Seventh and Eighth PLN

NCTE Front Page

7. NCTE

This was an addition to my PLN this semester as well! It is specifically for English teachers, and it is filled to the brim with information for them. Www. ncte.org is a collection of English teachers from all around the U.S., and with that they share papers and articles that they feel are important to the field.


How did you find/create/use this resource? I found it through a professor this semester. He is a member of the NCTE, and he has spoken nothing but good things about the organization.

What prompted you to find/create/use this resource? One of my professors this semester spoke highly of the organization, saying that it was a wealth of knowledge for our field and it was one of the best one he's joined in his 50 years.

What did you learn from this resource? I have learned that not all English teachers are the same. It may sound like a "duh" thing, but it never occurred to me that there are some English teachers, who are in a field that is hard to grade normally, who are for things like strict grading. This is only the start of it, but it really opened up my eyes to the perspective for others in my field.

How will you benefit from this resource in your future teaching? With this resource, I'll be able to always recheck other's thoughts on topics that could benefit or hurt me. Think of it as a way of revising my philosophy on teaching all the time.

Facebook homepage

8. Facebook

Another monolith of connectivity, Facebook.com has been in used by me since I was in middle school. At first I used it as a space to get in touch with just my friends, but it has grown into a place where I talk to veteran teachers about specific topics.




How did you find/create/use this resource? I found out about this website the same way that I did with Twitter. Some of my friends were talking about what a cool website this was, and how it was soooo much better than Myspace.

What prompted you to find/create/use this resource? What prompted me was the cleaner interface mostly. While Myspace allowed user completely customize their page, it was also incredibly annoying. Weird layouts as well as the annoying music that the person put on. Facebook was just a lot more "professional" in the sense that it looked like an Apple commercial website with blue.

What did you learn from this resource? I have learned that a lot of companies and organizations use Facebook! It allows them to interact with their customers, let them hear their complaints, and respond accordingly. 

How will you benefit from this resource in your future teaching? I will benefit from it in the same way that I do with Twitter, although this website will be used for more in depth discussions. I have already begun using it this way, as I am friends with my teachers from my high school, and I am able to receive insight from them on topics that will affect me when I become a teacher. 

Fifth and Sixth PLN

Example of a Twitter account's page.

5. Twitter

While Twitter.com is mostly used for rapid fire opinions, crammed into 180 characters, it is more than that in the sense that it is an wide ecosystem, connecting everyone from across the world.






How did you find/create/use this resource? I found it way back when I was in my early years of high school. Some classmates from school were talking about it, saying how cool it was, and I decided to try it out. I was amazed how I was able to connect with people that were considered out of my reach before it.

What prompted you to find/create/use this resource? I was encouraged to try it out when I heard how some of my classmates were talking about it. They made it seem so much better than Facebook, mostly because the interactions between people and, let's say, celebrities felt more personal.

What did you learn from this resource? I have learned more about myself in a sense. I have branched out into new interests because of the retweet and recommended people tab mechanics that Twitter has built into the site.

How will you benefit from this resource in your future teaching? In my future teaching, I will make a teacher account for myself where my students can follow me and stay up to date with things like assignments and others. As an added bonus, they have a channel to my phone that is much more likely to get a response from than they would with an email.

Edmodo front page

6. Edmodo

Www.Edmodo.com was also a website that I did not hear about until this semester either! I think it is because I was not in classes that were strictly teaching, but now that I am in classes where teaching is the main focus, I will be introduced to more websites like these.




How did you find/create/use this resource? I found out about this website through the word-of-mouth from professors and classmates around me.

What prompted you to find/create/use this resource? I was encouraged by classmates and professors. Most of them said the same thing: That it made education easier. It had everything they needed in one space and more. While professors did not need to care about this specific part, but teachers for high school and below enjoyed the fact that parents could see what their child was doing in activities as well as seeing how their grades were doing.

What did you learn from this resource? I learned that there are a lot of perspectives from teachers all around, and that can only help trying to find an activity or idea that would fit your classroom the best.

How will you benefit from this resource in your future teaching? I will benefit from because everyone will be able to continue the lesson and/or keep learning beyond the classroom. The students will be able to go back to the lessons while the parents will be able to see what their child is doing as well as their grades. It makes it easier for them, and me, and cuts out of the middle man of an email, phone call, or physical meeting.

Second and Third PLN

Front Page of r/Teachers

3. Reddit - .com/r/Teachers

I use Reddit a lot, because it is a website that houses thousands of communities, each with their own and specific interest in mind. Some of the ones I am connected with are things like fashion, watches, and gaming. It wasn't until around this year that I decided to check out if there was a subreddit for teachers. There was!

How did you find/create/use this resource? I found this website on the mere curiosity of myself. It just happened that one time I was on Reddit and thought, "Huh, I wonder if there's subreddit for teachers?" Typed in www.reddit.com/r/Teachers and there it was. I use this resource by seeing what other teachers, from different parts of the United States, think about teaching. Although, it comes with its share of problems as well. One does not find a shortage of burnt-out teachers, or ones where they exaggerate their stories.

