“Educators, like any other professionals, need peer-to-peer interactions and reciprocal investment in order to grow and develop” (Whitaker et al., 2015, p. 2). Prior to beginning my PLN journey, my level of digital literacy was ‘Technical’, with quite low interaction and coherence (Lupton et al., 2019). I was comfortable on Instagram, but did not have the confidence to interact, post and connect with educators on a regular basis. My social network identity was very different on each of the platforms I used, depending on the primary purpose of creating the account. My teacher Instagram account was solely for professional content and my personal Instagram account solely for personal content. My Facebook, however, had a mixture of professional and personal content, but was predominately personal. These were the only applications I used regularly in terms of connecting with educators, seeking out ideas and resources for my classroom and investigating pedagogies, such as Inquiry, behaviour management and visible learning.
Once I had begun expanding my network and building confidence in communicating more online, I wrote my first blog post. I discussed the initial stages of my Inquiry-based learning journey and shared infographics that explained the inquiry cycle in an engaging yet simple way. I also shared my classroom on Instagram to provide other educators with inspiration on pedagogies and learning tasks. Engaging in both professional and casual discussions about education, inquiry learning and visible learning occurred weekly, if not more frequently and was an effective way of sharing my journey with other educators and developing my knowledge.
In 2014, the World Wide Web Foundation declared that the internet has become the most powerful communication medium the world has seen. The other forms of content that I engaged with included making Instagram stories and posts, commenting on Facebook posts and initiating conversations about inquiry learning on Instagram, Facebook, blogs, LinkedIn, YouTube and Twitter. I shared curations of my current teaching and learning space to share with my followers on Instagram. I found the sharing of practices I was doing in my own classroom was easier and more comfortable for me than writing and publishing a blog post. I did, however, enjoy the reflection process that came from the blog post and the discussions that emerged from this. This was inspired by an educator on Facebook sharing their own blog post to a community I am apart of. I read her post and then commented my thoughts after reading it. She then reciprocated the offer with my post.
The various teacher communities offer support and can be expanded through the many online communities, regardless of being geographically separated (Mancinelli, 2020). The inquiry-based learning community is very active, especially on the Instagram, Twitter and Facebook platforms. The number of educators and users on these platforms is growing exponentially, creating a diverse amount of content able to be consumed by those interested. The content varies between platforms, in terms of the format of information shared. Instagram is more aesthetic, appealing looking content that influences teachers to adapt their classrooms to reflect what is trending at the time. Facebook has more practical and relatable resources and tips, with a lot of questions being asked and specific topics being discussed. Twitter tends to share links to authentic and reputable users, blog sites and research. The concept of #EdChat allows users from all over the globe to weigh in and share their ideas and opinions on topics relating to the education system. The Twitter interface makes this a quick and simple process. It also allows the topic of conversation to veer into different directions, depending on those users engaging in the discussion.
Reflections and Learnings The way I interact and engage with my social media platforms align with a combination of an ‘evolved educator’ and a ‘genuine influencer’ (Oddone, 2018). I have been developing my PLN since I became a classroom teacher and was quite consistent with contributing to the online communities, I was a part of. I found it to be such a helpful tool for a beginning teacher working in a rural setting. More recently however, I'm finding myself sharing and consuming information with my colleagues at my current school more than within my social media side of my PLN. I find the idea of posting quite daunting as the majority of people online seem to be "experts". This journey has excelled my progress and taken me through the learning pit. It has encouraged me to explore other social media platforms to develop my knowledge in Inquiry-based learning.
A key learning from this process was that people can be very selective in how they respond to certain content as well as who they respond to. While developing my PLN, I found that users who had a large following or who were very present on a digital platform received the majority of the engagement and responses. As someone who does not have a large following or contributes to my PLN regularly, I found this to be somewhat of a blockage to my journey. I seemed to receive minimal comments or likes, which makes sense as I am not a well-known content creator and so therefore a limited amount of people would both see my content and be likely to respond to me. On the Instagram platform, where my following was the largest of all my social media accounts, I received the most amount of engagement with my content as I had previously formed relationships and connections, which assisted this greatly. The responses and interactions experienced with other educators were always positive and generosity and reciprocity were commonly exchanged.
Through my research and connections made with the topic of Inquiry learning, I have ascertained that this teaching and learning pedagogy is becoming common and well-regarded in the education field. It receives a lot of traction on social media platforms. Finding content and information on this area of interest was fairly straightforward and the hashtags connected to the topic delivered a variety of results, in terms of contexts and individual practices.
Formal learning no longer makes up the entirety of learning; it occurs in a number of ways, such as through personal networks and communities of practice (Siemens, 2005). Digital media is an excellent resource to gain inspiration, practical ideas and genuine advice on career, passion projects or areas of interest in the teaching profession. In a profession that has such an over-crowded curriculum, ever-changing standards and guidelines, and such a tight timeline to achieve requirements, having opportunities at your fingertips to seek support is invaluable. It allows educators working in contexts with limited support, and/or technology opportunities to continue to expand their knowledge and keep their finger on the pulse with current practices and trends. Educators across the globe can connect, broadening their skill sets as well as connecting them to mentors, online support systems and pen pal classes.
Critical Incidents Driscoll (2000) explains how learning can only occur as a result of a learner’s experience and interaction with the world. A number of critical incidents occurred along my journey of expanding my Inquiry learning PLN. My initial incident was a positive one and was when I stumbled across an absolute gem of a blog, “LearningbyInquiry”. The resources and information I found on this website was fantastic. I expressed my gratitude in a comment and the author responded, reciprocating her generosity for my kind words. This event sparked my motivation and encouraged me to consider sharing my own content online. The internet can be a place of hope where educators can build off each other’s positivity (Mancinelli, 2020). This statement perfectly summarised my thinking from this encouraging experience.
