Experiencing Just How Flat Our World Is

Last Saturday, I was able to experience firsthand just how flat our world truly has become.  Through my Personal Learning Network, I heard about the Flat Classroom Conference that was happening in Qatar.  I am amazed and inspired by the fact that they were able to have so many schools from all over the world participate in such an excited project.  Some of the student reflections have started to appear online and it is incredible to see the personal growth that they went through as a result of this experience.  

Leading off the conference was a Question and Answer session with the author who inspired the teachers who created this project, Tom Friedman, who wrote The World is Flat.  However, Tom Friedman was at his house in Washington, D.C., and was speaking to the conference via Skype.  In addition to all of that, Steve Hargadon, who was in Philadelphia at Educon 2.1, created a virtual link up for other educators who wanted to participate in the conference and listen to Tom Friedman.  As a result of all of that interconnectedness, I was able to listen to Tom Friedman (in D.C.) answer questions from students all over the world (in Qatar) via the web.  

As I mentioned above, Educon 2.1 was also going on at the same weekend.  Also via my PLN, I was able to watch presentations/conversations from this "unconference" in Philadelphia.  

I am running out of superlatives to describe how excited I am about this age of hyper-connectivity we are living in.  The impact of all of this on education is just beginning to be felt.  And if this past weekends activities are any indication, the possibilities are endless.  I can't wait to get started teaching and incorporate all of this into my classroom.  

Intimidation Part II

My last post tended to ramble a little bit and I think that I missed the point I wanted to make. So here goes round number two.

For the past few months, I have been working on creating my own Personal Learning Network (PLN). I subscribe to twenty-something blogs related, both directly or indirectly to teaching and business education. I also started using Twitter and mainly follow the same people there whose blogs I subscribe to. The main reason for all of this activity is to become more connected with teachers all over the US and the world.

But those connections cannot happen without action on my part. I haven't posted to Twitter for a few days now, and it's not because of the holidays. I just flat out don't know what to say. I feel very intimidated writing knowing that these very distinguished educators will be reading what I write. With Twitter, I feel out of the loop because I am not currently teaching. I feel something like a fraud. I also don't have a lot of classroom experience to help my form my opinions and thoughts on the various topics that come up in discussion either on Twiter or blogs. I have the same feeling with commenting. I read an excellent post by Chris Lehman and I clicked on the comments. I had some thoughts in my head on the topic, but then I just closed the tab to comment. I know that I need to just get over it and start writing, but I am having a hard time.

I have also read some contradictory tips about what to write on Twitter. The tips mainly centered on not writing about what you are doing, i.e. I just finished eating dinner. I also found out ny lurking on Twitter that a lot of teachers post links to helpful articles or tech tips. I did that for a while, but I recently stopped because I found that I was researching earticles to post to Twitter and that it took away time from other things and that using Twitter usually doesn't require research. Also by lurked, I have found that some/most of the people I follow do include updates on what they currently are doing. I have been considering posting on that as well, but again the intimidation creeps in and I think that what I am doing is really insignificant to the others that I follow.

The other cause of anxiety/intimidation when I write online for my PLN is that I don't believe that I will contribute enough to the conversation. In order for these other educators to want to include me in their PLN's requires me to contribute thoughful, meaningful contributions to the discussion at hand, and I don't think that I have enough knowledge to do that.

I guess that in order to get over all of these fears, I just have to go out and start doing, whether it is tweeting or commenting.

Intimidation

Ever since I finished student teaching, I have had some time on my hands. I have used that time to create and add to my Personal Learning Network (PLN). In hoping to add to my PLN, I joined Twitter. Over the past six months, I have heard a good deal about it and how useful/addicting it can be. I was initially skeptical because I thought that blogging was helpful, but didn't necessarily see the point of micro-blogging. I see that the power of Twitter, following other people and having others follow you, is essentially just like your own little PLN. Also knowing that a good amount of my students probably use it, I thought it would be helpful to be knowledgeable about this emerging way to connect with each other.

So I made up my mind that I was going to give Twitter a shot to see what is was all about. The signing up process was very quick and easy, but then came the hard part; the content. As I was considering joining Twitter, I also read up a lot on it, such as the do's and don'ts. One of the don'ts that stuck with me was to not just state what you are doing i.e. just finished dinner. I kept reading about making sure that you are providing value to the people who are following you, because who really cares that you are getting a cup of coffee. So after I started following the same authors of my blog roll, I now had to ensure that what I was posting was of value to these veteran Twitterers. I have a hard enough time coming up with ideas to blog about, let alone ideas to constantly post to Twitter. I know that I struggle as a writer getting the ideas and thoughts in my head onto paper, or the computer screen. I hope that one of the many benefits of blogging is to strengthen my writing ability, and I hope that Twitter does the same for me, albeit in a much shorter, to the point method.

As I have been using Twitter for a few days now, I have noticed a slight change in my behavior online. On my iGoogle page, I added a Twitter gadget to keep with my notworks tweets. Normally when I go to my iGoogle page, the first thing that I check was my Google Reader for any new blog posts. But suddenly, I am now scrolling down past my Reader box and going right to my Twitter box. The good news is that Twitter is living up to its billing as a tremendous place for resources. I currently follow about 20 people and I am having a hard time keeping up with it all. The good part is that a number of the people I follow are tweeting about links they find interesting. So I click on them and check them out. And then I read my Google reader. This is starting to take up a lot more of my time. In just a short time, I think that I am starting to suffer from some of the downsides to Twitter which is hyperconnectivity. Wes Fryer wrote an excellent piece about it the other day.

People on both the pro and con sides of hyperconnectivity say it will influence people’s health. While those who fear it say it will cause stress-related illnesses, those who welcome it say the flexibility it offers may improve mental health.

I’m with those who predict more health-related problems with hyperconnectivity than helps. Look how we’re struggling now to keep up with email, SMS messages, blog posts, and other news-related media streams? Discipline is hard. I think digital discipline is only going to get more challenging in the months and years ahead.

From page 132:

HYPERCONNECTIVITY WILL CREATE UNREALISTIC WORK EXPECTATIONS AND STRESS, AND INTRUDE ON LIVES - Many people see hyperconnectivy as a threat. Among the hundreds of elaborations provided by the respondents, only a few people perceived that blending work and personal time would tilt people’s lives toward more time for family, friends, and personal pursuits.

This finding has BIG implications for our need for both digital discipline and digital dialog.

I can't agree with this more and I believe that in addition to teaching our students how to connect with the world properly, we should also teach them how to disconnect with the world as well. The only good that came of this is that when I teach digital discipline going forward, I will have a real life story to go along with it.

I realize that I have only been using Twitter for just a few days now, and that I will start to get the hang of it and will stop being so intimidated.