The whole Canadian community is benefiting from the discussions that have been initiated by our members. Here’s a sampling!

Trading Post

Alan Fletcher’s ‘Connecting Students’ discussion led to a new space called PLP Trading Post where teachers can share connections they’d like to make with other teachers about classroom or personal ventures – check it out!

Gathering and Validating

Tony Hardy initiated a discussion that concerns us all – ‘Gathering and Validating Information’. He suggests, “If not careful, won’t we possibly increase the opportunity for misconceptions based on poor information?”  This led to some great practical resources being shared about the Ontario Institute of Education’s Knowledge Building research and the Critical Thinking Consortium’s classroom activities on this topic. Brian Smith also speaks of discussing a hierarchy of trust with students to help them determine validity.

‘Inquiry Based Learning’ discussion

After Webinar #2, folks began sharing resources and thoughts about the importance of inquiry.  Alastair McGillivray said it well when he describes the opportunity to explore in PLP this way, “As system educators we’re often challenged to think critically and even creatively to solve problems but that challenge is directed by those around us who need to see results.  How often do we get this chance to identify a particular set of needs, devise a strategy for exploration, determine our own success criteria and complete all of this on our own time BEFORE moving to implementation.  Thanks PLP!!!”  Lucie deLeBruere brings in the work of John Seely Brown and Colin Jagoe notices that “once you start thinking about teaching in an inquiry fashion, it starts to infiltrate all aspects” of your teaching – a great thing!

Excitement building

Some members of our Pick One are just returning from two weeks of holidays and team spaces are starting to come alive with thoughts of the new year and of the upcoming webinar.   Many team leaders participated in a valuable webinar and shared some practical ideas in support of the whole community.

Celebrations and awards

• Chad Reay had a second baby boy, Oliver, in November
• Brenda Sherry and Peter Skillen were awarded the ISTE Making IT Happen award.

Communities are forming now

A Powerful Learning Practice Community is an ongoing, job-embedded professional development experience built around emerging, social Web technologies. Within these communities, participants are supported in an intensive community-building process online and in person by a passionate team of experienced experts and educators. Our professional development model encourages you to learn through immersion and then as a team develop an action plan for how you will scale what you are learning with others. Communities are forming now! Learn more and sign up for an info session.

Photo credit: Flickr

Curious about our Passion-Based Learning Community?

Our Year 2 experience focuses on project, problem, and passion-based learning. We teach you how to use inquiry-based learning through the lens of social technologies. You’ll have provocative conversations and explore collaborative solutions to assessment. We work on re-envisioning classrooms and curriculum through hands-on, online, student/teacher collaboration. These teams will develop a cross-curricular project aligned with state standards and embedded with 21st Century skills and literacies. We look closely at how to scale learning while involving students in the PLP process. See an example of how our students and teachers saved the world through their problem-based learning experience.

Learn more about Year 2 and save your spot for the Communities forming now!

Photo credit: Flickr

Deep breaths. Some questions. Uncertainty. More quiet. And then they jumped in.

In their new private team spaces in the PLP community hub, they chose team leaders. They introduced themselves and shared Twitter handles. They created team blogs on which they will transparently share their journey. Given a simple activity to get to know each other, to co create content together, each team approached it in a different way bringing their unique talents and gifts to the task. (The Diamonds of Inquiry task: Given a graphic, as a team select 9 words that best describe inquiry in the classroom.  Put the words on the image, prioritizing from most to least importance.) Two teams took this activity to an additional level as it became part of the foundation for their moving forward.

Each member of the Arts and Crafts team listed their choices in their private space on the PLP Community Hub; one their members manually prioritized their selections by number of times each word was mentioned. Another member used Picnik to add the words to the image. Subsequently in a webinar, Sister Geralyn, team leader, posted their completed image on the white board stimulating their first deep and meaningful conversation around their project.

The team with the Instructional or Discipline Focus began the task with a shared Google drawing created by one of its members. The image below illustrates their “diamond building” in progress.

In their team space days later, Sheamus Burns posted an idea:

“I thought we could rate the words we came up with on a scale of importance. Our project will have particular outcomes and the words we chose have to do with the nature of those outcomes. The words that we rank the highest can become categories in which we start determining what our intended outcomes for the project might be. I imagine we could have a set of shared intended outcomes and then our own personal intended outcomes.”

