Building a Learning Community Through Connectedness |
"Educators become connected educators by first becoming connected and constant learners , ones who reach out to learn, share, collaborate with a network of fellow learners interested in education." ( p xxii)
What Connected Educators Do Differently provides a seven step approach to becoming a connected leader through the development of a professional learning network. Each of the seven chapters in the book takes an in depth look at a 'key connector' . According to the authors, the most important connector is the establishment of a professional learning network. Each chapter ends with a Follow 5 , Find 5 and Take 5 . The authors provide a list of five educators that one should follow on Twitter. These leaders/learners triumph the topic of that particular chapter . Then in Find 5 , they provide five online resources that support the message of the chapter and finally Take 5 suggests five action steps that if taken will further your advancement down the connectedness path. Like Sheninger's text, What Connected Educators Do Differently, emphasizes the need to build and nurture relationships. It is the community of learners that will support educational change through the forging of professional relationships that reach beyond individual districts. The power of this is to realize that real change comes from learning together. So far this is the only text that I have encountered to devote an entire chapter on recognizing the need to balance your technology and non-tech based priorities. The chapter entitled Know When to Unplug provides strategies to ensure that educators do not rely on connectivity as a way of life. Whitaker, T., Zoul, J., & Casas, J. (2015). What Connected Educators Do Differently. Routledge. |