Tips on How To Develop Your Professional Learning Network (PLN)

I just wanted to begin by saying that I don't think the development of your PLN will necessarily look the same for any two people. Instead, I acknowledge that as individuals, we will pursue developing our PLN with different time constraints and webtools. That being said, I have decided to create a list of tips on how to develop your PLN, which I believe should be adjusted accordingly to how you think it will best benefit you!

1. Use Twitter/Tweetdeck & Diigo (or some variation of a webtool that lets you put together important links into an organized manner). Twitter has allowed me to find many useful online resources that are either about education or for use in education. It has not only expanded my knowledge of the Common Core, but has also allowed for me to bookmark several online educational sites and tools. I have been using Diigo to store most of the online sites and tools that I have looked at (because someone shared it on Twitter). But I must admit, I have not yet become a full master at using Diigo. Just last week, I had clicked on a link about 25 free educational sites, and I really liked it, but I did not "Diigo" it, and now I have not been able to find it again. When I found an interesting site with free online interactive graphic organizers, I found that I was re-tweeted by many people and organizations. It's nice to know that you can not only get thing from Twitter, but you can also give back. Tweetdeck is a life-saver, because if I hadn't been introduced to it, I doubt I would have continued to use Twitter. It is a great way for me to organize different #hastags that I am following such as: #edchat #historyteacher #ushistory #langchat. Without Tweetdeck, as I believe most, I would be so overwhelmed by the constant endless streams of Tweets. Tweetdeck is a great way to organize Tweets into hashtag categories, so I can better manage and search what I'm looking for.
2. Blog! As with most activities and learning, whether it be formal or informal, service, tutoring, etc... I believe that it is necessary to reflect, in order for true learning to occur. Blogging has helped me sew together the threads between my part-time job as a tutor, my role as an aunt, a volunteer in my nephew's kindergarten class, and my courses at USD. I even will blog about some of my own learning from this past weekend when I visited Griffith Observatory. This way the visit will not just be one thing I did over the weekend, but something I get to reflect upon, and therefore I get to share a little bit about the learning that happened for me.
3. Webtools: I have begun to use webtools I had never seen or heard of before, and some I like better than others. The reality is, that a bit of exploration and experimentation needs to occur with webtools, so you can find out what works best for you, and what is of most use to you. What I find is most driving my desire to try new webtools, is CURIOSITY. Ideally, I think that this is one of the best ways to propell learning, is to allow curiosity to drive you, so that you may have the energy and passion to discover new things, and therefore learn. Granted, some webtools will involve trial and error, but the curiosity of new possibilities is what keeps me going back to try new ones. It excited me to consider the plethora of webtools I will have under my sleeve for when I student teach next semester.
4. Organization/Lists/Planner: Personally, I still use a traditional planner to write down my homework assignments for my graduate courses. I like the dates format, and that I can make lists, and write when things are due, and see the week all at once. But, others may find using something like wunderlist.com to be useful, or maybe your planner is digital, or perhaps you like lists on paper or your iPad. Whatever it might be, just keep yourself accountable with some type of organization to attempt to blog  and use Twitter. Recently I find myself reflecting upon educational experiences and connections during my everyday life, so I have begun to make a note on my iphone about those thoughts, to later blog about them. Even when I am in a hurry, if I find some webtool that I want to blog about later, I just create a new blog post, write some notes and the url in it, and then save it as a draft, so that I can come back to it later and finish.