What prompted you to find/create/use this resource? Pure curiosity really. There's communities around subjects that are so specific, so I thought "Is there a subreddit for teaching? There has to be."
After realizing this could be a tool to stay in touch with some teachers, or get multiple perspectives on politics related to teaching, I decided to stick with it.

What did you learn from this resource? "It's okay to suck your first year. No one is expecting you to be perfect." Some may regard this as small, but having veteran teachers telling newbies that no one is expecting them to be perfect was a step in the right direction for me because I personally worry greatly about whether or not I will be serving my students well right from the get go.

How will you benefit from this resource in your future teaching? I believe I will benefit from this resource in the future in the way that I benefit from it now. I will be able to capture multiple perspectives on issues ranging from the politics of education, people's opinions of certain lessons plans, or even relate to the funny stories that everyone shares of their students.

Edutopia front page

4. Edutopia

Www.Edutopia.org is a website that I actually discovered during this semester. I never really heard of it until my INSTTECH 1020 class. After dabbling in some of its articles, I'm beating myself up over the fact that I didn't find it sooner!



How did you find/create/use this resource? Some of my professors advised us to try it out, because it was a wealth of knowledge that wasn't being utilized by as many as it should be.

What prompted you to find/create/use this resource? I started using the resource because it broadened my horizon on the topics and issues of the education field. Some of the topics that are being talked about within their articles are not usually found within a classroom curriculum.

What did you learn from this resource? I've realized, after using this website, that the education field is a lot more complex than people usually think. There are bad things, there are good things, and their great things, but after snooping around the site for around an hour or so, one can see that teaching is a lot more complex than just "standing at the front of a classroom and educating students."

How will you benefit from this resource in your future teaching? Like the teachers subreddit, it gives me a door to new perspectives and ideas that I have not thought about before. It also gives me insights on topics or events that I might have not even heard throughout my day-to-day life.

First two PLN

Crash Course: An educational YouTube channel

1. YouTube - Crash Course

Even though I have already showed that Youtube was apart of my PLN, I didn't specify what channels I watched. That was because I did not have a lot of channels that were more than entertainment. That was when I found Crash Course, an educational YouTube channel that educates its subscribers on a variety of subjects like politics, science, history, and many many others.

How did you find/create/use this resource? I just googled "Educational Youtube channels." I enjoy Crash Course the most because they do multiple subjects with the same veracity as some specialized channels.

What prompted you to find/create/use this resource? I was tired of finding channels that either specialized in one subject, or they were very casually in one subject.

What did you learn from this resource? I have learned that there is a lot more channels solely for educational use than I thought, especially when you see on the right side of the photo. It shows that they are a ton more channels than just them.

How will you benefit from this resource in your future teaching? I can benefit from these channels in the sense that I will be able to help other educators. Crash Course, and their subsidiary channels, have talked about topics within most subjects that are within high school curriculum. If I want to look for a video on a subject in my field, or another teacher needs help finding one, we could search on this channel.

Ted.com homepage

2. TED.com

Ted.com TED talks were always the thing that, personally, I thought professors/teachers used when they could not speak about a concept themselves. I felt it the same way I do when someone uses a long video within their presentations: It's just there to pad out time. After exploring the site a bit more, I have come to realize that I was very much wrong.
It is a place where people go to to talk about concepts that are much bigger, much broader, and something that cannot be explained by just one teacher.

How did you find/create/use this resource? I found this website from back when I was in highschool. Teachers were very enthusiastic about the website because it gave them a connection to the opinions of some of the leading minds in the world.

What prompted you to find/create/use this resource? What prompted me to actually look through it more was the use of it during multiple classes. This was not a website that was just for one subject, or just one concept. It was compiling a bunch of different subjects, from different sides of the spectrum, and I thought that it was amazing because think of how much work it takes to even build up a small conference in other places. This organization is serious about teaching concepts.

What did you learn from this resource? In regards to my field, English education, some of the videos have shown me that I have to be more critical about the education system, and that I need to look at it deeper than just its surface. Specifically Ken Robinson's "Do schools kill creativity?"

How will you benefit from this resource in your future teaching? I will benefit from this resource in my school years from now on because it is another voice, another perspective, from a highly accredited mind that will teach their ideas to my students. It is the answer to teacher's woes when they wished to hear insight from qualified minds, but they were always out of reach. Now they are not out of reach.

First part of my PLN

First Draft of My PLN Map

When I first started this PLN map, I thought that it looked alright as a first draft. Although, looking at it after some time has passed, and after being in the INSTTECH 1020 class for the semester, I have realized that this map can be specified much more than I originally made it.

Another point is that during this semester, I have started looking into other websites, both general and specific, that deal with education and the theories around the topic.

Along this journey, I realized that there are a lot of resources from different avenues for educators! Especially from ones that one wouldn't think about!

Chapter 1 of Dropped Drafts

Hello, I'm making this because my Ed. Tech professor has made me, but let's see where this takes us. Maybe I become a great blogger where I'm a stay at home mom with millions of followers. No one will knowing that I'm an aging man with a semi-useless degree.