Online Teacher Development Group

[darren elliott]

I am currently working at a university in Japan, and I`m looking to start a small internet based teacher development group of about four or five people, with teachers from different contexts.

I would like to use http://www.tumblr. com/ as a basic platform, partly for it`s flexibility and simplicity (although setting it up does require a tiny bit of fiddling...) . It`s a great place to share video, audio, links, writing, and so on. Perhaps we might use email, skype, googledocs or what have you later, who knows.

I enjoy mailing lists like this one, but I envisage this as a much more personal group, where we can pose questions to one another, share thoughts and ideas and interact on a more regular basis. Of course, how it actually turns out will depend on the group...we can thrash out details as necessary.

I`ve posted this in both the IATEFL TD Sig and the Learning Technologies Sig because I figured members of both are probably my target audience.

Mail me at [e-mail] if you think it might work for you!

Darren Elliott

Nanzan University

Nagoya, Japan

[Frank]

Hey Darren, why not just start a professional network at Ning, like this one (META) here where you posted? I think Nings feel more community-like and Tumblr more blog-like. You can limit the membership and the features as you like.

[Leigh Thelmadatter]

I dont know what Tumblr is like but a Ning would serve your purposes. But no matter what format you use, the most important part of any enterprise like this is the people!

[darren elliott]

Thanks both for your replies... I might look into ning for future projects, but this time I was aiming at "paralell blogs", and tumblr has a lot to offer. It sprung from my attempts to keep a reflective journal, and I want to create a space for myself to do that, but at the same time compare my journal with others and respond to their thoughts. I know other platforms and applications have benefits too (and I will continue to participate in other online groups such as this one for other purposes), but for a long term project without a clear goal, I am quite happy with the format I'm setting up. So far it is working well...but as Leigh says, the people are what counts - I'm still looking ; )

[Frank]

That's is great ... I blog too .. and the blogging community is very interconnected, too. Good luck!

darren elliott said:

Thanks both for your replies... I might look into ning for future projects, but this time I was aiming at "paralell blogs", and tumblr has a lot to offer. It sprung from my attempts to keep a reflective journal, and I want to create a space for myself to do that, but at the same time compare my journal with others and respond to their thoughts. I know other platforms and applications have benefits too (and I will continue to participate in other online groups such as this one for other purposes), but for a long term project without a clear goal, I am quite happy with the format I'm setting up. So far it is working well...but as Leigh says, the people are what counts - I'm still looking ; )

[Benjamin Stewart]

Not having a clear idea as to exactly what you'd like to accomplish, I'll put in my "two cents worth" - the beauty of posting questions to social networking sites such as this is that you're likely to get a variety of opinions, which is a good thing.

The question you raise has a lot to do with how one establishes a personal learning network (PLN). You state that ideally you would like to have four or five members in your PLN and you'd like to conduct "[parallel] blogs" through the use of a single platform (i.e., tumbir). Upon reading your initial post and subsequent responses, a few questions came to mind:

1. Why is having four or five people an ideal PLN for this particular purpose?
2. Would having more people participating less in your PLN be of more use?
3. Is searching for people in a Ning the best way to approach people who you wish to participate in Tumbir?
4. Would open educational resources such as those found in Wikieducator be a better option?

I´m not trying to be critical or try to talk you out of Tumbir (since I know nothing about it), but if we apply a connectivist theory here it's about who you know and less about what you know. For example, my own PLN involves many different platforms: wikis, nings, blogs, moodles, learning central-like sites etc. But I don´t form my PLN based on the platform, rather I base it on the people in those platforms (as I believe most would agree). Stated another way, I have not found a single platform that would satisfy my own PLN.

I was curious about finding your blog in Tumbir, and learning more about what you want to accomplish but was unsuccessful, so I assume you want this network of five individuals to be private? If this is the case, I would recommend entering as many different social networking sites as possible and finding the people you would like to collaborate with. This way you can build a relationship first in order to see how things might work out in the future. If you want to collaborate in a open way, you could join Classroom 2.0 (ok, it's a Ning, sorry), create a group, and then start joining conversations with other teachers (blogs, forums, etc.) who teach in a variety of contexts. I say this because Classroom 2.0 has nearly 21,000 members and not so much because it's a Ning. If you're looking for language learning educators, obviously you could do well doing the same in META. But again, I would get to know people first by interacting with them (via their blogs, wikis, nings, etc.) then pursue collaborative efforts.

