priorities include:
• What hinders and what helps me in doing that?
• How can I help myself by working with like-minded
people?
• How can I become the best teacher that I can be?
• What does development mean to me in my context?
IATEFL TD SIG
http://personales.jet.es/bazkat/about.htm

6. Dialogue with Colleagues
Dialogue with colleagues is the major tool
teachers have available to use for the
improvement of their practices.
Connelly and Clandenin (1988)

7. Ways to Benefit
• participation in a discussion group
• accessing research published on the
web
• publishing our own articles in online
journals.

8. Sharing Practice With Fellow-practitioners
We provide ideas and resources for
colleagues to use, while gaining
valuable feedback which stimulates
new cycles of action research.

10. Community of Practice
Various internet facilities can facilitate
induction and participation in peer
networks to support our professional
development.

11. “Modern theories of learning and
professional development stress the
importance of reflection on experience,
peer enquiry, the need to embed
training in practice, and of collaboration
(Schön 1987; Vygotsky, 1978; Kolb,
1984; Wenger, 1998).”
Phil Riding
www.icce2001.org/cd/pdf/poster1/uk102.pdf

12. “Teacher networks and communities are
excellent ways of fostering the
conditions in which such collegiate,
reflective, practice-based development
can take place (Lieberman, 2000).”
Phil Riding
www.icce2001.org/cd/pdf/poster1/uk102.pdf

13. distributed individuals > network > community
The forming of ties between individuals in on-line
environments
Reilly, R.A., (1999)

14. ‘A community of practice is different from
a network in the sense that it is “about”
something; it is not just a set of
relationships. It has an identity as a
community, and thus shapes the
identities of its members.’
(Wenger, 1998)

16. Professional Growth
An important characteristic of persons
who are members of CoPs is that they
assume responsibility for their own
professional growth and development.

17. By creating a telecommunications
network dedicated to teacher
professional development we hoped to
entool teachers with the mechanisms
for defining and "growing" their own
professional development
Collaborative Electronic Network Building
by Vanessa DiMauro and Gloria Jacobs
The Journal of Computers in Math and Science Teaching
February 1995

18. Building Community
True communities are much more than just
Web sites, communication tools or gatherings
of people. Communities require member
participation and contribution, ownership,
quality support and facilitation, shared
direction, goals and projects.
(Wellman & Gulia, 1997; Palloff & Pratt, 1999; Kim, 2000).

19. Resources Available on the Internet
• Journals
• Discussion boards
• Online teaching resources
• Newsgroups

20. Journals
TEFL Web Journal
http://www.teflweb-j.org
“TEFL Web Journal is a free, Web based
forum for adult level teachers, teacher
trainers and researchers world-wide.”

21. Discussion Boards
Developing Teachers.com
Forums for the developing
language teacher
http://foro.developingteachers.com

22. Online Teaching Resources
http://www.onestopenglish.com
“Solutions for English teaching”

23. Newsgroups
• TESL-L
• Dogme
• TD SIG
• ELT discussion lists in Greece

24. TESL-L
• http://www.hunter.cuny.edu/~tesl-l
• To join TESL-L:
SUB TESL-L firstname lastname
• TESL-L was founded in May, 1991
• As of December 4, 2002, we have
29,232 members in 161 countries. Our
message average is 10 per day

27. Dogme
• "No one can be told what [dogme] is...
they have to see it for themselves.“
• www.teaching-unplugged.com
• http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dogme
• Members: 175
• Founded: Mar 9, 2000
• 2882 messages

28. IATEFL TD SIG
• http://personales.jet.es/bazkat/
• http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TDSIG
• Members: 52
• Founded: Jul 10, 2000

29. Websites and discussion lists in
Greece (1)
TESOL Greece
• www.tesolgreece.com
• http://groups.yahoo.com/group/tesolgreece
• Members: 124
• Founded: Jun 27, 2000

30. Websites and discussion lists in
Greece (2)
TEFL-GR
• www.teflgr.angelcities.com
• http://groups.yahoo.com/group/tefl-gr/
• Members: 64
• Founded: Oct 22, 1998

31. Websites and discussion lists in
Greece (3)
Anglo-Hellenic
• www.anglo-hellenic.com
• http://groups.yahoo.com/group/anglo-hellenic
• Members: 411
• Founded: Jun 25, 1999

32. Websites and discussion lists in
Greece (4)
Greek ELT
• www.greekelt.net
• http://groups.yahoo.com/group/GreekE
LTfeedback/
• Members: 11
• Founded: Oct 23, 2001

33. The newsgroup as a
community of practice

34. Teacher Professional Development
• Co-operative design • Building community
• Fostering participation • Collaboration among
teachers

35. Participation
Engagement with such a community can
provide a channel for development,
leading from peripheral to full
participation.

36. Legitimate Peripheral Participation
A CoP is comprised of a wide range of
expertise in its membership, ranging
from apprentice to expert. Inducting
apprentices into the community sustains
a CoP.
http://www.ced.appstate.edu/intercollege/3850/readings/cop.html

37. “Practice is an effective teacher and the
community of practice an ideal learning
environment.”
Brown & Duguid (2000)