Presenter:  Heather Blanton – Wise County Public Schools – Mathematics Coach

Presentation at – http://www.slideshare.net/hblanton/twitter-me-this – Tools to create your Personal Learning Network

Idea of PLNs – not new – technology just makes them easier – and you can spend as much or as little time as you want

What is a PLN?

• PLNs are about what YOU are interested in
• Group of folks you can collaborate with
• Where is your network? – With technology comes from all over the world! Can tap in to the knowledge from everywhere and any time – limitless
• There’s a lot of variety in how to build your PLN
• Opportunity for differentiated Professional Development – interesting thought – Your PLN IS tailored to YOUR needs

Vide0 – A Brave New World Wide Web (Find Teachertube version so it will open in school)

Twitter

• “The dumbest tool you’ll ever love…”
• In last year’s conference – pulled FIVE(!) pages of resources from people in Twitter PLN
• Sometimes the best professional development does not occur in the sessions, but in the “backchannels” on Twitter and over lunch/dinner
• Twitter has transformed how news is being reported

How do you build your network? – Who do you follow?

• Twitter4Teachers – to learn how to use and find people to follow – http://twitterforteachers.wetpaint.com/
• Follow folks from the conference
• Follow VSTE folks
• K3 Teachers Guide to Twitter – http://www.k-3teacherresources.com/teachers-guide-to-twitter.html
• Twellow – http://www.twellow.com/ – yellow pages of Twitter

Ning

• “Swiss army knife social media…” – it will do just about everything
• Great for social networks for educators  – more “professional” than “personal” (as opposed to facebook which is personal)
• VSTE Ning – http://vsteonline.ning.com/
• Classroom 2.0 – http://www.classroom20.com/
• ISTE Ning – http://www.iste-community.org/

Blogs

• “Sharing stories one teacher at a time….”
• Coolcat Teacher Blog – http://coolcatteacher.blogspot.com/
• Teacherlingo – VERY cool – directory of teacher bloggers – http://teacherlingo.com/

Social Bookmarking

• “This is the coolest link, everyone should know about it!”
• Simplybox – http://simplybox.com/ – Box it and save it for later – “librarians love this”
• Stumbleupon – http://www.stumbleupon.com/
• 7 Things you should know about social bookmarking – good article – http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7001.pdf

Second Life

• MUVE – multi-user virtual environment
• VSTE Island in SL has a Jamestown simulation! Very cool – Avatar (in life digital persona) can actually visit and explore! – http://vsteonline.ning.com/group/secondlifevstemembers
• http://vsteonline.ning.com/video/vste-jamestown-settlement – video about Jamestown settlement in SL
• There ARE teen islands in Teen SL where different schools are running different projects – creation of civilization/society experiments and projects – good for government and life skills?
• VSTE members who are running VSTE Island in SL – very active and helpful!

Webinars

• “Connecting Learners the world over…”
• VSTE Webinar Series – not free, but not too expensive, and they are good
• Classroom 2.0 Live
• ISTE Webinar Series

Social Aggregators

• Friendfeed – http://friendfeed.com/

Additional resources on last slide in presentation (see above link)