Instagram is the platform where I feel most comfortable sharing and connecting with others as it is the application where I have been the most active prior to this assignment. It made sense for me to therefore start my PLN expansion journey by commenting on inquiry-based posts and building my connections this way. Two critical incidents stemmed from these efforts, where I was able to connect with educators from America, who were on similar pathways in terms of teaching using an Inquiry approach. I was able to take practical classroom activities and implement them into my classroom. We then shared our experiences from these activities. This was another positive experience as I was able to receive instant feedback and connection from another educator, outside of my workplace.
My blog post about my initial thoughts and experiences with Inquiry-based learning was difficult for me to post as it was very much outside my comfort zone. I was stepping outside my Instagram profile, where I knew people would respond positively to my content and posting my thoughts on a public platform. Sharing this with my current followers on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn was daunting to say the least. Unfortunately, it was not a success as it did not receive any traction. The closest I came to receiving connection from the post was a handful of likes on Twitter. Although this was hard to accept, it was not a surprise. As Siemens (2005) states, knowledge online must be connected with the right people in the right context to be classified as learning. I could not expect my very first blog post to “break the internet” when I have a very small number of followers and an even smaller portion of these followers who currently teach using the Inquiry method.
Analysis of Theories In a 2009 survey, 90 percent of teachers agreed that other teachers contributed to their success in the classroom (MetLife Incorporated, 2010). Siemens (2005) shares this view by explaining how nurturing and maintaining connections is necessary to facilitate continual learning. Throughout my teaching career, I have heard the phrase, “teaching is a lonely profession” countless times. Although we are surrounded by tiny humans for six hours a day, the amount of adult connection and interaction can sometimes be very limited. Forming connections online is therefore paramount. There are two theories that align best to the development of my PLN, which both emphasise the individual’s contributions to a network. These are the ‘egocentric’ approach to Social Network Analysis and ‘connectivism’.
Whitaker et al., (2015) discusses how in the past decade, educators have begun learning what and when they want, instead of being limited to topics offered within their workplace. In the ‘egocentric’ approach, the individual is in the centre of the social network and the connections made, or nodes, all relate back to the individual (Chua, 2011; Frith, 2014). In other words, this approach focusses on the people, applications and ideas an individual is connected to. Frith (2014) explains that the goal of the theory is to better understand the role one’s network plays in shaping their behaviour. It looks at how connections limit or increase access to resources. The contrast between resources resulting from my Instagram connections and my blog post highlights the importance relationships have on whether or not online platforms meet your professional needs or completely miss the mark.
Similar to the ‘egocentric’ approach, the individual is the starting point of ‘connectivism’. It is the integration of principles explored by a number of theories and revolves around the concept that learning can occur outside of individuals and in technology-based interfaces (Siemens, 2005). The connections made within these applications allow us to learn more about our interests and are more important than our current state of knowing. Connectivism is driven by the fact that new information is constantly being acquired and acknowledges the shifts in how we now learn as a society (Siemens, 2005). Before I began my Inquiry PLN journey, I had very limited experience and knowledge on this pedagogy. I did, however, have an understanding of my context, the needs of my learners and the frameworks my teaching and learning had to align with. The theory of connectivism enabled me to narrow my connections and interactions down to focus on forming relationships and downloading resources that would be practical for me to implement into my own classroom. Taking into consideration how intimidating the realm of Inquiry can be, focusing on my individual professional needs was advantageous to both my teaching practise and online presence.
Images of inquiry-based learning being executed in year five classrooms
My Personal Learning Network Journey
connections formed on social media...
PHASE THREE: WHERE TO NEXT?
Reflecting on my digital footprint and social media identity, visible progress and changes have occurred (Oddone, 2019). I am currently more “emerging” in terms of my digital literacies (Lupton et al., 2019). Both my coherence and interactions have increased. I still have room to improve on both of these factors, which regular connections and positive interactions will help in making this a reality. Engaging in this PLN journey has accelerated my progress in terms of feeling worthy enough to share my thoughts and experiences within online communities.
In the future, I plan to continue expanding my PLN and engaging in social media platforms that are more unfamiliar to me, such as Twitter and LinkedIn. Connected educators have found that the best people to learn from are those who are facing similar issues and are similarly seeking new ideas and solutions for these issues (Whitaker et al., 2015). The breadth of knowledge gained from connecting with like-minded educators, from all over the globe is too valuable to disengage with. I would hope my confidence grows in terms of being able to post more content, express my feelings and opinions on certain topics and engage in more conversations with educators. I also hope that having documented my journey with Inquiry-based learning in such a visual way on my website, allows me to reflect on how I have progressed and how my teaching practice and thoughts have changed on Inquiry.
Whitaker et al., (2015) stresses the importance of modelling for our students a willingness to embrace the changes that have occurred and are occurring in terms of technology and education. I feel this is especially relevant for me as an upper primary teacher. My students are surrounded by social media and are living in an all-encompassing digital era. Connectivism provides insight into learning skills and tasks needed for learners to flourish in a digital era (Siemens, 2005). I want and need to be a type of educator who embraces these practices and integrates Connectivism into my teaching, ensuring my students have a role model who exposes them to and shares ways to positively interact online. My intention moving forward is to show my learners how they can reap the benefits of connecting with like-minded people through online communities.
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