A link followed to a Google form he created to collect everyone’s input.

Undaunted by time zones and geographical distance, year 2 PLPeeps rise to the challenge. Their passions fuel their journey; the technology enables it; the collaboration exponentially enhances it. Their taking a simple activity and leveraging it as a foundation for their journey is telling. With their diverse talents and perspectives, they are on their way to extraordinary PBL units.

Stay tuned. They are just getting started! And I get to tag along, to marvel, to learn, to celebrate — what could be better?

You can vote here for any or all of the 18 categories until 11:59 p.m., U.S. Eastern time, Tuesday, December 13.

I’m particularly proud that our group blog Voices from the Learning Revolution, launched just nine months ago, made the shortlist for Best Group Blog. With curation and editorial support from PLP consultant John Norton, we’ve posted more than 100 essays and articles written by nearly two dozen public and independent school teachers, principals, instructional and tech coaches and central office administrators. As one nominator (Tempered Radical Bill Ferriter) put it:

I’m still in the classroom full-time, so I understand better than most the sacrifices that we make when we choose to teach.  I also understand just how risky it can be to make our practice transparent in such a public way by choosing to blog.

 

That’s why the Voices from the Learning Revolution blog — a PLP Network project — means so much to me.  It’s chock-a-block FULL of real-live classroom teachers writing with great detail about their instructional practices — and it changes what I do in my own classroom almost every time that I stop by.

You can learn more about our Learning Revolution project and see a complete list of current Voices writers here. After you check out the blog, I hope you’ll consider casting your vote in support of this amazing writing community!

More PLP friends on the Awards shortlist!

Other folks involved in our Powerful Learning Practice communities who are nominated for EduBlog Awards this year include:

Best Teacher Blog (vote here)

Ann Michaelsen, Teaching English with Web 2.0
Shelley Wright, Wright’s Room

Best Student Blog (vote here)

Sara (Ann Michaelsen’s student)

Best Librarian Blog (vote here)

Jenny Luca, Lucacept

Best Class Blog (vote here)

Kathy Cassidy, Mrs. Cassidy’s Grade 1 Classroom Blog

Best Administrator Blog (vote here)

Lyn Hilt, The Principal’s Posts

Best Individual Blog (vote here)

Will Richardson, Read. Write. Connect. Learn.

Best Individual Tweeter (vote here)

Alec Couros, @courosa
Dean Shareski, @shareski

Most Influential Blog Post (vote here)

Will Richardson, “My Teacher Is an App”

Lifetime Achievement (vote here)

Bud (the Teacher) Hunt
Will Richardson
Dean Shareski

If I somehow missed a PLP friend (there are literally hundreds of nominees across the categories), please add yourself (and a link) in the comments below.

And congratulations to everyone who does the hard work of sharing and staying connected. We don’t do it for awards, but they often help us find new audiences.

cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog

Before the main part of his presentation, Alan set up a few activities based on the Alternate Reality Game PLP had set up for the participants here - a story about the PLP penguin, Periwinkle who had somehow gotten himself tied up in a boxing match with a tough kangaroo named Joey.

Alan had our PLPeeps think about these characters do some creative activities to develop their personas.

He split the room in two, and had half the room work on the questions about Joey’s character and half do the same questions about Peri (created in open Google docs) — they took to it with plenty of  energy!

cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo shared by cogdogblog

Alan ultimately had to pull them out of the google docs while they were still writing and laughing. Then he asked for a volunteer to come up on stage and lead the choices of photo for a 5 card flickr story (he had gotten people to tag about 300 photos with the project tag plpconnectu). Lois was a great sport (see her story here) and then it was the group’s turn. Once again, they really ran with this activity.

Then he extended the story development process, and had the groups switch, the people who had worked on Joey’s character, now had to review the traits about Peri, and enter the responses to the Call to Adventure stage for Peri — and likewise, the other group do the same for Joey’s Call to Adventure. He then got two more volunteers to come up on stage and do a pechaflickr round of improv with those plpconnecu tagged photos.

The 50 Ways Tool Picker

He then unveiled his secret weapon – a tool that would help decide which Web 2.0 tool was best for the job. All they needed to do was click “pick” on the 50 Ways Tool Picker! Click below to check it out!

Our PLPeeps were truly on the edges of their seat and willing to jump in and play. A big thanks to everyone who participated and to Alan for an energetic and fun keynote!

