Imagine and Teach

On September 30, 2008, I began my adventure.  That day was the opening session of our Powerful Learning Practice (PLP) cohort.  At the opening session, Will Richardson and Sheryl Nussbaum Beach had us all sign up for this thing that I had not heard of….Twitter!

And so it began.  I started to learn what a personal learning network (PLN) was.  There was a lot of googling of twitter terms going on in my life.  And before I knew it, I was building a PLN.  And what an incredible resource that has been.

So what have I learned?  Well, this is by no means an exhaustive list, but here goes.

1. I am humbled by my PLN.
2. From my PLN, I have learned so much.  My delicious account is full of links I have seen on twitter.
3. Tweet and retweet often
4. Thank your followers
5. Be selective when choosing who to follow.  I pretty much keep it to teachers. Admins, and ed tech people
6. Don’t follow celebrities
7. I often check twitter before I check email
8. The amount of followers doesn’t matter.  This is not a popularity contest.  It is about quality conversation and learning.
9. There are many Phillies fans in my PLN
10. It is incredible to connect and learn with great people around the world.
11. Time zones
12. It is good to go “off the grid” every so often.  The tweets will continue and I don’t need to read them all. Balance.
13. There are some tremendous blogs attached to members of my PLN.  I read as much as I can. My Google Reader is loaded!
14. Go to Educon.
15. My PLN on twitter has brought me some of the best professional development I have ever had.
16. It is great to see and read innovative thinkers, even and especially when there are differences of opinions.
17. I can’t wait to see what’s next with my PLN.
18. I can tweet from my iPhone!
19. On occasion, I actually find that I have something of value to say. So for those of you starting out on Twitter, keep going and believe that you have something to add to the conversation. Because you do.

As I said, this is not a complete list.  I wanted to post this on September 30, but as blogging goes, that didn’t happen. So, if you are reading this, first, thanks!  And then, if you are not on Twitter, get there.  And build your PLN.

Thanks to my first 8 followers: @erikgerm, @lawdog0140, @lrphils, @antiprogress, @ncara. @shareski. @glassbead and @snbeach. You guys are still following me!  Thanks and thanks to these 8 and all of my PLN for teaching me, learning with me, and sharing.  Here’s to another year!

BY the way, my twitter ID is @horizons93

Just this past Tuesday, we had our culminating celebration for our PLP cohort, The Archdiocese of Philadelphia Cohort.  The cohort included teams from all 20 of our high schools.

Prior to September 30, I was not a web 2.0 guy.  I had never tweeted, blogged, facebooked, wiki’d, or ninged.  I will admit to being one of those teachers who saw no benefit in social networking. But then PLP happened. I met Will Richardson, Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach, and Clarence Fisher. At the opening meeting, they had us all sign up on twitter, join the wiki, and join our PLP ning site. And then the fun, and the learning began.

As I ventured into our ning site, the discussions became lively, Many of us found ourselves pushing boundaries and questioning convention. As the ning grew, the conversations grew as well. Then there is twitter.

Like so many others, I started with twitter, not understanding how this could possibly be useful.  started to follow a few people that Will, Sheryl, and Clarence were following. Then  following some of those whose @name appeared after that RT thing. (Which took me a while to understand was just a retweet!) As I read what was being posted, I was humbled.  Feeling way behind despite my years in education, I kept reading, found out the value of reading blogs, and joined some other nings. Clicked on as many ustream broadcasts as I could and tweeted as many things as I could to get use to this new found personal learning network. Thanks to all I have met on twitter for teaching me and sharing.

And now the PLP year is over. But not really.  Our school team has set up a ning for our faculty.  I have a wiki for my class.  I have this blog.  And I now have a pretty good understanding of twitter! Here is our  PLP wiki.

But most importantly, PLP has opened my eyes to the possibilities for our students. There is so much to learn, so much to share, and so much to change.

Thanks to Will, Sheryl, and Clarence for their leadership, push backs, take aways, and encouragement.  And thanks to all of the cohort members. We have established a community that will continue, to share, continue to grow, and continue to learn.  The journey has begun. Thanks PLP!

Welcome to my first post. I know the page doesn’t look quite ready yet, but it will soon.

Why, “Imagine and Teach?” Well, I needed a name. And I wanted to get started. But I think the real reason is that imagination is a big deal to me. Imagination is what powers us, it drives our thinking. It also drives our students thinking and learning when their imagination is allowed to be unleashed from the standardized, quantitative world in which they live.

Imagination has always inspired and challenged me. Being visually impaired, (Stargardt’s Disease) an assistant principal, teacher, musician, dreamer and theatre director, my imagination is vital to me having enough “vision” to do what I do.

So imagine and teach. It is what I hope I do. It is what I try to do. And it is what I try to encourage.

I am presently in a Powerful Learning Practice cohort and am loving it. Without it, I would not be blogging. PLP has challenged my imagination and my teaching. It has challenged me as an administrator as well. I now find myself with an increasing 21^st Century educational outlook.

PLP has not only driven me to blog, but to the idea of a personal learning network. By using our ning site and Twitter, I have begun to develop my personal learning network. This has been an incredible experience even though it has only been a few months. I can only imagine the possibilities. If you have not ever thought about a personal learning network, I highly recommend it.

So there are some opening ramblings from me to get this started. I will blog more about my journey into the connected world in another post. And who knows what else. For now, hello everyone thanks for stopping by, please feel free to leave any comments.