Wednesday, June 20, 2018

#PLN: Using Twitter to Impact Your Professional Learning

This post is week 2 of 8 in the 8 Weeks of Summer Blog Challenge for educators from HotLunchTray.com. Find out more about this challenge by clicking here.

2of 8weeksofsummer FBThe most important/impactful professional learning I have ever participated in was developing my own Personal Learning Network (PLN) through Twitter.  When I tell many of my fellow educators this, they look at me with a strange look on their face. Whats a PLN? and how on earth are you doing professional learning with Twitter?

My explanation of a PLN is an asynchronous (sometimes synchronous) group of learners that openly share and discuss their resources with anyone that wishes to join in. The great thing about a PLN is that the learner can engage where-ever and when-ever they want. I also use the term engage very loosely. Many people are lurkers, meaning that they just go through a topic and read what other people say/share. There is no right or wrong way to do it. Some weeks, I barely have time to check my twitter feed, while others I'm on twitter several times through out the day.

How do I get started?
There are several platforms that can be used, but Twitter seems to be the most popular. There are a couple steps that you take to get going.

Step 1: #Hashtags
Find hashtags that apply to what you want to learn about. The very generic ones are #edchat & #edtech. There are many, many hashtags, and some groups even make up there own. Here are some resources of Educational Hashtags to use in your Titter Search Bar:
The Complete Guide To Twitter Hashtags for Education  from TeachThought
60 Popular Education Twitter Hashtags from Getting Smart

Step 2: Follow, Follow, Follow
Once you search through hashtags, find people that are posting frequently about those topics and follow them. Don't feel bad about being choosey either. If you click on that persons profile and you find there are more posts about what they eat for lunch than what you want to learn about, then don't follow them. Here are just a few of my favorite Education Twitter users:
@gcouros
@NoApp4Pedagogy
@jmattmiller
@DavidGeurin
@curriculumblog
@Rdene915
@ziegeran
@bethhill2829

Need more convincing?
Here is an excellent SketchNote from Sylvia Duckworth on why you should give a PLN a try!

8 comments:

  1. I have put a great deal of thought into this as well. It is such a personal thing that I often tell people "there is no right or wrong way to set-up a PLN" too. But there are some easy commonalities to detect in effectively used PLNs, aren't there?

    Check out my thoughts when you get time: http://www.hotlunchtray.com/pln-vs-pln

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