Keep your eyes out for more posts soon all about the team projects, alternate reality game and the other adventures at our culminating activity!

Resources

See photos from the culminating activity on Flickr. All of the presentation slides and links are at http://50ways.wikispaces.com/plpconnectu. You can also listen to an Audio archive of his presentation.

Australia Community PLPeep Delia Jenkins

In the beginning.
A colleague and I arrived at the first F2F (face-to-face) day after a very early rise and 3.5 hour drive. I had been asked if I would like to go to the PLP professional development and was told it would be a great opportunity to further my IT skills. Always up for something new in IT, I thought it would be a worthwhile day. After the first 5 minutes of Sheryl’s introduction I was already worried that I was way out of my depth. It was clear that every one else in the room had far more knowledge and was more comfortable with their skills than I was. I listened intently and did my best to keep up with the Ning, wiki and tweeting. So much information in a short period of time and a 3.5 hour drive home to try and figure out what had just happened.

 

I am actually a bit of a perfectionist and never like to let something beat me. This isn’t always a good thing, and I have learnt to control these feelings on most occasions, but after the F2F day I felt I was honoured to have been given the chance to be a part of this and I was going to give it 100 percent. I made it a priority to follow all the instructions, post as often as I could and get involved in all the different activities that were going on.
When it came time to select a group, I immediately chose the Environment group as it was an area that I felt I had most knowledge in and one where I could incorporate the topic into the Yr 7 Science class I teach.
I was disappointed that the group was slow to fill and it looked like some that chose it did so as there was nothing else left. Little was I to know that this was to be a very strong group of special, dedicated teachers that all have similar passions and abilities.
Got to put your trust in the powers that be and accept that all things happen for a reason.

 

How did working together change you?
Being able to work as part of a team where we hadn’t met face-to-face was an interesting experience at first. Communicating initially via the Ning and getting to know a bit about each other was a good introduction and everyone began to find their feet. For me, having the courage to communicate via Elluminate and Skype, where we got to see and hear each other, was a little more daunting but very rewarding and I have built some great professional relationships through the project. Being prepared to have a go at new experiences is getting easier and easier and the more you do it the more benefits you reap.
We often ask that of a lot of our students and really don’t appreciate the challenges that it puts to them. Collaborating as we did and then using the same format in the PBL gave us a deeper appreciation of the challenges put to the students and also gave us the insight in how to best support them in their learning using these ‘new’ technologies.

 

How was it collaborating?
I think because our team got up and running so early and everyone was very keen and interested (how fortunate were we!), the collaborating happened easily. We all had lots of different experiences to bring to the table and were happy to share these freely. The sharing of professional knowledge and experiences and the support from each other was definitely a major plus for me. To actually be able to put into use – in a meaningful way – many Web2.0 tools that I had heard about and looked at before but never found an application for in the past was wonderful.
Barring the occasional technical difficulties and availabilities of all the team members, we did a pretty good job of collaborating. With the use of the Ning, Elluminate, Skype, texting, e-mailing, etc., we managed to keep the project running smoothly.

 

What are your thoughts now about PBL?
I had actually done a PBL with a teacher from another school 2 years ago. I already knew this teacher which made communicating easier and we used mainly Skype. The project was a very simple one and we had a lot of technical difficulties. We did struggle through it and felt we had put in a lot of work for a small return.
When we started this PBL I was worried about the amount of time it was going to consume and yes, it did feel like I had a whole other job on top of what I already had to do, but the difference this time was the huge amount of extra support and professional direction from people who clearly knew what they were doing (Thank you PLP ConnectU and especially our coach John P.).
My main issue with our PBL was wondering what if anything my students learnt about the environment. We were initially going to assess what they learnt about the environment and decided that was going to be a near impossible task and changed our assessment to reflect their learning about collaboration, team work and communicating globally using web2.0 tools. I think all our students did extremely well and the assessments indicate that from a collaborative point of view our PBL was a great success. I was still a little worried that I had spent an entire term of science classes on a project where they hadn’t actually learnt any science (how was I going to report on that?!!). Well, how wrong was I?
Four of my students were interviewed and filmed about our PBL, by the DEECD. They were asked specifically that question – What did you learn about the environment and how did you learnt it? I was looking the other way and sinking in my chair thinking they aren’t going to be able to answer that question. Wrong again. All four very eloquently went about telling the chap amazing things about how they had researched, asked opinions, edited video drafts, created songs, discovered new information and so on. I had no idea. I don’t recall actually seeing this learning happen. They had learnt a great deal about the environment, specific to the topic for their group and when we get time to have a look at each of the groups work I am sure they will also learn from the collaborative work that they have all done. I still don’t know how to assess it though. Does it need assessing?

