Analysisof

Personal Learning Networksin Support of Teachers’Presence Optimization

Malinka IVANOVA, Technical University of SofiaCarmen HOLOTESCU, Politehnica University Timisoara

Gabriela GROSSECK, West University of Timisoara

Aim

To study the organization of Personal Learning

Networks (PLN) and to support the optimization of teachers’ efficacy and productivity

Outline

• Networked world• Related work• Survey results and analysis• Discussion and the model for PLN

optimization• Conclusion

Social networks

SNs have a strong impact on teachers’ behaviors - for self-elaboration, improvement of teaching and collaboration

progress of information and communication technologies

need of reliable connection and successful dialog among people with similar interests

Web 2.0 developed tools and social software with flexible user interface

culture of sharing, promotion of new ideas and connection

socialization through web-based communicative and collaborative activities

enhanced instruments for personalization

phenomenon of a networked world

Personal Learning Network

The social interactions of every person could support his currently emerged or future planned needs for learning, shaping the individual features

Learning network - describes the gained experience of students and teachers when

they utilize computers for learning (http://csalt.lancs.ac.uk/jisc/,

2001)

Social learning networks - can utilize social software and social networking

sites – learning through interactions among participants

Personal learning networks - describe “the

sum of all social capital and connections that result in the

development and facilitation of a personal learning environment” ,

(Couros, 2010)

Research Questions

Whether and how

a PLN could facilitate the

teacher’s practice?

What is the dependence between network structure and the teacher’s efficacy?

Howa PLN could be optimized to stimulate the

teacher’s productivity?

Used Methodliterature

exploration

• about the impact of social networking and social media on personal and professional development

• research reports and scientific papers with experimentations focused on teachers’ online presence

creation of a tool for data collection

• to understand teachers’ engagement and motivation for participation in social networks

• to comprehend the ways of PLN building• to catch up the purposes of use

model development

• to support the teachers practice in the directions of personal learning network optimization and further elaboration

Literature ExplorationSocial

networks

use

• A report of organizations : edWeb.net, IESD Inc., MMS Education, and MCH Inc. about personal and professional usage of SNs by school principals, librarians, teachers and students

• Benefits of SNs for education are: information and resources sharing, professional learning communities’ creation, improvement of school-wide communications , (Final report School Principals and Social Networking in Education, 2010)

Social media potent

ial

• A report about relationship between professional development of educators and social media (McCulloch, McIntosh, Barrett 2011)

• Social media potential for improvement of teachers’ quality and performance - identified through case studies and through presenting the social media benefits for business

Social

Networ

ks in

distanc

e learnin

g

• A paper for Ning use in support of topics discussion, community of practice forming and students’ social presence building

• advantages of social network range from “increased levels of communication and collaboration to deeper levels of reflection”, (Brady, Holcomb, Smith, 2010)

Social media

in Higher education

• Exploration of social media for personal and professional use• Findings - educators are active users of Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, blogs, wikis, Twitter, 90% of them have a stake in social media, (Moran, Seaman, Tinti-Kane, 2011)

Microbloggin

g for person

al development

• A paper for the role of microblogging for personal development and organization of social networking• several possible learning scenarios are proposed, (Holotescu and Grosseck, 2010)

Scientific Events Exploration

• the importance of scientific events related to the PLE/PLN concepts :

– the conference from Barcelona, Spain (2010)

– the conference from Southampton, UK (2011)

Social Network Analysis (SNA)SNS - a method for understanding the formal and informal relationships in a social network (its structure) and how connections could facilitate or cumber knowledge gathering and learning occurring, (Serrat, 2009)

Web crawling method - for analysis of online social networks like Flickr, YouTube, LiveJournal and Orkut - suitable in the situation

when the users’ data is not directly accessible, (Mislove et al., 2007)

Content-based SNA - for the reaching data from mailing lists - a network is divided in subgraphs organizing participants

according to the discussed topic, (Bohn et al., 2011)

Personal network analysis - to explore the structure of relations among young people and to find the connections

in personal networks and discourses, (Aguilar, 2003)

• A survey with questions grouped into three categories:

– current PLN structure– its dynamic view– regular usage for personal

development and for educational purposes

• This survey is distributed to teachers from Primary schools, High schools and universities over the world

(Thanks to @pdonaghy)