[darren elliott]

Thanks Benjamin....what a long winded way to say you don`t like the idea ; D

I`ll answer your questions, although I think I`ve already answered some of them - and others kind of contradict what you said yourself.

1. Why is having four or five people an ideal PLN for this particular purpose?
Beacuse otherwise it is no different to any other larger network such as this one. I would envisage it as a small committed group. Generally, larger networks tend to form into smaller cliques to solve particular issues, which disperse once the short term goal is accomplished. That is a good thing, but there are plenty of places I can go for that. I want something longer term but less focused....dare I say, a shared journey of discovery? (Pass the bucket ;-P)
2. Would having more people participating less in your PLN be of more use?
See above
3. Is searching for people in a Ning the best way to approach people who you wish to participate in Tumbir?
Is there a brand loyalty? You said yourself that you use a number of different platforms. Well, for the purposes of this project I like tumblr. It doesn`t mean that I, or any of the other participants, will be restricted to tumblr forever. As I wrote in the initial call out, we may well use other applications as necessary. And I will continue my participation in other forums, mailing lists (even nings, now i know what they are) and so on. I tend to find that they are helpful for finding the answers to specific problems, but this is a longer term partnership.

"I´m not trying to be critical or try to talk you out of Tumbir (since I know nothing about it), but if we apply a connectivist theory here it's about who you know and less about what you know. For example, my own PLN involves many different platforms: wikis, nings, blogs, moodles, learning central-like sites etc. But I don´t form my PLN based on the platform, rather I base it on the people in those platforms (as I believe most would agree). Stated another way, I have not found a single platform that would satisfy my own PLN."

I quite agree - this group is one small part of my PLN. I did have a moment thinking "It`s just a blog, it`s so 2001.... even my grandmother has a blog now, I should find something more cutting edge and "web 3.0"". Then I realised it doesn`t actually matter, because it`s what I want to do. I need to write for myself, but my moleskine journal never answers back. This is a way of getting people in entirely different contexts to give me new perspectives. In return, I`ll do the same for them.

4. Would open educational resources such as those found in Wikieducator be a better option?
Don`t know, never heard of it. Like you`ve never heard of tumblr ; P

You do make a good point about finding the people and then forming a group, rather than starting with a platform. But I chose tumblr basically because I`m comfortable with it, and because it has to be SOMETHING. Trying to direct me in the direction of other platforms is kind of missing the point.

Anyone who responds to the invitation and, once I`ve explained what I want to do, come on board, becomes someone I want to work with... I had a quite a number of initial responses but not all followed up - which is fine. So far, we are three, in three very different contexts, and it`s going alright.

If you want to have a look at it, here is a bit of it ... http://teacherdevelopment.tumblr.com/tagged/introduction ... and you can click on from there to read the rest.

Thanks for the feedback though.... I do appreciate it, even though some of my response might not sound like it ; ). I`ll have a look into some of the other resources you mentioned.

Even writing this response has helped me clarify in my own mind what I am trying to do, and for that, too, I thank you.

[Benjamin Stewart]

I find this dialog intriguing - the thought process of how one develops a PLN. You've been kind enough to share your ideas and for that I am greatly appreciative. Your response to my first two questions is really at the heart of my intrigue.

As I reflect on my own learning and development of my PLN, I find that I have run into people that I seem to "cling" onto (e.g., Frank and Nellie), which has been the result of a variety of encounters through various networks regarding a multitude of topics. Getting to know people in this manner is one way to form stronger nodes in my particular network that provides me with a certain amount of knowledge as I continue to learn. But another important part of my own learning is through the formation of loose ties.

Much of my knowledge gathering is also through the use of brief, dispersed discussions with many different people that I find myself in contact with. Sometimes they are discussions that I initiate while others are my response to other discussions. Being a peripheral participant to a particular topic or community allows me to broaden my understandings (i.e., connected knowledge) as I pursue particular interests.

I view both of these ways of learning - building strong and weak ties to nodes of a network - as short and long-term.

I would love to hear from others about their own personal rationale(s) for developing their PLN. Since PLNs really are more of a process than a fixed product, rationales thus remain in a state of flux as well. But as we learn from others as to how, when, where, and why their PLN emerges, we gain insight to our own rationale for emerging individual PLNs.

Thanks again Darren for an interesting discussion.