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By Loertscher, David V. and Koechlin, Carol (2011). Check out the library at BSU for full text! Discusses each component of digital PLEs in greater details and provides a model that divides the PLE intro three distinct stages of development (each phase empowers the learner to manage specific aspects of his/her learning potential.)

This article addresses the fact that learners have multiple identities as they cross into their various communities (work, school, home, church) but must maintain a strong sense of self within each community. This article briefly discusses the impact of situational cognition on education. They suggest that if learning is truly acquired by doing, then educational institutions must adapt and offer opportunities to hands-on, real-world experience.

A video that defines a PLN and discusses the importance of them in an educational environment.

Cool resource! I didn't look into using videos as resources but I can see how this would have great value. This one starts out a little dramatic (especially with the music!) but is VERY informative! I also like how it uses other scholarly resources to validate the points of how using PLNs can be effective. Also, I appreciate the clear definition of PLNs

Under PLN Strategies there are some really good resources on how to create a personal learning plan, and some experiments on PLN's as professional development.

Authors discuss connectivism as a framework for how students learn. They note that learning is making connections within a personal learning network and knowledge is recognition of these connections. They also note that knowledge is stored outside of the learner. They discuss connectivism and its origins as well as the role of connectivism in the work of librarians. They discuss how connectivism informs pedagogical practices in the library and defines the library as a node within student PLNs.

Exploration of the connectivist theory in relation to library media is the topic of this article. It expresses the idea that connectivism is defined by one's abilities to recognize connections, patterns, and similarities between concepts to construct learning. Dunaway argues that changes in technology, learning, and literacy make it necessary to apply connectivist ideas to library practices.

The author suggests that learning takes place when a learner connects ideas from his/her various personal learning networks. Further, those pieces of information is controlled by information technology. This idea becomes apparent when running the same search in Google, Bing or Yahoo. The author purports that in order for a teacher to be effective, he or she must understand this idea of connectivity and how it impacts a student's learning environment.

This article proposes the infrastructure of a next generation "context-aware" PLE environment that would automatically filter content using a Bayesian prediction engine. The guts of this are over my head, but it does address one of the key issues with PLEs and Connectivist pedagogies which is information overload and significant time wasted exploring the "wrong" links and resources.

This article takes the provocative position that a PLN is *not* the best learning situation for all learners. The authors qualify this, however, explaining "when the technology used to support learning is designed to support a specific learning model, this can often lead to a compulsory learning process that users must follow to reach the course objectives." I am not entirely sure this is a bad thing, however; in formal learning situations, I think it makes sense to have clear objectives, assessments, and learning activities. In informal settings--such as personalized professional development for practicing educators, for example--this point might hold true. The authors explain that individuals' epistemological beliefs affect their willingness to learn in an informal (PLN-based) learning situation. Further, the authors believe that beliefs about the role of technology for learning will impact the learning that can occur in a PLN. I really agree with these ideas!

This article focuses on creating a link between the wide variety of social networking tools available and the principles of connectivism. Pettenati and Cigognini go so far as to define connectivism as "...social networking applied to learning and knowledge". To support this idea, the authors explore the role of the learner at present, how e-learning, personal learning environments, and Web 2.0 have emerged, and the stages of a connectivist learning experience. The article concludes with the sharing of a scenario in which all of the previously described stages are evident.

This articles debates what constitutes a personal learning environment and how PLEs have emerged as a reaction to closed LMS evironments. The authors argue that a collection of resources does not alone constitute a PLE; it must also be associated with intentional learning practices such as blogging. Not my favorite, but certainly on topic.

Interesting article here. There's a hand signal you can use to help students remember the power and importance of PLNs. This could be helpful to teach younger students the "why" they have to be learning these skills in order to make learning meaningful. Student- Thumb; rest of the team depends on them for resources and help. Mentor- Index finger; helps organize and keep the group on task. Expert- Ring finger; ensures accuracy. Advisor- Longest finger; pinpoints needs and identifies necessary changes. Peer- Pinky finger; shares thoughts, communicates frustrations and celebrates when things are successful. Watch the video here: http://videos.videopress.com/lzULinmO/collegeunboundpersonallearningnetwork-hd1_fmt1.ogv

Love it! The hand metaphor is great.. It actually helped me to better understand PLNs myself. "Just as the hand's function is to grasp, hold, and manipulate, making it essential to daily tasks, so is the student support team essential for the same reasons."

I really like this Ryan! Not only is the picture intriguing but the metaphor is great for understanding as well as teaching about PLNs. Good find!

This article from the Educational Leadership journal is an interview with Karen Cator, former Director of the U.S. Office of Educational Technology. Cator goes into depth on the topic of personal learning environments. She says that PLEs bring in "the long tail of student experiences and interests." She also state that anytime you add a new technology, something gets amplified and something else gets reduced.

