Sustaining Communities of Practice with Early Career Teachers

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xxii

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2. What Is a Community of Practice?

   • Jacquelin McDonald, Bernadette Mary Mercieca

   Pages 1-19

3. The Value of Communities of Practice for Early Career Teachers

   • Jacquelin McDonald, Bernadette Mary Mercieca

   Pages 21-43

4. Leading and Sustaining Communities of Practice

   • Bernadette Mary Mercieca, Jacquelin McDonald

   Pages 45-64

5. Sustaining Online Teacher Networks

   • Bernadette Mary Mercieca

   Pages 65-97

6. The Collegial Networks of Early Career Teachers in Primary Education

   • Laura Thomas, Melissa Tuytens, Geert Devos, Ruben Vanderlinde

   Pages 99-131

7. Professional Learning in Networked Communities: Models and Methods—A Northern Ireland Reflection

   • Celia O’Hagan

   Pages 133-160

8. Conclusion

   • Bernadette Mary Mercieca, Jacquelin McDonald

   Pages 161-173

This book focuses on sustaining communities of practice in primary and secondary schools in Australia and internationally for the professional learning of all teachers, and particularly, early career teachers. Informed by the communities of practice research of Wenger-Trayner, it shows what factors are conductive to the sustainability of communities of practice, drawing particularly on a case study of an Australian regional secondary school, and explores how it has sustained support particularly for early career teachers over a three-year period.


The first chapters of the book provide longitudinal perspectives using qualitative data and include perspectives from a variety of stakeholders, including the principal, the professional learning coordinator and the early career teachers who have experienced the school’s Communities of practice over three or more years. It offers practical suggestions on how to implement and improve communities of practice in schools and highlights the increasing importance of online communities to support early career teachers. Policy-makers, school principals, teacher educators and teaching practitioners find the book useful for implementing and sustaining communities of practice in schools.


Subsequent chapters explore the value of online communities, such as Twitter communities; the role of collegial support networks in supporting early career teachers in Flemish primary education; and professional learning in Northern Ireland pre- and in-service teacher networked communities.

• early career teachers in rural schools
• rural secondary schools in Australia
• rural communities of practice
• communities of practice in rural school environment
• sustaining communities of practice in rural school environment
• educational communities of practice
• supporting early career teachers in Australia
• early career teacher and communities of practice in Australia
• longitudinal case study of communities of practice
• longitudinal perspectives on communities of practice
• community of practice in Australia
• online communities of practice
• learning and instruction

• Australian Catholic University, Ivanhoe, Australia

  Bernadette Mary Mercieca

• University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba, Australia

  Jacquelin McDonald

Bernadette Mercieca currently works as a sessional educator at Australian Catholic University, Melbourne. Her work with pre-service secondary teachers highlighted for her the disparity between the high hopes of graduating teachers and the challenges of their first years in a teaching position, especially as many could only acquire casual relief teaching positions. She is also researching the value of online learning spaces for early career teachers with her colleague, Jacqueline McDonald.


Honorary Associate Professor Jacquie McDonald is a Higher Education Community of Practice consultant. She previously worked for over 26 years as Learning and Teaching Designer at the University of Southern Queensland (USQ) Australia designing online and distance learning courses and programs. Since 2006, she led the successful implementation of communities of practice at USQ, which was recognised by a 2009 Australian Universities Quality Agency commendation and 2009 Australian Learning and Teaching Council (ALTC) Citation. She led a number of institutional and national fellowships and grants to research and provide resources for leadership of communities of practice. She is a member of the Australian Learning and Teaching Fellows (ALTF) Alumni and has been invited by national and international universities to facilitate Community of Practice workshops and contribute to CoP initiatives. Recent publications include 2017 Springer co-edited books, Communities of Practice: Facilitating Social Learning in Higher Education, and Implementing Communities of Practice in Higher Education: Dreamers and Schemers.

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