Using Social Media to develop your own Personal Learning Network Sue Beckingham and David Walker

What is Social Media Social software, software that supports group communications Shirky C, 2003 Technologies that enable communication, collaboration, participation and sharing. Hughes A, 2009 for JISC

Social Media is an ecology for enabling a "system of people, practices, values and technologies in a particular local environmen t" a medium for facilitating social connection and information interchange a tool for augmenting human social and collaborative abilities Suter, Alexander and Kaplan, 2005

Social Media: An Ecology An ecology, habitat, or studio is simply the space for fostering connections. Networks occur within something. They are influenced by the environment and context of an organization, school, or classroom. Certain ecologies are more conducive to forming connections.... Connection barriers are aspects of an ecology.... The nature of the ecology influences the ease, type, and health of networks created (Siemans 2007)

Your personal choice of tools Solis and Thomas (2009)

Communication SpectrumCommunication Spectrum Collaborating Moderating Negotiating Debating Commenting Net meeting, Skyping, Video Conferencing Reviewing Questioning Replying Posting and Blogging Networking Contributing Chatting ing Twittering/microblogging Instant Messaging Texting Churches, A. (2009) Blooms Revised Digital Taxonomy

Your personal level of involvement Creators Conversationalists Critics Collectors Joiners Spectators Inactives

CreatingEvaluatingAnalysing ApplyingUnderstandingRemembering LOTS Lower Order Thinking Skills HOTS Higher Order Thinking Skills designing, constructing, planning, producing, inventing, devising, making, programming, filming, animating, blogging, video blogging, mixing, re-mixing, wiki- ing, publishing, videocasting, podcasting, directing, broadcasting. checking, hypothesising, critiquing, experimenting, judging, testing, detecting, monitoring, blog commenting, reviewing, posting, moderating, collaborating, networking, refactoring, testing. Comparing, organising, deconstructing, attributing, outlining, finding, structuring, integrating, mashing, linking, validating, reverse engineering, cracking, media clipping. Implementing, carrying out, using, executing, running, loading, playing, operating, hacking, uploading, sharing, editing. Interpreting, summarising, inferring, paraphrasing, classifying, comparing, explaining, exemplifying, advanced searches, boolean searches, blog journaling, twittering, categorising, tagging, commenting, annotating, subscribing. Recognising, listing, describing, identifying, retrieving, naming, locating, finding, bullet pointing, highlighting bookmarking, social networking, social bookmarking, favouriting/local bookmarking, searching, googling. Blooms Revised Digital Taxonomy Churches, A. (2009)

Fitting the right pieces together is personal to you

Personal Learning PEOPLE! Tools Information

It’s all learning Formal Learning Informal Learning

Sir Ken Robinson (2010) RSA Animate - Changing Education Paradigms

The added social value > Enables and provides support for learning Can increase the effectiveness of learning Can increase access to learning Allows people to connect with each other in spite of geographical distances Provides a forum and permission to participate Complements face to face communication Adapted from George Siemens

Use a PLN for asking and answering questions

Use a PLN to collaborate on projects

Use a PLN to get feedback on your own work or seek inspiration from others

A PLN may include specific tools to help you get organised

A PLN may include following blogs and websites

A PLN may also include a private space to reflect

Learner 2.0 Operate within decentralised and deliberately formed networks of tools, resources and people Established through contributions to blogs, tweets/tweeting via Twitter; sharing slides (Slideshare) etc Crowdsource ideas, active/passive social search e.g. for research or assessment Importantly it is both personal and collaborative Source: David Hopkins, 2009, University of Bournemouth

Graduate Attributes ‘Our country will need different kinds of student experiences to enable its graduates to contribute to the world of the future’. Prof. Paul Ramsden, JISC Student Experiences of Technology:

Public Bloggers Steve Wheeler

Public Bloggers Donald Clark

Jane Hart

Top 100 tools for learning 2011

Activity In groups consider: How do you currently inform your own professional development in relation to social media? What tools do you currently use and are there any you’d consider trying to further your professional development or your role?

Remember it’s a dialogue

@ Sue Beckingham Sheffield Hallam University David Walker University of Dundee