Group items tagged

This study observed and surveyed undergraduate students in a teacher certification program use Twitter to form personal learning networks. Researchers were interested in how students perceived Twitter before and after group discussion. Additionally, researchers wanted to know if Twitter was an effective medium for group discussion. Although some students had frustrations with Twitter's structure, most had a positive experience in using it for networking.

I like this article because it shows how social media is rapidly transforming all aspects of our professional lives. At first when I started reading it, I wondered what are the benefits of Twitter over the chat function in many Learning Management Systems. But then I realized students are more likely connected to Twitter with several devices. The chat session would stay around longer than the course page in the LMS. Additionally, the PLN created by the synchronous chat session exists outside of the classroom walls and can continue long after the class is over. The article was correct to cite that one of the drawbacks is the lack of critical thought that goes into Twitter feeds. The low number of characters allowed limits the ability to express thoughts clearly. However, if it is used to organize PLNs it becomes an effective tool as the participants in the study all attested.

The study supported the belief that Twitter chats provide a place where learners can be exposed to widely differing perspectives, not limited by geographical or socioeconomic constraints: "Twitter chats . . . to communicate to other professionals you may not even know but you will absolutely learn from them and what they have to say." I enjoyed the anecdote of the student who found himself in the same chat room as his school principal father!

Learn to be concise by using Twitter. Daniel Clinghard uses Twitter as a summary tool to help students understand the power of words. Students have to summarize political texts in the 140 character limit and write a good summary.

Daniel Klinghard, a political science professor, uses Twitter to force students to write precisely about a particular reading.

Summary: The authors of this article clearly prove that a learner who is in control of h/her own learning will benefit the most, especially if h/she designs and navigates h/her own network. A learner will learn whether the connection is strong or weak as long as h/she has: 1) a choice in what network is joined, 2) a true passion or interest, and 3) a flexible method of communication (could be in person or via technology).

This clearly follows the belief that personalized learning is beneficial to the learner. By getting to create your PLN you are strategically picking who to network with and the topics you want to be involved in.

In this article, the discussion of personal learning networks surrounds working professionals and how they manage their professional network. The article presents a model of personal professional networking with the goal of creating a personal learning network.

Upon trying to find an article specific to CoP's and Twitter, I came across this study that utilizes Twitter to create CoPs. It is an interesting read, with the following quote laying a foundation to the context of article: "Twitter was not meant for building communities. Its original design - 140 character limit; postings accessible for a short time; and its prompting "What's happening" - were focused on immediate responses amongst those who already knew each other. But its enhancements such as improved search and the adoption by its users of conventions such as the hashtag and "@" symbol for communication have provided capabilities which can be used for conversation and collaboration (Gruzd, Wellman, and Takhteyev 2011).

This article talks about the evolution of Twitter and how recent enhancements like the hashtag (#) and the @ sign have made it a good tool for collaboration and conversations. The article gives a great overview of CoPs and Personal Networks as well. Twitter can now be used for what's trending in education and is more that only what is trending in social media news.

What an interesting article, I love how they are researching and analyzing social media tools such as Twitter. The graphs and data made this article easy to understand and helpful to those of us who are not so Twitter savvy. I especially love how it addressed the evolution of Twitter to address the users needs...THIS is education! :) Thanks for sharing @Katie Swanson Sathre

This article explains how communities of practice are growing and evolving through technology and allowing teaching (and learning) to advance to new heights with very little limitations.

I truly believe that reflection takes place once you are involved in a learning community. That is the best way to achieve knowledge and change. This article was a nice read about how a learning community can boost professional growth. Students need to see educators taking ownership of their learning as an example of how they need to be in charge of their own learning as well.

This article reviews how behaviorism, cognitivism, and constructivism have all been central ideas that we based our teaching on. However, in the new digital age, it is becoming evident that we need to shift to a connectivism point of view. We need to use the resources we have to connect with teachers and learn from each other.

This article, written by George Siemens explains how connectivism is the theory behind the PLNs. The author describes how connectivism fills the limitations of behaviorism, cognitivism and constructivism, the learning theories developed when learning was not impacted by technology. It is the complement. The author compares the connections in a PLN with pipes and says "The pipe is more important than the content within the pipe. Our ability to learn what we need for tomorrow is more important than what we know today." (Siemens, 2014)

A detailed article on connectivism, written by one of the biggest promoters of Connectivism- George Siemens. There is a lot of great information on how this impacts organizations which was particularly interesting. We struggle with this all the time at my company- "Connectivism addresses the challenges that many corporations face in knowledge management activities. Knowledge that resides in a database needs to be connected with the right people in the right context in order to be classified as learning".

