Tweets went flying and while this list isn’t comprehensive, we’re sharing some of the links that flashed across Tweetdeck, Hootsuite, and Twitterfall as we monitored the #plpnetwork chat! Here are some of your favorite resources, a list created by the participation and collaboration of the PLP community.

1. Buffy Hamilton – The Unquiet Librarian
2. Joyce Valenza – NeverEndingSearch
3. Voices from the Learning Revolution
4. Howard Rheingold – Net Smart
5. Wesley Fryer – Moving at the Speed of Creativity
6. Lucy Gray – Lucy Gray Consulting
7. Chris Lehmann – Practical Theory
8. Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach – 21st Century Collaborative
9. George Couros – The Principal of Change
10. Ryan Bretag – Metanoia: Shifting Thoughts on Leading, Learning, and Teaching
11. Lyn Hilt – The Principal’s Posts
12. Edna Sackson – What Ed Said
13. Terie Engelbrecht – Crazy Teaching
14. Nicholas Provenzano – The Nerdy Teacher
15. Franke James – My Green Conscience
16. Eric Sheninger
17. Kathy Cassidy – Blogmeister
18. Lisa Nielsen – The Innovative Educator
19. Teach Paperless
20. Will Richardson
21. Claudia L’Amoreaux
22. Jackie Gernstein - User Generated Education
23. Marsha Ratzelster – Reflections of a Techie
24. Kathy Schrock
25.  Getting Smart

Is this what your top educational thought leaders list would look like?

We also gave out some prizes! Congratulations to our winners: @JudyArzt, @kitchenerd, @vttechteacher, @kjarrett and @Nh1st0ryLIB!

Still not sure what all this Twitter chatting is about? Check out our blog post on How to Get the Most Out of Participating in a Twitter Chat.  Then you’ll be all prepared for next time! We’ll set up more chats in the future, and you’ll be first to hear about it if you sign up for PLP e-mails!

In planning courses we continue to find that many of the resources we turn to for guidance are often traditional, text-based models of learning, especially in higher education. This doesn’t often sit right with me. My goal is to help teachers imagine new possibilities in their own classrooms as they begin to shift their practice.

In setting out to model some more innovative practices, I hope that by seeing a variety of options as learners first, teachers will understand the power of these new approaches and feel free to play with some of these new tools and then reflect on them with a critical eye. Most of the teachers who will join me in these courses are newly connected to social networks, and therefore my aim is to plan a meaningful experience that is not too overwhelming.

These newly connected educators often look for some advice about where to jump in: Twitter? Blogs? Facebook? Social networks for teachers? There are so many choices! As a result, I’ve surfaced some thoughts about the difference between the work I do with networks and communities and how I might advise teachers who are newly connected.

Virtual colleagues? Business as usual

In an earlier blog post I was asking this question:

“I’m gravitating towards more collaborative work that involves a different kind of connection than something like twitter — what should I be recommending to others just starting down this path?”

I’ve been thinking about where I’m finding my best support for my own learning these days. While I’ve been going to my twitter network and saving links, resources, and graphics to help me plan this course, I’ve found that it’s actually my community of inquiry within Powerful Learning Practice that has lead me to the deepest learning along this new journey. Only a handful of these people are actually in the realm of my f2f connections and none of them are people I see day-to-day. Working virtually with people from my online community is just becoming business as usual!

As I begin teaching this course, I think I owe it to my learners to help them understand that while twitter networks might lead them to incredible contacts and resources, our classroom community will be where they can get down and dirty with some really messy learning.

Let me share a recent example. I was extremely lucky to be taking Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach’s PLP e-course Teaching Online: Becoming a Connected Educator back while I was building the first rendition of my own course curriculum. It gave me a source of feedback and critical friends when I was first drafting, asking questions, and pondering my next moves. Even now, 6 months after the PLP e-course, I am still in contact with several of those folks who I know would help me with revisions. This potential for an extended conversation about my work would not often happen on twitter, and actually I don’t know that it’s ever happened to me in a f2f context, either!

