Home page: http://benjaminstewart.co

1. Cultivating a Language Educator's
Personal Learning Network Through
Informal Pedagogical Dialogues
by Benjamin Stewart
CO13
February 1, 2013
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PLN Experience: http://bit.ly/WsdzFs
Twitter: @bnleez
Google+: gplus.to/bnleez
Google+ Community: http://bit.ly/12rUVBE

2. Professional development
Reflecting back on your own experience
with teacher professional development,
what type of experiences have led to
useful learning that had the greatest
influence on your language learners?
Why?

3. PD in Mexico
In Mexico, as few as 40% of teachers receive
the professional development support that
they need.
Global average of 70%; Mexico trails 21 other
countries
(Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2011)

4. PD in Mexico
Sixty-sixty-five percent (60-65%) of Mexican
teachers have no induction and mentoring
programs.
Global average of 18-20%
(Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2011)

5. Informal pedagogical dialogues become the
means by which educators share how they
interact with ideas, materials, and other
educational stakeholders in terms of
cultivating one’s personal learning network.

6. Informal Pedagogical Dialogues
Informal Pedagogical Dialogues vs.
conferences, workshops, in-services, etc.
image attriubution: http://bit.ly/UUpjQW

7. Informal Pedagogical Dialogues
The tendency is to rely on isolated workshops and
conferences as the primary means for promoting
professional learning. image attriubution: http://bit.ly/UUpjQW
Chung, Darling-Hammond, Richardson, & Orphanos, 2009; Organisation
for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2011).

8. Cultivating a personal learning network
Image attribution: http://bit.ly/VVZAcr

9. Personal learning networks are the sum of all
social capital and connections that result in
the development and facilitation of a
personal learning environment.
(Veletsianos, 2010, p. 6)
Image attribution: http://bit.ly/V9H50W

10. Social Networks
There is a connection and contagion.
(Christakis & Fowler, 2009)

11. Connection and contagion rules
We shape our networks.
(Christakis & Fowler, 2009)

12. Connection and contagion rules
Our network shapes us (connection).
(Christakis & Fowler, 2009)

13. Connection and contagion rules
A network has a life of its own.
(Christakis & Fowler, 2009)

14. Personal learning network (PLN)
PLN = Ideas + Materials + Social Interaction

15. Opinions
Understandings
Beliefs
Thoughts
Knowledge
Perspectives

16. Conceptual Understandings:
explain, interpret, apply, perspective,
empathy, and self-knowledge
(Wiggins and McTighe, 2005)

17. Personal learning network (PLN)
PLN = Ideas + Materials + Social Interaction

18. What materials are needed to communicate with others?
Image attriubtion: http://bit.ly/Sz4ddD

19. Image attribution: http://bit.ly/Y7Sg0v

20. Personal learning network (PLN)
PLN = Ideas + Materials + Social Interaction

21. With whom do you interact?
Image attribution: http://bit.ly/UZl9XR

22. How do you interact?
One to one
One to many
Many to one
Clusters
Unidirectional
Bidirectional

23. How do you interact?
Colleagues
Those outside your institution
Like-minded individuals
Diverse opinions

24. PLN = Ideas + Materials + Social Interaction
Material Semiotic (physical and non-physical
actors)
...how natural, social, and technical objects become
enacted within a web, how they associate and
exercise force, and how they persist, decline, and
mutate over time
(Fenwick & Edwards, 2010)

25. Purpose
How do EFL educators in Mexico conduct open, online, informal pedagogical dialogues that enrich a
personal learning network?

26. Research Design
(Creswell, 2009)
A multiple case study, employing a qualitative research design. One which allows participants to
share interpretations through an inductive, emergent, and holistic approach.