This article discusses how LMSs have become the norm for higher education, but identified limitations of the LMS and how learners are demanding a modification that gives students more control and interaction using web tools such as social networking sites to create PLNs to support their learning. Students want to create their own PLNs to manage information, create content, and connect with others. These approaches "represent a shift away from the model in which students consume information through independent channels such as the library, a textbook, or an LMS, moving instead to a model where students draw connections from a growing matrix of resources that they select and organize", emphasizing the personal aspect of PLNs.

I thought that this personal learning network resource was a great fit for our class. This article discusses how schools are using social media to engage students and real-world relevance, for professional development, and school, district, and teacher collaboration. They used Twitter to document and share a paper tower challenge with schools and teachers from all over the world. Twitter was used to connect with experts and students got to see that not all scientists agree on certain topics. They also connected with the community.

I like that this article looks at how Twitter can be used for students and for educators. The idea of Twitter for educators as professional development fits very well with the ideas of COP's and PLN's. While I haven't been a true part yet of a structured Twitter session for PD, I have lurked in many formal PD discussions with hashtags for our public school system and benefitted from what I gleaned.

What an awesome video. It makes me excited to go back in August and really challenge myself to use Twitter or Facebook to showcase my students. Our school district uses a hashtag #bsdpride for teachers to showcase things going on around the district and it's starting to take off. It's awesome that teachers are encouraging each other to use Twitter and begin challenges that involve students. You can tell from this video how important these students feel when their work or projects re used on social media, and are getting attention from other schools.

This is a link to my somewhat limited classroom website. It is a work in progress for this new year. I try to provide information, yet provide a sense of anonymity for those who might stumble upon it.

Learning communities need to be intentional; students must form with each other deeper understandings; gives students more control over their learning environment

This article really helped to define knowledge in the Connectivist theory. To know something, means that you are able to organize and connect ideas together. The author makes a brilliant point that the more connections you have to the idea, the stronger your knowledge of it is. It also states that it is more important to continue to search for more knowledge and connections than it is to be satisfied with what is currently known.

This article discusses different learning theories. One of the theories was network semantics and connective learning. This section describes what it means to be a network. Then it connects networks to what it means to be connective.

After reading this article I can get my head around how important PLN are and I applied it to my corporate job. Both my peers and the people who report to me connect in many ways.

This is a great site to get started understanding the benefits of PLN's. In particular, I like the fact that when discussing the benefits of PLN's the author, Education in America, brings up the fact that even though teachers are surrounded by students and colleagues, teaching can be an isolating experience. I've been there, and I know that having a PLN has not only made me feel connected, but also it has helped me share ideas in a more personal way.

I liked the fact that this site recognizes that "teaching can be an isolated profession"! Very interesting article.

I have to agree with the statement in this article about teaching being an isolated profession. I felt that many times and often wished that I had the remedy. In hindsight, I think a better network would have been helpful. Most of my time spent in a traditional classroom setting (face to face instruction) was as a lone teacher in a very small school. A better PLN would have been very helpful.

Stevens, V. (2008). Trial by Twitter: The rise and slide of the year's most viral microblogging platform. TESL-EJ: Teaching English as a Second or Foreign Language, 12(1). This article did not focus just on Connectivism or just on communities of practice but provided a clear example of both after my previous readings. If you think about the basic fundamental of twitter it would be easy to discount at first whether or not it would be successful. I'm sure along the way some may have even felt that it was a fad destined to fail or fade. Who would want to be limited to only one hundred and fifty characters to get out a complete thought and why would anyone be interested. Well right now according to this article twitter is the most popular microblogging tool that has existed. I found it interesting if you have read my previous articles especially about linguistics in communities of practice that twitter type has made its way into our everyday vernacular, such as saying hash tag in actual dictation. Interesting that a change in our speech and actions are indicators of belonging to a certain community of practice, much like how some groups say 'lol' instead of actually laughing out loud. This article draws these dots that are easily linked together to show Connectivism. The author spends time explaining when he "got" twitter, or when it dawned on him this is an excellent tool. From there he uses some great analogies to describe the connected world twitter produces for millions of users a day. My favorite quote from his article "To 'get' twitter, you have to have your finger on the pulse of what is pumping lifeblood through the Internet, and that is the people on it and how they come together (Connectivism), connect, and relate to one another (communities of practice) in virtual learning networks". (Stevens,2008)

I didn't realize Twitter had been around as long as it has - I also didn't know it's origins. Lost most of the social media sites it's changed a lot since the beginning!

