From [[http://cpsquare.org CPsquare]], the community of practice on communities of practice.

... part of the technology for communities project, started off by the authors of [Digital Habitats], Etienne Wenger, Nancy White, and John D. Smith.

Project Contributing Category

Contents 1 Definition 2 Uses in communities of practice 3 Polarities 4 Key features 4.1 Reflection features 4.2 Reporting features 4.3 Integration of tools and processes 5 Related tools 6 Resources

Definition

Specific tools for reflecting on, assessing and publishing community direction, activity, or other issues. Can be an aggregation of polls, automated data collection and discussions in an easier-to-use or automated form.

Uses in communities of practice

Many tools can be adapted for this purpose but their usability or ease of use for supporting community reflection affects how uniformly, how frequently or how well they are used. Not all communities want the feedback or know how to use it. Different communities have different forms of reflection, so "out of the box" tools may or may not support and complement a community's processes.

1. Types of reflection features
2. Integration of tools and processes
3. Types of reporting features

Polarities

• Together/apart, Synch/Asynch:
• Interaction/publication:
• Individual/group:

Key features

Reflection features

Reporting features

Integration of tools and processes

These need to be sorted into the above categories

• Pre-set questions that are relevant Ask questions that are known to be useful without having to make them up each time.
  • Need to take community pulse without a great deal of effort. However, the questions that are relevant for one community may not be relevant elsewhere.
• Voting / Poll features Described in a separate section.
• Easy aggregation and reporting of results Standard or automated tools or methods of displaying the results to the appropriate audience.
  • Templates to standardize or minimize the effort may help make reflection more available when needed.
• Easy manipulation of results to see the data at different levels Ability to aggregate or disagregate when examining the results to show the big picture or small-scale detail.
  • In any assessment, action at group level may be more or less appropriate than a response to a specific individual.
• Easy link to discussions Link between polling tool and discussions can be made at the level of specific question, specific results, or specific points in time.
  • The process of reflection may be more productive than any specific result or assessment.

Related tools

See also:

Resources