Personal Learning Environments

I have been exploring, with a near obsession, the idea of personal learning environments (PLE) and how they may help create a way to synthesize learning, all forms of learning from the very structured, formal learning experiences of a university lecture/class to the very informal learning that happens in every aspect of our lives. I believe informal learning is the largest area of learning and with the growth of Web 2.0 and its tools, informal learning has the potential to make a significant impact on education.

After having read through many blogs and wikis, taking tours of virtual classrooms and landscapes, and taking on-line classes, the information became overwhelming and I reached information overload level. Because I am a writer by nature I found the idea of writing to synthesize what I have learned very appealing. So I braved my fears about writing on-line and created this blog. I also think that if I use this method to organize my thoughts in some semblance of order, I am modelling life long learning for my students.

What's a Personal Learning Environment?
Michele Martin had a very concrete way of stating what a PLE is:
...a PLE is a combination of the formal and informal tools and processes we use to gather information, reflect on it and do something with it, which is what we mean when we talk about learning.

For me, taking a graduate diploma through Simon Fraser University (SFU) in Teaching in a Technological Environment (TLITE) creating my own PLE here to gather information, at least some of it, and to reflect on it is proving to be very helpful. So following Michele Martin's PLE I also divided mine into three areas:

Gathering Information
When I began TLITE I could not put an attachment on an email, I could type basic text and a few little things in Word 2003. That was it. Then came this and my learning curve took a massive leap!

I gathered information in a rapid, rather disorganized way. Our SFU Faculty Associate come to our off-campus site and provided a day of Web 2.0 information which is what started this entire adventure. I explored sites on the wiki she created for the class and became more and more fascinated by what I was learning. I created a del.icio.us account and a Facebook account. I then took several on-line classes with Knowschools, the first being on tagging - using del.icio.us - how lucky was that! Then came a session on Web tools for the classroom, Web Quests (that was over my head) and tools for K - 3 students. Then I hit the overload level and stopped taking classes and needed to process what I had learned. Even with the information overload, I managed to tour Tapped In and created a virtual classroom there. I also created an account in Classroom 2.0 and downloaded Firefox as my web browser. We LOVES Firefox! (Still learning how to use it and all its potential!)

Processing Information
After all the information gathering was done, a significant amount of new learning floating around in my head with no place to land, so I decided to use Cmaps to create a web of what Web 2.0 was to me. That was some weeks ago and I might change that web now, but at the time it consolidated some of what Web 2.0 was. The visual was very helpful. It would be great to put a copy into this blog, but I haven't managed to learn how to do that yet.

Reading other people's blogs on the topic of PLE's was also very helpful. (The next thing on the list to learn is about RSS feeds.) By reading what others are saying about PLE's, it helped gel my own ideas, including how to blog.

Then I jumped into creating a blog. But, once again, I couldn't figure out what I wanted the blog to look like or what it should say about PLE's. Reading blogs by others helped here again. I am finding that writing my ideas/thoughts directly onto the blog might not be the best way for me. I think I need to write them down on paper first, so they are more organized. Looking on this blog entry, it is certainly not something I would hand in to a grad class prof. But then again, it is my PLE and I want it to be informal for now, and informal it certainly is.

I also decided to post on several forums and to join, of all things, Oprah's on-line book club for Eckhart Tolle's book. I wanted to be part of that huge on-line, first of its kind, on-line community. It was been interesting.

What do I want to explore next?

• 23 Things
• RSS feeds
• LiveJournal
• WordPress

Acting on Learning
Well, the most I've been able to do in the classroom, due to constraints on lab time and the type of position I currently hold, is to do a simple Web Quest with a reading group. The students have thoroughly enjoyed this and the boys stood out and were very engaged, which went along with the topic of our school district's Professional Development Day's Keynote Speaker - Barry MacDonald and his book Boy Smarts.

I also participated in an Elluminate session with the SFU Faculty Associate and created this blog, complete with a Yahoo avatar! Now that was fun. Tomorrow I will present a part of what I've been doing to my cohort group.

I hope to bring an intermediate class to my virtual classroom in the near future.

This is my on-going PLE. I would like invite others to comment about their PLE's, their thoughts on how the Web 2.0 tools and informal learning may alter our ideas of education in the future.