An online community of practice (OCoP) is a group of people, who are brought together by a shared interest and with the aim of deepening their understanding of an area of knowledge through regular interactions facilitated by computer mediated communication (CMC) tools. An OCoP can potentially provides teachers with those elements of effective professional development (PD), cited in the literature, such as; collaboration, opportunities for mentoring, and sustainability over time. In this sense, OCoPs can be considered as a viable alternative for teacher PD. If OCoPs are to become an alternative approach to teacher PD then it is important to understand what factors affect teachers' participation in such communities. Therefore, through the case of Webheads in Action (WiA) OCoP, this study aimed to identify what factors contribute towards creating successful OCoPs. Members' interactions in WiA's public group page were collated over a period of nine months and interviews with 24 members of the community (4 core, 9 active, 11 peripheral) were used to gather the data. Two major themes emerged in relation to factors affecting members' participation in this OCoP. The first one was identified as the creation of a sense of belonging to the community which was achieved through various means such as having an initiation process and fostering trust and an inclusive community environment through community norms. The second was dynamism inherent in the community which manifested itself as new topics that kept members interested and participating, and a flow of continuous member recruitment to the community. In conclusion, this study highlighted the importance of the socio-affective dimension for designing and sustaining OCoPs.Key Words: English as a foreign language (EFL), online community of practice (OCoP), teacher professional development.
The present study aimed to adapt the Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge (TPACK) for mathematics teaching questionnaire into Turkish for classroom teachers who work in public schools. There were three stages in the questionnaire adaptation process. The questionnaire's language validity was established in the first stage, validity in the second and reliability in the third stage. Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA, n= 372) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA, n= 310) have been utilized in establishing the validity of the questionnaire. A four-factor solution emerged as a result of EFA: 1) Knowledge of Teaching Mathematics with Technology (KTMT); 2) Knowledge of Teaching Mathematics (KTM); 3) Content Knowledge for Mathematics (CKM); and 4) Technology Knowledge (TK). Those four factors explained 62.20 % of the total variation in the questionnaire. In addition, the results of CFA suggested a good model fit and the internal consistency (α) for the whole questionnaire was calculated as .97. Total item correlation coefficients of all items were higher than .30. Evaluation of these results suggests that a valid and reliable Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge questionnaire, which consists of 47 items under four subscales (KTMT, KTM, CKM, and TK), was developed.
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