Journal 7: My Personal Learning Network (NETS 5)
PLN
A Personal Learning Network (PLN) is a variety of resources online that an educator has access to in order to share information with others around the world. There are many topics and collaborative tools available so that the PLN can be organized for that specific educator's unique area of interest(s). Having a PLN as a student and soon as a teacher will help me learn many ideas to help me as I begin my teaching career. I can also share my experiences with other new teachers and have a support system. As I continue teaching over the years, my PLN will expand and become even more refined. Having access to a plethora of resources through my connections with others in the United States and internationally will help me continue to grow as a teacher. As education, technology, and other ideas change over time I will stay current with them and bring that knowledge, passion, and inspiration into the classroom. By using Twitter, Diigo and the Educator's PLN I have three great resources to begin building a PLN that will most certainly help me as I begin my career as a teacher and for many years to come.
Twitter
Twitter is one of those websites I previously believed had no real benefit to my life. I never imagined that I would quickly change my mind and discover a whole community with so many people sharing information and supporting each other in education. Vicki Davis @coolcatteacher caught my eye at first because of her Twitter handle but after looking at her blog I found her extremely interesting. She is a mom and a teacher, something I very much admire. You can tell she is passionate about what she does and seems as though she will be someone who would have great Tweets about using technology in the classroom. Sheryl NussbaumBeach @snbeach is another person who has worked in a variety of jobs and with thousands of educators all over the world. It will be exciting to read what resources she will share about education. Heidi Echternacht @hechternacht is a kindergarten teacher with over 20 years of experience. My hope is to work as a kindergarten teacher and she could have some great classroom ideas that I could use in my own classroom. Lauren Pemberton @LNPG7 is a kindergarten teacher whose focus is on technology in the early childhood education classroom. I previously worked as a preschool teacher and always found it a challenge to utilize technology in my preschool classroom. I look forward to being inspired and learning about what has worked for her in the past and the direction that technology in the early childhood education is taking. Karen Bolotin @kbkonnected is a creative educator who works with students with emotional and behavioral special needs. My son has some particular emotional special needs that affect him at school and know that I will be dealing with a variety of children in the classroom, some possibly with their own behavioral and emotional needs. I love the thought of creative resources to help students of all different backgrounds.
On Monday, November 7th I participated in #kinderchat at 6 p.m. PST. I was very impressed by how much the people on #kinderchat seemed so knowledgeable and eager to help each other. There wasn't a specific topic that night, but there were a few things that people were discussing. Many people were asking for helpful iPad apps and I was surprised that so many people are using iPads in their kindergarten classrooms. There was also a debate about digital books versus print books in the classrooms which many seemed very passionate about. I was really excited when they started talking about Symbaloo and mentioned the #kinderchat webmix, which I had to check out right away. Reading all the tweets made me hopeful about my own teaching career and being able to use technology in the classroom, even with young children. I will definitely participate in #kinderchat again and am going to check out some other topics.
Diigo
Never having heard of Diigo before we began using it, I was thrilled to find out that social bookmarking existed! What a great tool for teachers to use in their PLN to keep the websites they find valuable organized and to also share them with others. Having access to your bookmarks from any computer is something I wish I'd known about sooner because it's very frustrating to have a website bookmarked on one computer and being on another, only to forget what the URL is or how to find it. Being able to use Diigo to network with other educators is so easy. I just found it more difficult to find people to follow because many people seem to give less info about themselves than they do on Twitter. Cyndi Danner-Kuhn is an educator, a mom, and an artist from Kansas. I think someone who is into technology and is also creative will have some great bookmarks to check out. Wesley Fryer is an author but he has also worked as an elementary school teacher. He is also has a blog called where he chronicles his interests in collaboration with other educators and other topics like digital storytelling.Wesley's other interest in education reform seems like something I would like to learn a lot more about. Ann Oro is a math and computer teacher for K-8 grade students. Although I think I want to teach kindergarten or 1st grade, I find other areas of teaching very intriguing and would imagine Ann knows of many invaluable websites that she uses with her students. Alexis Krysten is a K-12 teacher who is also looking for ways to integrate technology in her own classroom. Even those that aren't technology gurus can have some great websites to share! Brian Crosby's classroom is a 1:1 laptop room where his students blog and get to use their computer every day as a part of their education. I can only imagine how much fun these students are having in Brian's classroom and really look forward to seeing the gems that he has found online for his own classroom that I can eventually use in mine.
The three websites I bookmarked were:
What Do School Tests Measure - A New York Times article where different educators debate on standardized testing in schools. It's interesting to read different people's viewpoints on this topic.
65+ iPad Apps Perfect For Elementary School - In my dream school, every one of my students will have an iPad and we would be using some of these apps.
The Incredible Art Department - Creative lesson plans for students of all ages to learn about art and artists.
The Educator's PLN
On The Educator's PLN I watched Twitter 102 for educators because I still feel very inexperienced with Twitter and thought it would be great to see what advice he has. He really went into detail and explained things, which is a big benefit for educators who are even more weary of using Twitter than I was. The way he integrated himself into the video was not just funny to watch, it was helpful. It made me even more enthused to follow more people on Twitter for my own PLN.