A great discovery

Next, something Sheryl recently posted in the PLP Community Hub caught my eye. It was a document that Howard Rheingold had shared, inviting folks to work on collaboratively transforming a course about social media for high school students. I had been cocooning a bit, thinking through my plans, and while following some of Howard’s links I discovered — a visual syllabus!

This was great. I already had the very (19th century) text-based one I’d created from the traditional University model I had been given as an exemplar. And I had the video version that I had made for my students as a course introduction for the first week. However, the ‘good’ thing about video is also the ‘bad’ thing about video…you have to watch it! You can’t scan it well. So a graphic organizer was just the thing I needed to turn the syllabus into more of an infographic. I got busy creating and came up with a first draft:

I posted this to my community inside the PLP Ning space, where Howard’s course outline is also posted, knowing that I would likely get some feedback, suggestions, and perhaps even a discussion wherein more folks share what they are doing in this area – and then BINGO – we’d be building collective knowledge.

Sure enough, the sharing began to happen almost immediately. Suzie Nestico posted a reply that caused me to think more deeply about some of the requirements that will need to be in place before my students will be able to understand the difference between “knowledge sharing” and “knowledge building.” This will help direct some of my next steps in planning.

While I learn lots and connect well with Twitter and my other networks, it’s my community of inquiry (both f2f and online) that helps me to dive deeper, which is where I like to be!

Powerful Learning Practice (PLP) embraces change.  We are educators, life long learners and advocates for change.  We enjoy connecting, collaborating and co-constructing with educators and administrators from across the globe.  We don’t believe in just ‘talking the talk’  but rather walking with you side by side.  As you search for new knowledge and strategies, we want to support and challenge your thinking.  You do not see this more clearly than in our e-learning community. Instead of learning in a traditional online format in our e-courses, PLP uses an inquiry based, flipped classroom approach.  Since we believe in this approach being implemented across all grade levels and subject areas,  it’s only natural that we’d practice what we preach!

Contact Christen for more details

What is the Flipped Classroom Approach?

With the increase in student’s access to technology and teachers’ desires to prepare students for success in a global economy, the flipped classroom is gaining significant momentum.  If you’re not familiar with the flipped classroom, Knewton and Column Five Media created a nice diagram to explain this approach:

Created by Knewton and Column Five Media

What can I expect?

We embrace transformation and are not a “one size fits all company”.  We want you to discover the right path and approach for your students.  Therefore in your quest to transform and enhance your 21st century classroom, your eCourse will model the flipped methodology. Each course will include readings, videos and discussions.  Through asynchronous and  synchronous discussions you will challenge your thoughts and the ideas of your classmates and  instructors.  By the end of each eCourse you will be ready to transform (or enhance) your 21st century classroom and want to share your knowledge with others!

A Community Approach

Furthermore, as a community of learners, we don’t believe that learning should stop at the end of each eCourse.  Instead, PLP has a common community space for all eCourse participants to dialogue, collaborate and connect prior, during and long after each eCourse has ended.  You connect with others from around the world who just like you are learning online. The e-Course community space provides the perfect format for sharing knowledge, celebrating  success, learning from each other’s mistakes and collaboratively brainstorming future endeavors and connections between classrooms.

Don’t Take Our Word for It

Good news travels fast. People who take our e-Courses like to share their stories. Here are a few to check out.

• Nishant Mehta- Leading Edge Boot Camp (Will and Sheryl Talk too)
• Patricia O’Donnell- Transformation, One Lesson at a Time
• Nancy Caramanico- School Communications ToolKit
• Kevin Jarrett- Web 2.0 21st Centuryizing your Curriculum (Look at the comments!)

Join Us

So how will you lead your students into the next century?  Wouldn’t it be nice to learn in a collaborative professional learning community with others who are making a difference? Come trailblazing with PLP!   After all, Dr. Seuss said it best: “If you never did you should. These things are fun and fun is good.”

