Journal #6 NETS 3-5

Warlick, D. (2009, March/April). Grow your personal learning network. Learning & Leading with Technology, 36(6), Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/learn/publications/learning-and-leading/digital-edition-march-april-2009.aspx

The article was a very interesting article about PLN’s and RSS feeds that can be used in the classroom to help teachers teach their students.  What I liked most about the article is that it shows, through pictures and words, that a teacher becomes a great teacher if they start to think as a student learner as well as a teacher. 

            When it comes to PLN’s the article suggests that Personal Learning Networks have always been around.  They have just been adjusting from face to face networking during generations past to the social networking sites that we know today on the Internet.  Sites like Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, etc, have changed the way children, and students, interact with each other and how the communicate.  Communicating through the Internet and social networking has become nearly the only way children today communicate.  For that reason teachers need to savvy themselves in the complex ideas of the Internet and how to communicate through the students, and their, feeds so the learning process can begin. 

            I think that the icing on the cake for the article is the in depth explanation it gives about how important RSS feeds are to actually fulfill the communication between teachers and students.  Furthermore, telling us how to actually use the RSS feed is important because without it most people would be lost on how to actually us it.  I enjoyed reading the article and thought it was very informative.

Question #1

What does PLN’s have to do with everyone?

            Well according to the article, everyone.  Everyone, in every generation, has had his or her own personal PLN.  It just has adjusted from localized PLN’s to world wide PLN’s that communicate their idea’s and knowledge through the Internet.  It is actually does effect everyone because the Internet is now the main source of our PLN’s; especially, our children’s way of learning. 

Question #2

Is a teacher’s ability actually teach helped by Social Networking online?

            That is actually a very good question I thought of throughout the entire semester in this class.  However, throughout the class I have seen that it has helped kids learn the material because I can see how easy this can be for them to learn and communicate their answers with the entire PLN.  RSS feeds are also important with teaching because it helps communicate the assignments that the teachers want their students to learn.  Therefore, allowing them to follow what you want them to do later on in the day when they are at home trying to do their assignment for your class.  So, it is very helpful for the student to learn through Technology that you bring to the classroom.