Cara North, Ana-Paula Correia & Rick Voithofer
Educators face shoestring budgets and lack of time for professional development. Despite the requirement for formal education and professional development, educators often must pay for these opportunities out of their own pockets. By using tools such as Twitter, educators can create Personal Learning Networks (PLNs) to connect with other educators across the world. PLNs can provide educators with access to pool of collective knowledge, resources, and ideas to inform their own practice and receive feedback on classroom activities. Often when educators are asked about why they use PLNs, they mention the knowledge they gain by being a part of these networks.
One way to boost your PLN is by following hashtags in conversations you are interested in. Here is an example of what you may find if you search the Twitter hashtag for the educational technology chat #edtechchat.
This study consisted of a critical literature review that explores how educators use PLNs and how knowledge is applied. The major findings from the literature review indicate that while no articles reviewed explicitly define knowledge, knowledge can be applied in four different ways: curation, social capital, building current skills and learning new skills.