Ready to start your journey?  Click here.

Thanks to all who joined us for the first #PLPnetwork Twitter chat!

The first-ever #PLPnetwork was an incredible success, bringing together 162 PLPeeps to engage and discuss The Benefits of Engaging in Online Communities. Over 1,400 #plpnetwork tweets went out during the hour-long chat– that’s over 23 tweets per minute!

With so many tweets flying, it’s likely you missed something! A transcription of Sunday’s chat is now available in Google Docs. Also, Annette Thompson (@teacherannette) posted a list of all of the participants, if you want to be sure and follow everyone who participated.

So what did PLPeeps walk away with after the chat? Here are just a few responses we got:

Special thanks to everyone who participated and to Becky Bair (@Becky7274), who led the busy discussion like a pro. Several peeps walked away with fantastic prizes! Beth Reukberg and Meagan Stephens won History Channel DVDs, Beth Ellen won a copy of The Connected Educator by Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach and Lani Ritter Hall and Ms. Solomon won a free PLP eCourse!

We’ll plan another chat soon and look forward to even more participation!

Discussion is lively in our PLP Network Community Hub, where PLPeeps from across all of our communities can collaborate and join discussions. Joseph Terch IV, posted an interesting question to peeps: What gets you excited about education? Joseph suggested the answer could be something that was tried in the classroom, something students asked or something read or heard about. Our peeps had a lot to say! Check out highlights from their discussion.

Sister Geralyn Schmidt commented:

What excites me about education?  Hmmm…. As a high school teacher, when my students declared, “COOL!” and then bobbled their head.  Now, at the DIocesan center, working with teachers, there is a entire new level of passion.   What gets me fired up is the realization that every person in the world is now connected as long as they have internet access.  –

Educators must NEVER again teach in a silo.  Their vision must no be their class, their school, their district but their WORLD.  To teach with the vision definatley changes the dynamics of what teacher/learner is all about.  Teacher and learner are equals when vision is of education stretches to the horizon.  This is how an indvidual can change the world beginning with one person at at time.

 

 

Brenda Sherry commented: 

I get really excited when I’m helping students and their teachers create digital stories. The students (and teachers) usually need some help from me to understand conventions and techniques for this genre of media-making — but after that they blow me away!

Many digital kids – who don’t always excel at traditional pencil/paper school tasks – have such talent in this area!

It makes me wonder…what other talents do kids have that we hold them back from demonstrating? I think this is an exciting time in education when technology can help us awake and unlock these talents!

 

Marsha Ratzel commented:

I’ve been trying to hand over the power of my classroom to the students.  This past week I tried tiered lab groups….by that I mean I found/and or created 3 different levels of lab activities that investigated heat and energy transfer.  I picked the groups and partnered students of like ability together.  After we did a whole class demo lab showing how to use the temperature probes and software, each group started on their work.

Each tier started with a lab that let them figure out what heat transfer really looks like…one group used a mitten, another group mixed different temperatures of water and another group looked at insulation.  The second lab was more open-ended where it required them to apply their learning.

The lowest tier kids had to design and build their “perfect mitten” and another group had to design/build the best insultated travel mug.  The top tier had to study how the HVAC went on and off in our school by setting up a 24 hour monitor of temperature variations…and I found a mechanical engineer who is helping them think about how all this plays out in designing buildings.  They are exchanging emails with him and he will come into work with them the tuesday after thanksgiving.

While I set up a very structured activity….how they timed it, organized it and executed it….was very student-controlled.  In my mind the success of all this happened because some of the lowest level learners in my room….totally owned the mitten lab.  They wanted to repeat the trials with other mittens…and they argued with each other about where the heat came from.  I had more than one or two of the kids who never do anyhting, totally kick it into gear and become a leader.  And the highest tier learners are so excited to be working with an engineer that I’m almost irrelevant.

