Wednesday 30 June 2010

Missing: My PLN

These days, it's all about collaborative/social networking; it's a tidal wave sweeping through education. Facebook and Twitter are key players. With them, you can grow your own group of followers, while sharing your knowledge and picking their brains. If I had a group of educator followers I'd have my own "Personal Learning Network" and I'd be able to ask whether I'm doing the right things with my "Provisional Computing Driving Licence" for teachers. I'd be able to ask for pointers to resources that I could use in developing it. Since these people will be experienced educators, many familiar with integrating ICT (Information and Communications Technology) into the classroom, they'd be high quality resources.

But I don't have my own PLN. I can follow lots of educators, but which educators would want to follow me? I have little I can trade. So, for now, I trawl through the web, looking for material to support the driving licence, getting frustrated and distracted, and wasting a lot of time.

6 comments:

  1. I had never heard of a VLN!

    Have you heard of project aardvark? Its a project where you ask a question, and the site directs your question to someone who it think is authoritative on the subject matter. It's still in baby stages, but might be worth a look?

    http://vark.com/

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  2. I had never heard of project aardvark! Yes, looks like it might be worth a try - thanks for the pointer, Christoph!

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  3. Hi Clive

    I call it a PLN (personal learning network). I have an offline one and an online one :)
    The easiest thing to do on twitter is to follow hashtags like #edchat and #edtech (easiest in tweetdeck where you can set up columns) and gradually find people to follow who interest you. Email if you want help getting a headstart. We have some common interests to talk about... My son and his wife just finished a year volunteering in India for Nasvarjan. I'm looking forward to reading your blog and your story!

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  4. Hi Edna, Very nice to hear from you!
    Yes, I called it a PLN in an earlier post and a VLN here; so much for being consistent! Either way, I don't have much of an online or offline one! I actually loaded up Tweetdeck yesterday and will look into setting up columns as you suggest.

    How do I find your email address, Edna? It's not on your blog AFAIK. I could do with a headstart so thank you for the kind offer!

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  5. Hello Clive. I've followed you on twitter - I'm sure you'll learn a lot there.

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  6. Now changed from Virtual Learning Network to Personal Learning Network. They're equivalent in my eyes, but "PLN" is becoming predominant.

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