Social Networking,
via the Twitter medium, offers an option for professional development which
supports the flipped classroom approach, in that online collegial discussions,
research, surveys, and an enriched professional learning approach can be done
outside of the traditional faculty meeting time and then the learning that
takes place through Twitter can be implemented during the “faculty meeting
time.” While some faculties of educators in many schools today operate in the
old way of scheduling after-school meetings and gatherings in the library to
comply with mandated professional development, other schools and teachers are
incorporating the flipped approach by maximizing the capabilities of Twitter
and allowing teachers to be entrusted as true professionals to conduct their
learning outside of the traditional faculty meeting time and to replace that
time with the implementation of the learning.
Professional
development via twitter and Professional Learning Networks (PLN’s), unlike traditional
forms of faculty meeting based or site-based professional development, have
resources growing at exponential rates that are available to Twitter users which
allows the user to be independent and in control of his or her own professional
learning outside of mandatory times and places in which many teachers are used
to spending their “professional development”.
For example, with Twitter, one has the ability to follow authors,
mentors, researchers, educators, colleagues, etc. based on their own desires,
interests, and musings and then be able to grow at their own rates rather than
at a set time and place with the “whole faculty.” Other options for faculties
using twitter include online discussions using hashtags, such as #edtech,
#formativeassessment, #socialstudies, #edudream, #edchat, #satchat and many more, where teachers simply post
their own thoughts, questions, and/or links that relate to the topic in the
hashtag. Twitter, like online textbooks, allows teachers to investigate
relevant and current topics in order to expand their learning in a subject,
similar to the way students use their online textbook features.
In
lieu of spending hours on end searching for topics, learning opportunities, and
relevant educational trends, Twitter allows users to follow other Twitter users
in order to have desired information to be tweeted straight to the follower
which saves time and energy.
Peter Dewitt, praises
professional development through Twitter by opining:
“Conversations with peers, whether they are in our building
standing next to us, or a password away on the social network, help us make
sure we are on the right track. By going to a social network like Twitter we
are surrounded by people who are experts in the area of (our interests) and
they are a helpful resource as we negotiate our way through this process.”
In addition, college professor, Steve
Wheeler, details the importance of
creating a professional learning network through the use of a metaphorical
graph below. You will see Twitter is in the first quadrant:
“It is worth noting that only the first quadrant of this PLN
model is actually performed synchronously, that is, in real time. That may give
some a clue as to the latent potential of tools such as Twitter to connect
people powerfully and instantly across the globe and to give all of us access
to a worldwide network of experts and enthusiasts in any subject for which we
have an interest. Everyone should have a PLN, because in today's connected
world, without it you are not fully equipped as a professional.
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