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I did some work recently for the EUN where we looked at the role of Social
Media in Learning and Education (SMILE). One of the outputs of my
contribution to the project was a professional development eLearning course for
European Teachers and Head Teachers on the use of Social Media in Schools.
As this part of the
course has now finished (and we have gone into the community development phase)
I am re-posting a version of the materials here so others can benefit from
them.
This is part 4 of 6 - Using social media for professional development
(CPD)
Using social media for professional development (CPD):
The Video
Social Media in Learning and Education (SMILE) - Video 4 of 6: Using social media for professional development from Ollie Bray on Vimeo.
Using social media for professional development (CPD):
The Course Notes and Links
1. Personal Learning Networks
Much like the
term ‘Social Media’ there has been a lot written about the definition of
‘Personal Learning Networks’ over the years. Some of the pioneering research in
this field has been completed by Dr Alec Couros, University of Regina, Canada.
Dr Couros argues
that most typical teacher networks are one way and that teachers are delivered information on professional
development and professional learning. He also talks about the rise of the ‘networked teacher’ where due to the
increase in social media tools available for teachers professional learning and
professional learning becomes two-way, driven by dialogue and as a result more open
and reflective.
The key thing to
remember about any Personal Learning Network is that they are, by definition,
personal and depend on the interests and willingness of the individual to
engage. When considering the use of social media to develop Personal Learning
networks it may be useful to break them down into three component parts.
The first of
these is face-to-face, even in the Internet age and with the rise of social
media you can’t actually beat sitting down and talking to someone. Trusted
professional feedback is also often born as a result of trusted relationships
between colleagues.
The second
component is one of closed digital communities. These are digital closed
communities of practice where people may not know each other but they are
connected through interest (examples might include TES Forums,
Microsoft Partners in Learning Network and the discussion forums for the SMILE
eLearning Lab).
The last
components are digital open communities that are often un-moderated and are
built around tools that have not been designed for education but have been
adopted by educators. Examples of these tools include Blogs, Social Bookmarking
and Open Content Repositories.

Some of these
tools are services will now be discussed and exemplified below.
2. On-line Communities
On-line
communities normally require registration and have been designed for a specific
purpose to link people together via interest or for a specific project. The
best on-line communities are ones that are allowed to grow organically over
time because the users suggest new ideas or topics of discussion to keep the
community vibrant and up-to-date.
Examples of on-line communities include:
- EUN Community - a hub for European Union led projects as well as providing a facility
for users to create their own communities of practice.

3. Using RSS
Reading about other peoples work and their reflections on
classroom practice can be hugely valuable to your own professional development.
Globally thousands of people are blogging about what is going on in their classrooms
every day. The trick is trying to keep track of the blogs that interest you and
to be automatically up-dated if someone posts something new or interesting.
Blogs produce an RSS feed (to find out what this is watch
this CommonCraft
video) but all you really need to know if that this means you can
aggregate content from a variety of blogs into one place using an RSS Reader,
such as Google Reader.
You will need a Google Account (which is free) to start
using Google Reader. This CommonCraft
video on
Google Reader will tell you everything that you
need to know about using this service. By using an RSS reader you can easily
follow hundreds of blogs from educators around the world but only have to visit
one website (your personal Google Reader page) to check for up-dates.
4. Social Bookmarking
Social Bookmarking is when you save the URL of a website
that you like to another website rather than to your favourites on your web
browser. One advantage is that you can
see if anyone else who is using the service has also save the website that you
have just saved. This is useful because users who have saved the same website
as you will have often also save other websites that you will be interested in.
This makes Social Bookmarking another great way to
collaborate with people globally, to swap ideas and useful websites that you
have found to help aid school improvement.
This CommonCraft
video will tell you everything that you need to know about Social
Bookmarking using a service called Delicious (although it is worth noting that Delicious has changed since this video was made).
5. Searching the Future Web
Google
Alerts are
a way of telling Google a key word of phrase and then if that word of phrase is
published on the Internet and is picked up by the GoogleBot you
are sent an email link to where the article has been published. You can also
create an RSS feed for alert terms (see
RSS above). The use of Alerts is an important 3rd
Millennium research skill and are already used widely in higher education.
As well as setting up alerts for professional interests eg: “formative
assessment,” “outdoor learning,” and “international school links”. It is also
useful for schools to have a Google Alert set up around their own school name.
Used in this way Alerts can be used as an early
warning system if someone writes about or mentions your school online.
Importantly, it’s also a really good way to track wider student achievements. For example, many
children take part in activities outside of the school and some of these
activities are really impressive. These achievements are often written about in
the local media and normally the child’s school is mentioned. As most papers
are digitized, Google Alerts gives you an opportunity to receive this
information as it is published. This is often before you have a chance to read a
paper copy of the local news.
6. Micro Networks
Micro networks
such as Twitter are a great way to receive short and concise advice,
recommendations and resources from educators around the world. This article from Tony Parkin provides a good
oversight of how you can find educators to follow on Twitter.
Hash (#) tags are
also used within the Twitter community to bind conversation together. Most
conferences now have a Twitter Tag and you can you services like Twazzup.com to search for a #tag and then aggregate
all of the tweets and images shared on Twitter from the event.
Other micro
networks that are worth exploring for professional development purposes include
Slideshare and SlideBoom. These are on-line communities where
people share presentation slides and they are very popular with educators.
7. The Importance of Recommendation
As the above
notes demonstrate there are an awful lot of professional development
opportunities that are available on the web and many of these are linked to
social media services.
However, just
like any social service recommendations about a product are important. This is
similar to recommending a product or a seller after you have bought somthing on
Amazon - but within this context we are recommending professional development
opportunities to others.
CPD Scotland is
National Resource that has been developed by Education Scotland. One of its
services is CPD Find,
this is a national directory of paid for and free CPD opportunities. What is
interesting about it is that it is not just a catalogue of courses because some
of the courses have been endorsed by peers and you can see what other people
think of the course content, delivery and value for money.
Including a
system for open peer feedback and recommendations should be an important
consideration for anyone who is interested in developing their own CPD portal. It
also encourages teacher who attend the courses to become more reflective.
8. Research
Research into the
use of social media for CPD is limited because the tools and service evolve so
quickly. However, this report produced by The Pearson
Centre for Policy and Learning and NoTosh Ltd in 2011 titled ‘Tweeting
for Teachers,’
provides a number of useful case study examples of how social media can support
teacher professional development.
Links for you to explore and
reflect on:
On-line Communities:
Social Media Tools and
Services:
- RSS -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS
Research and Articles:
- Tweeting for Teachers: how can social media support teacher
professional development - http://goo.gl/Dxeis
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