My final thought about PBL is, that it’s like learning to ride a bike or learning any new skill. We ask our students every day to learn new things and challenge themselves. Some persevere and others don’t. The more you do something the easier it gets. Yes it is a lot of hard work and sometimes you will fall off the bike and want to give up, but if you stick to it, it will be worth it in the long run.

Thanks, Delia, for leading, learning and sharing as part of the PLP Australia community, and congratulations on your outstanding accomplishments!

Margo Edgar

As the Australian Community meets for their culminating session, community member Margo Edgar of Pascoe Vale Primary School shares with us her reflection on the PLP experience:

I can remember attending the first F2F (face-to-face) day and being somewhat daunted by the faces in the crowd. Educators I had admired from afar through my slowly developing Personal Learning Network (PLN). The fact that my reason for taking on the challenge of PLP was because I wanted to ‘go global’, only added to my fear. These were educators that had taken that step and seemed so comfortable online. I wanted to step over that edge and open up opportunities for online learning for myself and my students.

PLPConnectU was the catalyst that gave me the opportunity to clarify thoughts around teaching and learning and bring together concepts I had been struggling to make sense of over recent years. I have been teaching for a very long time but the last few years have seen the greatest changes for me as an educator.

These are my musings as I try to make sense of the powerful learning that took place for me as part of this experience.

Sometimes my first choice is not necessarily the best
In the beginning, I remember contributing many ideas for PLP projects, had a few possible directions in my head, and then …..
I was away with no Internet contact the week the project ideas hit the wiki. This meant none of my first choices were still available. I have to admit I was bothered by this.

But everything happens for a reason. And the group I joined, the environment team ended up being pretty close to perfect. Perfect for me, because it was exactly what I needed. Teachers who also wanted the challenge of collaborating on line, teachers who wanted to get things happening, teachers who challenged thinking, who were good at articulating ideas and a coach who just seemed to provide exactly what we needed.
Remember to look upon every challenge as an opportunity to grow and learn.

I can give up total control
I am a control freak, I used to spend hours planning lessons that ‘hit the mark’, achieved my purpose, delivered content in exciting, interesting ways, that engaged my students. Now I spend hours learning, exploring and working out how to give that control back to the students and still know where they are at with their learning, where they need to go next and what I can provide to support them.
This PLP journey has been the impetus to bring together many ideas that have been bubbling around in my head for a while. The elluminate sessions, the ning, the challenges to my thinking, the opportunity to question what I do all contributed to clarifying and changing my thinking around a number of education issues. Mainly that I should not, will not and do not control other people’s learning. However I can provide support, challenges, ideas, tools, knowledge, information, guidance and direction when needed and when asked.
We should each OWN our own learning and be responsible for the direction we take.

Learning is messy, challenging, uncomfortable and glorious
The uncertainty for me of no clear plans, structures or directions when we started PLP created very uncomfortable feelings. How would we know if we were getting it right? Who would decide what was going to happen? How would we know what to do? Being asked to work with a group of people I didn’t know or wouldn’t necessarily choose to work with was challenging. Yet I often ask this of my students.
It was messy, but as our team navigated our way through the mess, started to know each other, shared our goals and our skills, discussed, negotiated and challenged we could see the value of the process for us as learners. So much so we used the same process for our students. They too experienced much from that messy, uncomfortable not knowing what to do feeling and also got to know each other, shared goals and skills, discussed, negotiated and challenged each other, learnt the importance of clear and precise communication, found out you can never assume and walked away at the end with varying degrees of success.

How glorious to stand at Federation Square on Thursday as we prepared for our Flashmob and watch our student’s work on the big screen, the faces of our students as they saw themselves, each other and our schools up there for all the world to see. How glorious to listen to the buzz, hear the anticipation and feel the excitement as they waited for the signal that it was their time to shine. And then to reflect on the speed with which it was all over and the memories that would last for much longer.
For real learning to happen it has to be messy, challenging, uncomfortable and glorious.

