What is a PLN?
As teachers we must remember that we are also learners. An important part of learning is to build your own Personal Learning Network (PLN). This is a group of people who can guide your learning, point you to learning opportunities, answer your questions and give you the benefit of their own knowledge and experience. Personal Learning Networks enable teachers to access to a wide range of experts and communities to support their professional learning.
The building of personal learning networks can be facilitated through the use of a range of ICT tools, some of which include professional learning communities and websites, social networking sites (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn), social bookmarking tools (Diigo, Delicious), wikis (wetpaint, Wikispaces) and MOOCs (Massive Open Online Course). The picture below illustrates the tools that are available for use. We will be discussing how to access and use these tools in a later section.
Essentially, anyone that you interact with, whether they are social contacts, professional peers or experts in their field, can be considered part of your Personal Learning Network.