I’m looking at my mind map below and wondering how this network has changed the way I learn. The easy answer is, of course it has. It has only been within the last three years that I’ve been connected to every branch of the Social Networking limb. In fact, within the past 5 years most elements of the mind map were unknown to me apart from Google. My network was comprised solely of physical, brick and mortar connections. Now my search for answers first wanders through a maze of electronic connections, Google scholar, RSS Feeds, informative blogs. I take that information and then present it to and gain feedback regarding it, to my social networks. They are both electronic, Facebook, Wabash, ATLA listserv, and physical, colleagues and friends from my own work environment and the the schools I attended. I take that reworked raw information and run it through my own experiential grid and come to some sort of answer. Once I get an answer I often turn around and teach it to my students using the same networked online tools such as Prezi and Google Docs to start the cycle over again for a whole new set of networked learners. While the route is now more far flung than it ever was before I think I have benefited from a broader perspective. It has made my learning experience a richer one.
If I had to give my digital tools a ranking I’d have to start with Google, in all its iterations. While I know I need to be careful of the mass of un-vetted material it is a great place to start if you are looking for a clue, a starting place for your learning. From there I often taken my clues to online databases that hold thousands of peer reviewed articles ready to be exploited in my learning processes. After that it is a return to the social networks where I can gain valuable experiential insights from past and present colleagues and scholars. As I look at this I see that it is also the way I gain new knowledge. With my ear to the electronic ‘ground’ I catch what’s coming next. But this is only one way to learn and the ranking can fluctuate from day to day. Perhaps I’ll hear something intriguing in a podcast I subscribed to off of iTunes. That will lead me to a blog that has been reliable in such matters in the past. I’ll see what’s been written about what I heard in the podcast and with that information proceed to my listserv and see what the peers in my field are saying. Once I’ve passed all that information through my grid I pass it along. And the cycle begins yet again with something I saw off of one of my RSS Feeds!
Does this aforementioned learning style refute or support the central tenets of Connectivism? I’d have to say that there is much that supports Davis’s (2008) idea that there is some “delicate interplay between complexity and self-organization” in all I do. I do make use of many voices when I seek out my social network. As well I do seem to hop from one specialized node, say Google Scholar, to another, some RSS Feed, to seek, strengthen and support my collection and analysis of raw data. And all these connections, both human and non-human, facilitate continual learning for me. That seems to definitely spell Connectivism for me and my learning style.
Davis, C., Edmunds, E., & Kelly-Bateman, V. (2008). Connectivism. In M. Orey (Ed.), Emerging perspectives on learning, teaching, and technology. Retrieved from http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/index.php?title=Connectivism
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