Tiering is a WHOLE lot of work. But it’s worth it.  It made me want to suggest to the administration that using common planning time would be so productive if we could jointly build these kinds of experiences by taking our cookie cutter labs and building them out into tiered learning experiences.  Now I wouldn’t want to work in same ability groups all the time…that’s not good….but sometimes you realize that same ability groupings allow student to shine that don’t when you are in heterogeneous groupings all the time.

 

Becky Bair commented:

Last year I introduced my kids to blogging at the beginning of the second marking period. They thought it was interesting and were excited, and they typed away. Three days later we got our first comments from a class in Nevada. My kids CHEERED (yes, jumping, clapping, yelling) when they read the comments and couldn’t wait to write more. They were writing every chance they could at school and many of them were posting from home, too.

Cool as it was, that’s not the best part of the story. My kids went out to recess that day and told their 5th grade friends about the blog and their comments. Those fifth graders went to their teachers and said, “Why can’t we blog like Mrs. Bair’s class?” After much prodding from their classes, my teammates set up blogs for their classes, too. The enthusiasm of my class seeped into the other fifth grade classes, and even though those teachers weren’t as comfortable with technology as I was, they tried it. And we’ve gotten even more people to try it this year.

Kids being enthusiastic about their learning and getting their teachers to make a change is very exciting to me!

 

Alan Strange commented:

Learning free from grades excites me. I like the experience of connected learning within a flexible, transforming, studio design that extends outside the confines of a single room or building. Learning environments that encourage inquiry, personal learning and differentiation excite me.

These were some of our discussion starting points, but many more ideas were tossed around throughout the week. Consider posing the same question to your own personal learning network.

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!

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!

Kickoff
The first of those kickoffs happened in Lancaster, Pennsylvania with what we are calling the IU13 PA State Community. A lot of work goes into getting a community organized. The IU13 Community is in its second year of hosting. The affirming thing about this work is that most of PLP hosting organizations want to come back for a second year and sometimes a third or fourth.

IU13 decided two things this year: 1) to have another round of Year 1 participants in addition to returning Year 2 participants. 2) to go statewide with those who could participate. Janet Dubble, the organizer for IU13, did a wonderful job advertising the opportunity across the state and as a result the community will have a great deal of diversity in terms of schools participating. Robin Ellis will serve as the community leader for the IU13 PA community. Robin is an experienced leader within Powerful Learning Practice and has served in multiple roles within the company- including taking her own district’s team through the experience back in 2009. Her district, Quakertown Community, has decided to take another team through a Year 1 experience this year.

IU13, like our other year long communities, will go through a full year of team-based, job-embedded, blended professional development around managing 21st Century change as a connected educator. Collaboratively teams will create an action research project based on a school improvement goal. In addition to meeting face to face, the PLP teams will participate in a virtual learning community called the PLP Community Hub. They will learn with thousands of other educators (PLPeeps) who are going through or have been through the program. Each community will have access to their own private space in the Hub, as well as being able to co-construct knowledge with PLPeeps from around the world in common, shared spaces. In addition to learning in teams, in webinars, and in the online community Hub, this year’s teams will also have a menu of activities from which to choose such as: online book studies, virtual classroom visits, connected coaching sessions, and much more.

E-Learning

Powerful Learning Practice’s newest initiative, PLP e-COURSES will feature an e-course on connected coaching, a model created by Lani Ritter Hall, Dean Shareski and Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach. The model is influenced by face to face models such as Jim Knight’s instructional coaching, Art Costa’s cognitive coaching and the Tschannen-Moran’s evocative coaching but takes coaching to the next generation by applying it in online spaces with people the coach will never meet in person.

As part of the gearing up experience PLP communities are asked to participate in a Pregame activity, a self-paced Web 2.0 primer. Powerful Learning Practice decided to open it up to the public as well. If you are new to Web 2.0 and would like to participate in an easy, step by step e-Course you can register here.