Personal Learning Network Reflection

RSS Feeds and Podcasts: I am very new to using real simple syndication feeds, and it was not too simple when I was learning it but with a little practice it became easier. Podcasts I am not new to, I have been listening to a few different podcasts for a few years and have become fairly familiar with them. I have subscribed to many educational websites that share helpful information on teaching. One site shares lesson plans that is custom made for all grade levels. I would love to be a kindergarten teacher so I am following a lot of sites that provide helpful information for kindergarten teachers like projects to use in class and lesson plans. 

Twitter: I have been a member of twitter for a few years now but never use it! I already had an account I create for my business and even started following people but never sign in to read what people are sharing. In my network I already have many real estate and business professionals that I follow and just recently added all of the twitter users that were recommended by Professor Anderson. Many teachers and education professionals that I started following share a lot of pertinent news and updates centered around teaching and the school system. I have been searching hashtags centered around education, teaching, schools, and kindergarten. I have found many of the users postings shared helpful news reports or articles about teaching plans. I tweeted my opinion an article about shortening the school week to four days, but no one tweeted me back. I wish someone would have tweeted me back so I could have heard others opinions on the issue.

Diigo: Diigo was the most difficult website for me to navigate through because you can do so much on the site and because I have never used it before. Diigolet however was a really easy little tool and I enjoyed learning about it and using it, also for other websites not just websites centered around education and the profession. I started following groups revolving around k-12 government, kindergarten, lessons plans, and of course cats. I learned about a few websites that keep teachers informed on new information that affects their career. I also got to look at lots of cute cat pictures!

Ning: I explored both the Educators PLN and Classroom 2.0. I can’t believe I am just now learning about ning groups because they have a huge community of users. I noticed that many of the users use the website as a social networking site and a site to express personal opinions. They also share information that may be helpful and relevant to other professionals in the field. I found a really interesting article about dyslexia and elearning and learned that it can be helpful to students, especially when paired with auditory learning. Also, many professionals posted their opinion and advice and other helpful links on the forum. 

I found the PLN experience to be a little tedious and overwhelming to learn all these different forms at once but can see how they can be helpful to the profession and in the classroom. My least favorite part was signing up at first and having to navigate through an entirely new website. But my favorite part was having access to helpful and relevant information for teaching, much more than I realized was available!