Journal 7-PLN

NETS-T V

A Personal Learning Network, or PLN, is a community of individuals around the world who are learning together. By creating a Twitter and Diigo account and joining the collaboration of strangers that are dedicated to education, you build a network of online colleagues whom you share educational resources and information with. As a future teacher trying to keep up with what’s new and available to me, a PLN makes this simple. As long as I spend time on my Twitter account “following” other teachers/administrators and reading up on their ideas and resources, I will have an abundant supply of information to help me teach more effectively and be aware of current events in the education world.

To start off my PLN, I am currently following 34 students/educators/specialists. Susie Toso is a technology coordinator for grades K-5. I followed her because I recently read a journal article about technology coordinators and how they are so resourceful for teachers trying to think of creative ways to teach their students using various technological programs. Mandie is a 3^rd grade teacher and Photographer. I am hoping to teach 3^rd, 4^th, or middle school, so we share this interest. Jeremy Macdonald seems to be a very well-rounded dad, teacher, tech coach, and husband so I decided to follow him. Lisa Dabbs, who led the chat I participated in, will be a great person to follow on Twitter. Lastly, Jerry Blumengarten is an educator and writer and was part of the chat I participated in. He seemed to have some great ideas and resources for educators. 

The chat I participated in was about Long Range Planning. It took place on Wednesday July 25, 2012 at 5pm. I learned the pros and cons of Long Range Planning and was able to follow some key people who were part of the discussion. It was a very informational and fast-paced chat. I didn’t have time to formulate a comment. It is definitely something to get used to.

By using a social-bookmarking tool, called Diigo, I can access websites that I have bookmarked on a variety of computers as well as share them with others. I am using this tool to build my PLN by following other education professionals who share their activity, resources, and information on Diigo. I decided to follow Jennifer Dorman because she is very interested in infographics and provides lots of resources pertaining to this. Also, I am following Christine Southard who is starting her path towards becoming an Elementary Technology Integration Specialist. Paul Bodura is also a “tech geek”, I like following the technologically savvy people because they know a lot more than I do, and it would be beneficial to follow them and keep up on their new information. With that said, I am also following Greg Limperis who is the founder of Technology Integration in Education on www.linkedin.com. Jan Abernethy is also very involved in the Diigo community. 

The groups I joined are Discovery Educator Network and Clif's Notes on EdTech. Also, under my PLN bookmarks are the educators PLN, Best content in Building Your PLN K-12,

and Educational Wikis. By having these tags, groups, and people on my Diigo site, it will aid me creating my PLN.

I joined the Educators PLN digital discussion forum. This site is “dedicated to the support of a Personal Learning Network for Educators.” One blog post about inclusion discussed how different schools show inclusion in different ways. Some schools are very relaxed and work day to day with the special education students, where others are more strict. 

 

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