 | | | | Description
Etienne Wenger, author of Cultivating Communities of Practice, emphasizes the importance of defining a domain by saying that a domain, "inspires members to contribute and participate, guides their learning, and gives meaning to their actions. Knowing the boundaries and the leading edge of the domain enables members to decide exactly what is worth sharing, how to present their ideas, and which activities to pursue." Framing 3-7 triggering questions to guide the community’s learning and inquiry agenda takes that concept one step further. These questions help to maintain focus, interest, and energy, and help to ensure that each members' most significant issues are addressed by the community.
Example
One reflective community chose as their domain "Community-based Technology Centers: Issues in Design and Sustainability." To focus their learning agenda, they framed triggering questions around the following categories: - Demographics – How many centers are there in the UK, where are they located, what is the size of the geographic area served, what population do they serve, what services do they provide, how long have they been in existence, what are their annual budgets, how are they funded?
- Design – How do they define the need and context, what are their purposes, what are their functions, how are they structured, how are they staffed, how are they governed, how are they housed and sponsored, how do they market their services, how do they conduct outreach?
- Performance – How do they measure success, what quantitative and qualitative indicators do they use, what evaluation methods do their use, what strategies do they use for learning and improvement, what regulations govern their operations?
- Aspirations and Challenges – How do they define their desired future, what challenges and barriers are they facing, what sustainability issues have they surfaced, how are these issues being addressed?
Approaches
The key to defining a domain and framing triggering questions for a community’s learning agenda is discovering the most significant and compelling focus for the community’s work at this time. The process should take into account the fact that each member comes to the community with their own needs, aspirations, and reasons for committing time and resources to the work. Each also brings a knowledge and experience base to the community, along with an eagerness about learning. Thus, the best approach is to be in a conversation through which each members’ interests can be fully expressed, and then integrated into a clear statement of domain and a number of triggering questions. This process may take several conversations and iterations, but the time spent will serve the community well. When this approach is used, it can be a powerful force for creating the kind of open, trusting and caring community required for creating new knowledge. The questions below, or others you think are important, will provide guidance for these conversations.- How would you describe your field, profession, or vocation?
- What are the most significant questions that are being asked in your profession or field?
- What are the things about which you are most passionate and excited?
- What aspects of your work are most challenging?
- What brings you to this community?
- What is it that you uniquely bring to this community?
- What is it that you uniquely need from this community?
- What questions, if answered, would make your work more meaningful and rewarding?
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