The Educator's PLN

The Educator's PLN (or personal learning network) is a great resource to help educators connect on the web. In order to join this site, you must first sign up and then be approved by the administrators. When creating your account, you can also link other accounts into the network, such as your twitter, diigo, and linkedin profiles.

There are a lot of helpful resources on The Educator's PLN, including a chat forum for teachers to discuss their struggles and successes in the classroom, links to teacher podcasts and education blogs, and various advice articles related to teaching.

As someone who is new to twitter, I found one particular resource useful. Under the Resources tab, there is a list of twitter hashtags related to education!  I am sure that I will make use of this list to help me get the most out of twitter in my professional future.  There are also plenty of articles being shared by teachers in this network every day, which means that I can go to this site whenever a question arises in my classroom--since someone else is bound to have experienced the same problem!
While I haven't exhausted the possibilities that The Educators PLN has to offer to teachers as of yet, as I haven't been fully approved by the admins, I can already see how helpful this site will be--not only for connecting specifically on this website but also for intertwining the networks of all the accounts I have set up for this class so far.

Teaching in "The Present Future"

My boyfriend and I are two very different people. I am content to relish in what is and what has been, with only mild excitement about what is to come (where society and technology are concerned.) He, on the other hand, has frequent episodes of extreme excitement and anticipation about what he calls, "The Present Future," meaning things happening now that will directly affect the trajectory of our future world/society.

Today, I watched video called Shift Happens. I found it hard to watch actually: a slightly-too-fast-paced slide slow of "Did You Know?" facts about how the world is not the same as it was a few years ago, set to very distracting music. The video focused on the population changes and technological changes that have happened recently--just the sort of things that would spark my boyfriend's interest.

For me though, the most interesting fact presented by the video was this: "There are over 12 billion Google searches performed each month." The video then followed up this fact with a question that really struck me:

"To whom were these questions addressed before Google???" 

As an aspiring educator, I can't help but think that many of these questions were previously asked of teachers before the internet age! This idea made me feel sad and at a loss for how I can impact students in a relevant way when Google seems to have a corner on my job.

But then I watched another video, this one called A Vision of 21st Century Teachers. This is a very encouraging video for any teacher who is feeling dwarfed by technology. The simple video style and friendly faces calmed me down at once, reminding me that yes, technology has a huge impact on us all nowadays, but teachers still have a big role to play!

Teachers can use tech in the classroom in so many different ways--which means that no creativity is lost on our part! It's up to us to not only utilize technology as a learning tool to teach other materials, but in doing so we may also shape how students view and use technology throughout the rest of their lives.

So whether you're the type of person who relishes at the thought of change or someone who is a little less ready to jump into a new world, rest assured that as a teacher you will always have a massively important job to do.