Final Report On My PLN

There are multiple assignments that I have created this semester which bring forth a sense of personal pride in my work, but of these accomplishments I am the most pleased with the improvement that my personal learning network (PLN) has undergone this semester. Many assignments in school are created and completed, but my PLN has developed into an ongoing evolution of connections and organization. I foresee my continually developing PLN becoming the most beneficial tool that I have developed in EDM310, and this is mostly because of the various technological programs that are utilized in my PLN. In my previous PLN progress report I illustrated that which I thought to be an accurate representation of an extensive PLN, but in actuality I had barely scratched the surface in regard to the organization and communicative ties that I would develop as the semester progressed. I have divided my PLN final report into two separate categories which I believe accurately represent my blog. The two categories are organization and communication. 


Organization

Seeing as my PLN is centered upon technological connections and organization, I will start this representation by stating that Google Chrome and iGoogle are the two leading factors in organizing my PLN. Allow me to use an analogy to illustrate the role of each. I could compare Google Chrome to the office in which I work, and I could compare iGoogle to the desk on which I work. Comparing Google Chrome to an office and iGoogle to a desk is the best way for me to describe the benefit that each have served in organizing my learning network. Through Google Chrome I am able to organize and view far more than I could through other web browsers, and iGoogle allows me to add gadgets which link me to various websites right from my home page.


Communication

An extremely important aspect of any PLN is communication. I have fallen in love with communicating ideas through my blog, but a problem that I continually run into is that the majority of people spend more time on social networking websites than they do on blogging websites. I feel however that I have developed a method, that was posted in Blog Post #12, which helps provide a solution to this problem. A large aspect of my PLN, that most would not recognize as a learning tool, is the social networking sites that I incorporate such as Facebook, Twitter, and Google+. Each of these social networking websites are also termed "micro-blogging websites", and in my previous blog post I illustrated an idea that would use micro-blogs to catapult personal blogs into social popularity. Through using this tactic I have witnessed an increase in my blog views. 


The last thing that I would like to address is the collaborative tools that I use regularly, and the benefit that each tool has had on my PLN. Most college students will end up doing at least one collaborative group assignment during their college career, and I do not know of any better collaborative tools to aid in group communication than Google Docs and Google Hangouts. Skype has been one of the greatest video chatting tools that I have used in college, but Google has far exceeded Skype in the collaborative aspect of communication. The way that my group worked collaboratively was by chatting on Google Hangouts while working on a Google document. I was wanting to wait for project #13 to post this video, but I suppose this video will serve as an accurate representation of utilizing both Google Hangouts and Google Docs at the same time. I appologize for the rough video quality...Enjoy...







As you well know Google is the primary aspect of my personal learning network. I wish that I had the writing ability to illustrate an in depth representation of the various tools that have enhanced my personal learning network but I suppose that this will suffice.