Failure is an option
I want to shout this from the rooftops and write it in large, bold, capital letters. This has been my biggest shift and my greatest challenge. For students, teachers, anyone to learn we have to be allowed to fail, to make mistakes, to not get things right, to not get things done, to do nothing, to change our mind, to change our goal and to get it wrong. If we don’t fail, we don’t learn to problem solve, to ask why, fight to succeed and to value success.
Learning is the trips, stumbles and falls on the journey not the arrival at the destination.

Student voice is powerful
Another big mind shift has been opening up our planning to student voice. I realised if I was serious about students taking ownership of their learning, they had to have opportunities to be involved in planning for their learning.

I have had to do some deep thinking about what does it mean to plan with the ‘end in mind’. The end for me had usually been some predetermined task and/or creation that every student worked towards achieving. I hope for my future student’s sake I never fall in to that trap again. The end has become … what we (students and teachers) want to know and do and we should decide together how to get there.

We still haven’t got it right all the time but involving the students in term planning is a start. Working together to explore VELS, working out what that means, asking students how they want to learn, expecting them to be responsible for that, setting goals and success criteria together has led to many successes and some failures.

Our most powerful learning is coming from the failures and the endless questions we are asking ourselves. How do we support all students to be independent in their learning? Does it take longer for some students to take on responsibility for their learning, their failures and successes? Do we allow students enough time to succeed before we step in? How do we measure success? How do we maintain accountability? How do we cover the curriculum? What is essential learning?
We are educating for an uncertain future – but what is certain – is it is not the past.

So to the environment team, I thank you for being an inspired group of hard working, passionate educators. We did good!

Meet Susan Lucille Davis, Community Leader for Powerful Learning Practice

Tell us a little bit about yourself – who are you, where are you from, what are your passions?

I am a “military brat,” which means that I moved around quite a bit when I was growing up.  I ended up in South Carolina and gradually moved north until I settled in the Washington, DC/Baltimore area for almost two decades.  Now I live in Houston, Texas, which is a richly diverse community — and the people here are more self-deprecatingly humorous than you might expect. I am passionate about beautifully crafted things: writing, art, music, ideas.

What do you do here at Powerful Learning Practice?

I am in my first year as a Community Leader, working with the ADVIS/AIMS cohort.  I am also working on some blog posts for Voices from the Learning Revolution.

What else are you up to professionally?

As Academic Dean at Chinquapin Preparatory School, I love working with excited, young teachers to expand their perceptions of what teaching can be.  I also teach 8th-grade English and AP English to juniors and seniors.

Desert island situation – you get to take five books. What are they?

Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
The Complete Works of William Shakespeare
Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
The Girl Scout Handbook

What’s your favorite example of how online communities are powerful and transformative?

I love how Personal Learning Networks can help us feel less isolated from others in our profession, in our schools.  I find like-minded colleagues who support me and who challenge my ideas and help me grow.  The Community Hub of PLP is exactly the kind of “faculty room” I would create if I could magically make one from scratch: It is made up of teachers who want to learn and share coming together to do just that.

Where can people find you online?

@suludavis on Twitter
The Flying Trapeze, with my long-time friend and co-blogger, Renee Hawkins

Any final words?

I am struck by the irony that many educators worry endlessly about the time that online sharing can take away from their “real work” when they could be re-energized by the those very activities.  Maybe we need to get past the faulty notion that our collaborations with other teachers will take up too much of our professional time. This is the work we need to be doing in order to do our “real work” better. I wonder if we think we’re not supposed to be having this much fun?

ADVIS/AIMS Community

Team members collaborate at the AIMS Face-to-Face Kickoff Event.

The ADVIS PLP Kickoff event took place September 20 at The Lawrenceville School in Lawrenceville, N.J., and The AIMS PLP Kickoff event took place September 26 at Garrison Forest School in Owings Mills, Md.

Robin Ellis, Community Leader, was very excited to attend both of these kickoffs as well as IU 13 in Lancaster, Pa:

Each of the groups had a great day, with lots of wonderful conversations and sharing of ideas among the schools around thought-provoking keynotes provided by Sheryl and Will. Some of the teams participating have had previous groups from their schools or districts go through PLP, so there are many groups who have support on site from our PLPeep alums! The individual kick offs left those in attendance feeling excited about the year ahead and what this new learning journey will hold.

Canada & New England Community

Team members at the Canada PLP Kickoff can't stop talking about the learning journey ahead.

