Legitimate peripheral participation (LPP) describes how newcomers become experienced members and eventually old timers of a community of practice or collaborative project.
Gradually, as newcomers become old timers and gain a recognized level of mastery, their participation takes forms that are more and more central to the functioning of the community.
LPP suggests that membership in a community of practice is mediated by the possible forms of participation to which newcomers have access, both physically and socially.
For example, O'Donovan and Kirk suggest that young people's participation in sport can be compared to a Community of Practice related to physical education.
[3] In his later work on communities of practice, Wenger[4] abandoned the concept of legitimate peripheral participation and introduced the idea of a duality instead; however, the term is still widely used in relation to situated learning.