Great post and I was cracking up at "The Twitter Curve" image. It gave a good explanation to me about what makes Twitter so powerful and its benefits but am also glad it touched on things to be leery of.

New Tech High in Napa, CA is allowing students to bring their own devices and to use social media tools in the classroom. The school decide to focus on teaching responsible use rather than trying to limit access to tools.

Resources, including technology, for helping students with limited vision participate fully in science classes

This article provides another example of an actual case study attempting to implement a connectivist pedagogy in a smaller size ( to something else. For example, is a limited participant (closed) class automatically disqualified?

Authors discuss advantages of personal learning environments in facilitating collaboration and fostering learner control. PLEs are facilitated by technology, networking, and self-regulation by learners. Open network learning environments from instructors allow PLEs to form. Focus of PLE is not information consumption, but information creation and participation. Authors relate PLE and ONLE to the theory of connectivism and discuss various applications and limitations.

Fantastic quote: "Educators perceive the instructional value of integrating Web 2.0 tools include autonomy, diversity, openness, and connectedness (van Harmelen, 2006); yet, they find multiple technologies daunting, which may affect their attitudes toward online learning. The integration of multiple Web 2.0 tools has created frustration among educators and students because they lack knowledge of the tools (Lee, Miller, & Newnham, 2008), difficulty learn- ing different tools (Weller, 2007), conducting multiple authentications (Suess & Morooney, 2009), visiting multiple sites for different tools, etc. This phenomenon results from a lack of understanding of the social networking learning paradigm and inappropriate integration." This article describes the role of Personalized Learning Environments (PLEs) and how Open Network Learning Environments (ONLEs) are instrumental for creating a PLE. The authors indicate that connectivism is a key underlying principle for developing such a PLE--seeking connections to learners and sources of information. They cite Siemens ("the pipe is more important than the content in the pipe"), which surprised me, as I read that comment from Siemens as hyperbolic. Practical advice for creating your own PLE are also incorporated, as well as examples of how to work and learn within a PLE. The authors suggest that PLEs (operating through ONLEs) disrupt LMSs in the same way that technology disrupts learning in general. Interesting analogy.

This article quickly explains behaviorism, cognitivism, and constructionism and why those theories are not designed for the digital age. The article explains how there are some severe limitations and explains why connectivism would be a more appropriate theory for the current digital age. The article explains how learning will come from changing foundations and how discerning between useful and useless information is an important skill.

The authors look at connectivism through the lens of a literature review and a qualitative interview session with educators. With these sources the paper examines the pros and cons of connectivism including its limitations as a postulated theory. The conclusions drawn are that behaviourism, cognitivism and constructivism fall short to fully explain modern learning realities, but that it is unclear if connectivism can be seen as the next stage of learning theory evolution for several reasons.

You are right about this being a "very detailed" definition of connectivism. I appreciate is the "conclusions and suggestions" section which challenges the labeling of connectivism as a learning theory as opposed to a pedagogical approach. I completed a research paper in EDTECH501 in regards to the relationship of connectivism and mastery learning, and never once did I read about this debate. To me, the fact that connectivism is more concerned with the process of learning rather than the end product proves that it is in fact a learning theory.

I really agree this article does a nice job contradicting the value or criteria of connectivism as a learning theory versus a pedagogical approach. Many of you discussed this above so I will leave it alone. The piece I wanted to comment on came at the end of the article when the author brought up the idea that older teachers take longer to learn the digital aspects and are less likely to engage in adapting the practice. Where younger teachers who grew up in this era are more apt to use and utilize web 2.0 tools in their teaching and engage in this model of teaching and learning themselves. I have to be honest that I saw some of these same things in our school when we went to a 1:1 iPad. Many of the younger and newer teachers jumped in and had very little learning curve in understanding what was happening. Where older teachers struggled or resisted the change. I would be interested in what others experiences were as well?