The Canada PLP Kickoff event took place September 30 at Upper Grand District School Board in Guelph, Ontario, and the New England PLP Kickoff event took place October 4 at Champlain Valley Educator Development Center in Colchester, Vt.

PLP Community Leaders Brenda Sherry and Peter Skillen organized the get-togethers in Canada, while Tony Baldasaro provided PLP leadership in New England. According to Brenda:

Peter, Tony and Brenda are very excited because we actually had three separate kickoffs that will be joining into one exciting and diverse community!

 

We started with our Ontario folks who are serious about learning, but serious about having fun along the way too! Will kicked off the day virtually and the room was charged with sharing, ideas, and laughter as well as some serious plans and hopes for a great year. Sheryl kept us going with just the right amount of ‘whelm’ and we all left with a feeling of connection and excitement about our year. We’re not sure where the group will take us, but we know that we will be soaring!

And Tony reported from Vermont:

I was able to attend the kickoff event in Burlington. Despite some local connectivity issues, we were able to have a fabulous launch. The attendees were enthusiastic about joining our “Community Hub” Ning, sharing a bit about themselves in the getting to know you forum and asking a ton of good questions. One of the great things about this group was that we had several experienced Tweeters to start conversing with, @vtdeacon and @techsavvygirl to name just two.

Virtual Academy 

Our new Virtual Academy concept offers PD-on-demand to participants. Our cyberspace Kickoff, led by Will Richardson, was a chance to meet our very first VA teams, from the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. It’s been wonderful to start building relationships with these new folks and to begin finding our way around the community and into some really engaging discussions.

Here’s a recap from Community Leader Lani Ritter Hall:

 ”Welcome to the room. Would you like to give us a shout out to check your mic?” to which many replied: “This is ____, can you hear me?” So began the cyberspace kickoff and celebration by the Archdiocese of Philadelphia Virtual Academy community.

 

More than 100 educators from across the Archdiocese gathered in 2 webinar sessions and greeted each other in chat and by mic. For many, it was a first experience using Blackboard Collaborate, and so together under Sheryl’s facilitation we practiced raising hands, smiling, being away, whispering and using the text chat window, and controlling the microphone. Important skills, as all the Virtual Academy sessions are very interactive!

 

Sheryl led the group in a discussion of feelings around Common Core Standards, newly adopted by the Archdiocese; and everyone had an opportunity to share questions they had around teaching and learning with the new standards — questions they are now discussing within the Virtual Academy’s private space inside the larger PLP Community HUB.

 

For much of the kick off, we spent time making sure everyone joined the HUB (it’s a Ning environment) and felt comfortable in the Virtual Academy digs there. Sheryl modeled registering, joining the community, and creating a response to the “let’s get acquainted” discussion thread (far easier for a face-to-face group to accomplish together). Our Archdiocesan educators persisted, helped others who got “lost,” and are now veteran users, deep into discussions around learning about each other and teaching with Common Core Standards.

 

The next webinar session follows quickly, just one week after the kick off.  Virtual Academy members are challenged with new expectations, and excited at the possibilities that lay before them. We are on the first trek of what I sincerely believe will be an incredible journey into learning together.

If you’ve read this far, enjoy a free Web 2.0 Tools e-course!

As part of our gearing-up experience for 2011-12, PLP community members were asked to participate in a pre-game activity, a self-paced Web 2.0 primer. The response was so positive that Powerful Learning Practice has decided to open the experience to the public as well. If you are new to Web 2.0 and would like to participate in an easy, step by step introduction to web-based learning tools and concepts, you can register for the free eCourse here.

Our kickoffs also incorporated Cross Team Building, which enabled teams at different physical locations to get acquainted and begin to collaborate as a bonded community. We’ll all be connecting and learning within the PLP Community Hub, a Ning space where all the communities can share together and collaborate with Sheryl, Will and PLP’s community leaders and coaches. Instead of having individual Nings and wikis for each community as we’ve done in the past, the new PLP Hub brings everyone from around the world together to supercharge the synergy. Of course, each of the communities has its own private space inside the Hub to pursue their own special projects and local goals.

We’ve posted some photos from each of these kickoff events on our Facebook page. If you attended one of these events, be sure to look at the photos, tag yourself, and share them out on your profile.

Here’s to an exciting year ahead of connecting, collaborating and learning together!