A Personal Learning Network (PLN) is a variety of resources online that an educator has access to in order to share information with others around the world. There are many topics and collaborative tools available so that the PLN can be organized for that specific educator's unique area of interest(s). Having a PLN as a student and soon as a teacher will help me learn many ideas to help me as I begin my teaching career. I can also share my experiences with other new teachers and have a support system. As I continue teaching over the years, my PLN will expand and become even more refined. Having access to a plethora of resources through my connections with others in the United States and internationally will help me continue to grow as a teacher. As education, technology, and other ideas change over time I will stay current with them and bring that knowledge, passion, and inspiration into the classroom. By using Twitter, Diigo and the Educator's PLN I have three great resources to begin building a PLN that will most certainly help me as I begin my career as a teacher and for many years to come.
Twitter is one of those websites I previously believed had no real benefit to my life. I never imagined that I would quickly change my mind and discover a whole community with so many people sharing information and supporting each other in education. Vicki Davis @coolcatteacher caught my eye at first because of her Twitter handle but after looking at her blog I found her extremely interesting. She is a mom and a teacher, something I very much admire. You can tell she is passionate about what she does and seems as though she will be someone who would have great Tweets about using technology in the classroom. Sheryl NussbaumBeach @snbeach is another person who has worked in a variety of jobs and with thousands of educators all over the world. It will be exciting to read what resources she will share about education. Heidi Echternacht @hechternacht is a kindergarten teacher with over 20 years of experience. My hope is to work as a kindergarten teacher and she could have some great classroom ideas that I could use in my own classroom. Lauren Pemberton @LNPG7 is a kindergarten teacher whose focus is on technology in the early childhood education classroom. I previously worked as a preschool teacher and always found it a challenge to utilize technology in my preschool classroom. I look forward to being inspired and learning about what has worked for her in the past and the direction that technology in the early childhood education is taking. Karen Bolotin @kbkonnected is a creative educator who works with students with emotional and behavioral special needs. My son has some particular emotional special needs that affect him at school and know that I will be dealing with a variety of children in the classroom, some possibly with their own behavioral and emotional needs. I love the thought of creative resources to help students of all different backgrounds.
On Monday, November 7th I participated in #kinderchat at 6 p.m. PST. I was very impressed by how much the people on #kinderchat seemed so knowledgeable and eager to help each other. There wasn't a specific topic that night, but there were a few things that people were discussing. Many people were asking for helpful iPad apps and I was surprised that so many people are using iPads in their kindergarten classrooms. There was also a debate about digital books versus print books in the classrooms which many seemed very passionate about. I was really excited when they started talking about Symbaloo and mentioned the #kinderchat webmix, which I had to check out right away. Reading all the tweets made me hopeful about my own teaching career and being able to use technology in the classroom, even with young children. I will definitely participate in #kinderchat again and am going to check out some other topics.
Diigo
Never having heard of Diigo before we began using it, I was thrilled to find out that social bookmarking existed! What a great tool for teachers to use in their PLN to keep the websites they find valuable organized and to also share them with others. Having access to your bookmarks from any computer is something I wish I'd known about sooner because it's very frustrating to have a website bookmarked on one computer and being on another, only to forget what the URL is or how to find it. Being able to use Diigo to network with other educators is so easy. I just found it more difficult to find people to follow because many people seem to give less info about themselves than they do on Twitter. Cyndi Danner-Kuhn is an educator, a mom, and an artist from Kansas. I think someone who is into technology and is also creative will have some great bookmarks to check out. Wesley Fryer is an author but he has also worked as an elementary school teacher. He is also has a blog called where he chronicles his interests in collaboration with other educators and other topics like digital storytelling.Wesley's other interest in education reform seems like something I would like to learn a lot more about. Ann Oro is a math and computer teacher for K-8 grade students. Although I think I want to teach kindergarten or 1st grade, I find other areas of teaching very intriguing and would imagine Ann knows of many invaluable websites that she uses with her students. Alexis Krysten is a K-12 teacher who is also looking for ways to integrate technology in her own classroom. Even those that aren't technology gurus can have some great websites to share! Brian Crosby's classroom is a 1:1 laptop room where his students blog and get to use their computer every day as a part of their education. I can only imagine how much fun these students are having in Brian's classroom and really look forward to seeing the gems that he has found online for his own classroom that I can eventually use in mine.
The three websites I bookmarked were:
What Do School Tests Measure - A New York Times article where different educators debate on standardized testing in schools. It's interesting to read different people's viewpoints on this topic.
65+ iPad Apps Perfect For Elementary School - In my dream school, every one of my students will have an iPad and we would be using some of these apps.
The Incredible Art Department - Creative lesson plans for students of all ages to learn about art and artists.
The Educator's PLN
On The Educator's PLN I watched Twitter 102 for educators because I still feel very inexperienced with Twitter and thought it would be great to see what advice he has. He really went into detail and explained things, which is a big benefit for educators who are even more weary of using Twitter than I was. The way he integrated himself into the video was not just funny to watch, it was helpful. It made me even more enthused to follow more people on Twitter for my own PLN.
Comments
Post a Comment