This week I went totally out of my comfort zone and chose to create a Twitter account to begin building my Professional Learning Network (PLN). I started off with making an introduction tweet just so I could figure out how the program worked and I was shocked at the response I got! Verena liked and retweeted post, but I also got a couple of likes from educators in Alberta. This encouraged me to go check out their Twitter profiles and from there I found even more educators that I was inspired to follow. I will be the first to admit that I never thought I would enjoy using Twitter, and until this course I had always neglected to make an account just because I was a little nervous and unsure of the program’s offerings.

I am still working through all of Twitter’s features but I was able to spend time “lurking” through the #edci339 feed. I quickly realized that many of me peers made their accounts last week so it has been fun interacting with their ideas regarding building relationships in open learning spaces; I have been able to expand my learning even further by looking at the content my classmates are sharing.

Ultimately, I connected my experience creating my PLN to the course outcomes number 2 and number 6. Twitter is a great chance for me to interact with the current literature regarding open learning and I love that it is presented in unique ways such as infographics, videos or articles. Additionally, Twitter is providing me with practical experience using Twitter as both an educator and a student. I believe both of these learning outcomes are crucial as we learn about distributed and open learning because you cannot truly understand the topic if you do not immerse yourself in it!

I found this when I was reading through Shelley Moore’s posts and it made me smile…I hope it brightens up your day too 🙂