Aaron T.

Cleveland
Candidate for Instructional Technology (MED)
PLN URL: http://www.pearltrees.com/a_t_cleveland
Tweets since start of course:

Reflection:
A personal learning network (PLN) allows for learning to continue outside of the
classroom by immersing oneself with a myriad of inputs via websites, newsfeeds, podcasts and
more to continue to develop knowledge. The PLN is derived from a significant amount of
research, curated by the user, to cater to personal interests as well as the interests of others. For
the purposes of developing a PLN, I chose Pearltreees.com because of its user reviews about the
ease of use as well as the ability to quickly develop different collections. Pearltrees.com allows
for me to quickly mark a page into a designated collection or place in a drop zone for later use.
The latter has been particularly helpful for when I come across a page that I think would be good
for my PLN, but may be better suited for a collection to be determined.
The identification of resources for the PLN is based off of self-directed learning goals
Ive made and the process outlined by author Beth Kantors in her piece, Curation Planning
Questions (Kantor 2015). The goals I have set thus far for my PLN are to be better informed
about local and state educational news and increase my understanding to educational technology
trends, specifically flipped classrooms. The criteria for choosing resources for my PLN are that
the resource serves to help inform me of learning goal and the resource will be continually
updated. With these goals and criteria outlined, the process of curating resources to fit my

learning needs must be sought through a process described by Bryan Alexander of seeking out
information, sensing (synthesizing), and sharing it (Alexander, 2103). Initially, I believe the
process will be mostly seeking, but as I develop my PLN I could foresee it serving as a
repository of information that could be used to share or help people in education that have
similar interests or needs. For example, one of the collections that Ive started is about the
incorporation of flipped classrooms. I am a strong advocate for flipped classrooms at my
workplace (Apalachee High School) and many of my colleagues have come to me about the
technique asking for information. Up until this point, unfortunately Ive had little to provide
other than personal experiences. Through the development of this PLN, not only have I found
information about the continuously updated experiences of others (through a blog and discussion
board), but also updated information about the pedagogy behind it. This will a valuable tool for
not only myself, but for the colleagues that ask me for help because I can share what I have with
them. A PLN could be helpful for multiple topics and I would explain to a colleague that similar
to my initial experiences with flipped classrooms, a PLN on other topics that our school has
seemingly constant interests in (such as formative assessment techniques, literacy, and
differentiation) could significantly help because as Ive learned with using Pearltrees.com, you
can easily share your collection with other people.
Thus far, one resource Ive already fallen in love with is Edutopia blogs about flipped
classrooms. One of the most difficult concepts that people in my workplace have had about
flipped classrooms is that they need to be good with video production. I found through the blogs
on the Edutopia website an article about being an architect of a flipped classroom. Ive learned
that there is a valuable set of steps that one should know before engaging in a flipped classroom
model. (http://www.edutopia.org/blog/now-hiring-flipped-learning-architects-joe-hirsch)

References:
1. Alexander, B. (2013). My daily info-wrangling routine. Retrieved 29 May 2015 from
http://bryanalexander.org/2013/12/26/my-daily-info-wrangling-routine/
2. Hirsch, J. (2014). Now Hiring: Flipped Learning Architects. Retrieved 29 May 2015 from
http://www.edutopia.org/blog/now-hiring-flipped-learning-architects-joe-hirsch
3. Kanter, B. (2015). Curation Planning Questions. Retrieved 29 May 2015 from
http://socialmediafoundations.wikispaces.com/Curation+Planning+Questions