This week's presentation from John Evans on PLN's was interesting and also eye-opening. At the beginning of the presentation I didn't even know what PLN stood for, however by the end I can really see the importance and benefit of teachers creating their own PLN. The benefit of having a PLN has been emphasized, as in recent years there has been a decrease in traditional professtional development courses and there has been a greater need for teachers to complete more P.D. independently. John showed us how teachers can find different p.d opportunities online and how to use this information from online sources in the classroom. As I plan to teacher in a small rural community, it will be key to set up a PLN to make connections and create a network of support for the classroom. This will allow me to share ideas/resources, get advice etc. from other educators! Creating a teaching network will hopefully decrease some of the stresses of first year teaching!
Through my student teaching experiences, I have definitely wasted a lot of time searching for resources on Google, therefore I really like the idea of using Google Reader. Through your subscriptions, you can easily find anything you need on the sites or blogs. Through John's advice I subscribed for some neat sites including; wired science, 100 Best Blogs for Teachers, and my favorite is Free Technology for Teachers. This site has piles of current information and useful teaching tools. Using Google Reader will definitely save me a lot of time seaching the internet!
That's all for now, it was an interesting presentation!
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Tully Tully Tully....
ReplyDeleteI also agree that setting up a PLN for rural teachers can be a very important. Sometimes, being out in the smaller communities your kind of out of the loop on whats new. Setting up a PLN will allow you to stay up to date. The google reader is also a very useful tool which for sure will help teachers save some time researching.
Excellent Journalism Laura!
ReplyDeleteI agree that having a PLN is an absolute must in ANY community. Whether rural or urban I think that keeping everyone notified of new information and up to date online can only be good for the education of your students and their parents. Having and up to date PLN also allows parents to stay on the students that are less likely to hand homework in on time.
Justin