27. Participants
Seven to 10 EFL educators from three
different local institutions

28. Data Collection
Table 1
Online survey 15 minutes
Face-to-face orientation 90 minutes
10-week interaction period 10 hours (i.e., one hour per week)
Five biweekly hangouts (optional) Five hours (i.e., one hour every other week)
Final one-on-one interview 30 minutes
Total time 12 hours and 15 minutes to 17 hours minimum

29. PLN Experience
PLNE webpage: http://bit.ly/U0QlEf

30. PLN and the PLN Experience
Personal Learning
Network Experience
(http://bit.ly/U0QlEf)
vs.
Massive Open Online
Course (MOOC) (Video)
Image attribution: http://bit.ly/1026tMR

31. Google+ TILL Community
Add video of PLNE page
TILL (Google+) Community: http://bit.ly/12rUVBE

32. Data Collection
Personal blog, website,
wiki, ning, groups, other
Moodle, etc...and Twitter
hashtag to aggregate
information
All websites are to be open
to the public.
Image attribution: http://bit.ly/11vi1IJ

33. Data Analysis
Case-Quintain dilemma
Case study Quintain
Individual attributes Personal learning network (concept)
Findings Findings
Cross-case analysis Themes: pre-determined & emergent
Themes based on research questions
(Stake, 2006)

34. Diachronic Data Analysis
Looking back over the last one-to-two weeks, what do you think
was the most significant change in your personal learning
network (ideationally, materially, and interpersonally) that
contributed to your own professional learning?
(Davies & Dart, 2005)
Most Significant Change Stories

35. Diachronic Data Analysis
Change stories:
Cognitive vs. meta-cognitive

36. Reflexivity and openness
What do I know?
What do the participants know?
What does the audience of my final
interpretation know?
Double hermeneutic
subject vs. object Research design and interpretation of data
participants vs. researcher How prior events influence current
behavior
(Mills, Durepos, & Wiebe, Norreklit, 2006; 2010; Patton, 2002)

37. Feel free to visit the PLNE home
page if you would like to participate,
and I thank you for your attention!
by Benjamin Stewart
CO13
February 1, 2013
-----
PLN Experience: http://bit.ly/WsdzFs
Twitter: @bnleez
Google+: gplus.to/bnleez
Google+ Community: http://bit.ly/12rUVBE

38. References
Christakis, N. & Fowler, J. (2009). Connected: The surprising power of our social
networks and how they shape our lives. New York, NY: Little, Brown and
Company.
Chung Wei, R., Darling-Hammond, L., Andree, A., Richardson, N., & Orphanos, S.
(2009). Professional learning in the learning profession: A status report on teacher
development in the US and abroad. Standford, CA: National Staff Development
Council.
Creswell, J. (2009). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods
approaches. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
Darling-Hammond, L., Wei, R., Andree, A., Richardson, N., & Orphanos, S. (2009).
State of the profession: Study measures status of professional development. JSD,
30(2), 42-50.

39. References
Downes, S. (2009). Origins of the term 'personal learning network'. Retrieved from
http://halfanhour.blogspot.mx/2009/10/origins-of-term-personal-learning.html
Fenwick, T. & Edwards, R. (2010). Actor-network theory in education. New York:
Routledge.
Mills, A., Durepos, G., & Wiebe, E. (2010). Encyclopedia of case study research, vol.
2. London: Sage Publications.
Norreklit, L. (2006). The double hermeneutics of life world: A perspective on the
social, dialogue, and interpretation. Retrieved from
http://vbn.aau.dk/files/18718783/5-Double_hermeneutics.pdf
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). (2011). Building
a high-quality teaching profession: Lessons from around the world. Retrieved from
http://1.usa.gov/WoNshj

40. References
Stake, R. (2006). Multiple case study analysis. New York, NY: The Guilford Press.
Stevens, V. (2012). When is a MOOC not a MOOC? Retrieved from
http://advanceducation.blogspot.mx/
Veletsianos, G. (2010). Emerging technologies in distance education. Vancouver,
Canada: University of British Columbia Press.
Wiggins, G. & McTighe, J. (2005). Understanding by design. Upper Saddle River, NJ:
Pearson.

41. by Benjamin Stewart
CO13
February 1, 2013
-----
PLN Experience: http://bit.ly/WsdzFs
Twitter: @bnleez
Google+: gplus.to/bnleez
Google+ Community: http://bit.ly/12rUVBE