The first school that comes to mind when I read this article is about as poor and dysfunctional as the one in the article is well funded and utopic. In the last year there, not only have they not been able to get internet access and technology into the hands of all students, they have seriously discussed putting overhead projectors with plastic sheets back into rooms. The digital divide is alive and well, with the poor getting poorer. I truly believe that technology can make a huge difference in education, but how many students will be left behind waiting for it to get to them?

Cator hits home with a lot of these points for me. She speaks about how the digital and pedagogical divide amongst teachers and administration is so large. There are schools taking on the technological issues head on while others are still stuck in the old way of thinking. Before we can purchase all of this new technology, we need to get the teachers to realize what age they are living in and what is necessary to help them teach to the students in front of them.

SUMMARY: I especially appreciate this resource as it points you in several exciting directions to online CoPs to help you as a consumer of informatioin understand what constitutes a CoPs. I was pleased to see that I already belong to a few of these CoPs and I am excited to look into the others.

This was a great find. This site connects educators with communities that suit their needs. Educators can pick their interests and connect with folks on the spot. I really enjoyed viewing this resource!

First of all of course I love the name of this listing of CoP, "Online Communities of Practice in Practice". This listing is so interesting to me, I have for a long time collected from individuals blogs through feeds, but I haven't come across such a good listing of online communities. It was amazing to me as I begin to research these groups the number of educators in these networks. Of course each person is at their own level of involvement, but they are each harnessing the power of connecting in their own right, exactly how it works for them!

This text highlights the eight major principles of the connectivism theory and connects them to the Association of College and Research Libraries informational literacy standards. This source objectively evaluates the effects of connectivism when implemented for the purpose of teaching literacy standards. The big idea to be taken away is that as school librarians are embracing the digital media world, which is drastically altering student library experience, they are intuitively embracing connectivism, but would benefit from being more intentional about applying the theory. The theory applied to the library experience would involve the domains of information management, contacts, synchronous communication, and RSS. The goal would be that the conenctivism theory is applied so that students make personalized networks using the domains that maintain a dominance in secondary and post-secondary libraries.

This text is similar to others posted in that it highlights the main features to the communities of practice theory. However, this particular text's focus draws to the readers attention the importance of the commitment factor in order to form a successful community of practice. A community of practice can exist in haphazardly fashion, but when the commitment is to the common purpose and shared experience the success will be more vivid. It also alludes to the seven principles outlined by Etienne Wenger which include: shepherd the evolution, encourage internal leadership, weave private and public space, invite multiple level of participation, find rhythm between familiarity and excitement, build momentum, and develop both communal and personal identity. The author states that the communities of practice platform is the perfect place for new and unattempted concepts or ideas to be practiced with nurtured care.

A critical review of George Siemen's (2005) article "Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age". A distinct relationship is made with Personal Learning Networks (PLNs) and connectivism: The individual, and his/her abilities to create a personal learning network, is the "starting point of connectivism" (Siemens, 2005, p. 6). A great summation of the original article.

I thoroughly enjoyed this article! To some degree I have always associated Common Core with connectivism because I am seeing the ways in which Common Core is pushing students to be critical, analytical thinkers able to justify their responses. It isn't so much memorizing content as much as it is learning skills to apply to different terrains of knowledge which is similar to part of Siemen's definition that connectivism involves "determining when and what knowledge should be retired and replaced with updated knowledge." This statement prompted an "ah-ha" moment within my head as I was able to begin connecting some dots between connectivism and the practical aspects of my own teaching practice.

Is connectivism limted to Western and technologically advanced cultures? Learning theories such as behaviorism, constructivism and even cognitive and socioclultural theories can be applied to learning in various cultures. It seems that connectivsm requires a certain amount of freedom and access to technology. If this is the case, can it be considered a learning theory?

This paper describes the purpose of personal learning networks as they pertain to each individual. It includes a list of tools and their individual purposes.

This site explains the five stages of adopting a personal learning network: Immersion, Evaluation, Know it all, Perspective, and Balance. It includes an image that shows the evolution of those stages.

This article explores self-directed learning via connectivism and other learning theories.

I appreciated this article for a couple of reasons - research on self-directed learning (Yay!) and one of the conclusions that indicates that this is one of the more challenging environments for students. That means that if we ask students to be more self-directed and use the tools and resources that are "out there" and freely available, we need to provide some strategies and guidance on where to look, how to evaluate the information and how to network for learning.

I think that this is a good resource. It was really interesting to learn about connectivism and personal learning environments from a research study point of view. I believe that this source is a good way to learn about the growing needs of our students in the digital era. The source suggests that students need to be able to take control over their education in order to be truly successful.

In this particular video, Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach is delivering a keynote at ULearn08 in New Zealand. This is a short snippet of that keynote speech. Nussbaum-Beech briefly discusses the primary differences between communities of practice and personal learning networks.