Week 14 Summary: past and future networking (April 16-22)

Task Discussion

• 
  Keisha   April 25, 2012, 5:35 a.m.

  Just like SandyG mentioned P2PU is a community that I will always use as a tool in the future. Even though I've never met anyone in this community I've learned so much from everybody. Everybody has come here with some fantastic ideas and great information for us to use. It's cool to communicate with people with the same dreams as me. I love how we can share our opinions, struggles, and findings with each other without feeling like we're being judged. I like how we created a safe enviornment to learn in. I can tell that everyone will do great things as teachers.

  I don't know of any other tool that I can use because I haven't been a part of any other community. But I will surely explore more places to expand my resources. This picture I found on the link made me realize that I use a lot of other search engines that can be useful for teaching and as my PLN. I usually use them for leisure and other stuff. I never thought of taking advantage of them for teaching and learning. Now I have plenty of tools to use.

   

  

• 
  Kathy Cianciola   April 23, 2012, 9:20 p.m.

  I hope that when "crunch-time" is past, I will have more time to further explore some of these PLNs we've learned about, and participated in this semester.  At the P2PU online presentation I became curious about other courses offered via P2PU.  I was really inspired by some of what their speakers had to say. 

  I was also glad to be introduced to "Let's Play Math" on Facebook which is a great resource for teachers, and future reachers, like myself. 

  "Scratch" was also really fascinating to me.  Although it's not exactly a personal learning network, Mit does have their own community where "Scratch" enthusiasts create and share projects and interact with eachother. My husband and I plan on getting more creative with Scratch this summer, and teaching my son what we have learned.  It will be a great activity for the whole family.

• 
  Carolyn Lesser   April 22, 2012, 5:12 p.m.

   

  I really enjoyed PLNs and webinars even though I sometimes I personally found it hard to participate.  Think one of my favorite would be the MIT webinar. They are being inventive in making math fun for kids. This is something that is so important and something that I want my kids to have. I would like to follow their webinars and continue to participate with them. I just found it very interesting and an open environment. I also really enjoyed using Scratch. I found it frustrating at first but after I got used to it, it became a great tool. It is a great place to find and share instructional videos and is a place for kids to learn and explore.

  I am struggling to think of other PLNs just because I haven’t explored any outside of the class. However I looked at the link Maria gave us and found a diagram that I really liked. I think that it is a perfect descriptor of what we need as a teacher who is involved in networking. It is important to know what it takes to be involved as a networking teacher and this explain exactly what you need to do.

  

   

  Alec Couros, PhD Thesis illustration, the Networked Teacher - http://educationaltechnology.ca/couros/580

• 
  Carolyn   April 21, 2012, 10:06 p.m.

  Sandy and I are pretty much on the same page for this task...

  I would use any specific tool or comuunity that we have encountered through this course, but rather us them all as resources in my future classroom. Before this class I hadn't had much experience with just about any of the thigns we have used this semester. Each week I was challenged to use something new, including Twitter. Twitter is one thing that I found out can be more benefcial than at first sight. I always thought Twitter was updates on celebrity's lives, which it still is, but it is also so much more. Even beyond this class I have learned about Twitter and its benefits. 

  As for anyother tools I would use, just about anything. Again I am not that knowledgeable about the tools out there, but this class has definitely opened the door of educational technology to me. Anything that is out there I am open to exploring and reviewing for legitimacy. 

• 
  SandyG   April 16, 2012, 1:39 p.m.

  Which of people, communities and tools you have found look like keepers for your PLNs?

  It isn’t a specific person, place, or thing, but this course has helped me get over my reluctance to join online communities.  I have always been reluctant to participate in discussions that involved registering as part of the process.  I have protected my digital privacy and limited my digital footprint as much as possible.  Not only do I feel safer registering as myself, but I have gained some ideas for registering in a way to still protect my privacy.  I did enjoy the Twitter chats and plan to look for some forum like that in my field. 

  What other tools, communities or people we have not met this time, but should include next time around?

  Other than what we've seen in this class, I am unaware of what all is out there for math, but I think it’s worthwhile to explore some of Google applications such as Googledocs which allow students to share documents.  If there is something similar that would allow students to collaborate online, on their own computers, it could be a useful tool.

• 
  Laura Haeberle   April 16, 2012, 10:56 a.m.

  I've gained so much from various aspects of this course. I think I'm very glad to be involved in the Living Math Forum group on Yahoo. There's a great community that knows so much about math instruction! A lot of them are well-versed in the different programs that kids could use for math instruction, and everyone was so friendly! I think it was more helpful for me to use an online forum, as opposed to commenting on random blogs I found. I don't think I got many replies for my comments, and I think it's difficult to connect based on a one time interaction.

  I also really enjoyed using the Webinars! Because of time constraints, I wasn't really able to attend many, but I liked the ones I did attend! I enjoyed being able to talk to people in real time. The internet has gotten us to a point in communication where emails and comments make real time talk nearly impossible. It was nice to just sit down and talk with actual experts! There are so many people who want to share what they know and learn from others. I'm still learning, of course, but I know there are many different topics I can rely on in the future.

  In the future, I would love some sort of community for math-based lesson plans. We're learning how to lesson plans right now in my education courses, and I wish I learned how to fully develop math lessons. I know there are millions of lesson plans out online, so perhaps I can research to find promising math topics! I'm wondering if there are certain guidelines for math-related plans, or if it's similar to a lesson plan for any other area.

  Overall, I'm glad I got a chance to learn about PLNs firsthand. I feel like I'm ahead of the rest of the kids in my classes, who have only learned the term without the full experience!