Teachers

participate in

different social

networks

use a wide

variety of social

learning platforms

have specific

individual interests

every PLN

consists of several

social networks

SNA

Survey Results

Series10%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

41%

59%

malefemale

32%

34%

24%10%

25-3536-4546-5556-65

Teachers’ gender: Teachers’ ages:

Average ages of surveyed teachers: 43

Teaching subject/s:

Series10%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

45%

15%

39%

17%

5%

12% 12%

5% 5%

2%

Language as a foreign language

Computer science, In-formation Systems, Mathematics

Educational technology, eLearning

Natural science

Humanities

Primary education

Social science

Entrepreneurship and Business

Journalism

Nationality:

10% 7%

17%

7%

2%

10%12%

2%

5%

5%

5%

2%2% 2% 2% 2% 2% 2%

RomanianBulgarianSpanishNew ZealandIrishGreekAmericanBrazilianIndianCanadianBritishGermanFrenchEgyptianArgentinianItalianPortugueseTurkish

What kind of social software do you use in your personal learning network?

Series10%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

120%

98%

66%

32%

78% 78%85%

15%

social networksauthoring toolsanalytical toolssearch enginessoftware for communica-tionsoftware for collaborationother

Other: Managed learning environment (Google Apps for Education including Teacher Dashboard (Hapara)), LMS Moodle, software for curation / storage (Scoopit, Diigo, Mendeley), mobile applications

Series10%

10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%

78% 76%68%

24%32%

FacebookTwitterLinkedinClassroom 2.0other

Series10%

10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%

80%

59%

17%

54%

17%24%

Google DocsWikiNingMoodleEdu 2.0other

What social networks do you use?

Other:Tuenti (Spanish social network), Edublog, Google+, YouVersion (Bible), School Management System, PB Works, SoundCloud, Ning, ConnectYard, aPLANET, EFL Ning Classroom, Flickr, Pinterest, Blogger, Lognet, Xing

Other: Wordpress, Etwinning Blogger, FROG VLE Kidblog, NING, Haiku (google ap), Blackboard, Edmodo, Wall.fm, tried Grou.ps in the past, Google Sites, Netvibes, cirip (microblogging platforms), Twitter, Moodle. Edu 2.0

What social educational platform do you use for educational purposes (teaching/learning)?

Do you have an account in Twitter?

90%

10%

yesno

Do you have an account in social network Facebook?

Series10%

10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%

100% 93%

7%

yesno

How long do you use Twitter?

8% 5%

22%

32%

16%

16%< 1 year1 year2 years3 years4 years> 4 years

How long do you use Facebook?

Series10

0.05

0.1

0.15

0.2

0.25

0.3

0.35

0.4

0.45

3%

24%

39%

10%

24%< 1 year1 year2 years3 years4 years> 4 years

How often do you use Twitter?

Series10%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%27%

19%19%

11%

5% 5%

14%

continuouslyseveral times in a daydailyseveral times in a weekweeklyseveral times in a monthrarely

How often do you use Facebook?

Series10%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

24%

16%

26%

10%

3%

13%

8%

continuously several times in a daydailyseveral times in a weekweekly several times in a month rarely

How many friends do you have – following/followers in Twitter?

0%2%4%6%8%

10%12%14%16%18%20%

3%

12%

3%

9%

18%18%

6%

18%

> 1300/1500> 900/1300> 1900/800> 800/800> 200/300> 100/100< 50/50< 11/11 How many friends do you have in Facebook?

Series10%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

15% 15% 15% 15%

20%

3%

10%

7%

< 5051-100101-200201-300301-400600-700800-900> 1000

What is the structure of your friends in Twitter?

Series10%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

57%

22%

78%

46%

73%

30%

real friendsfamily memberscolleaguesother interesting for you people that you do not know in real life – in personal aspect other interesting for you people that you do not know in real life – in pro-fessional aspect strangers

How do you expand your Twitter network?

Series10%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

43%

54%

41%

24%

search toolrecommendation toolweb sites functionality (Twitter add button)other

Other :“I receive an email from twitter that someone new is following me. So, I click on their profile. I read their recent tweets. If I am interested, I follow them”.“Now I only add people if they follow me and if they look interesting I follow them back. Or I add a person now if I actually meet them F2F. Or if I read an article or email and their twitter handle is there I may add them”. “Nearly always following people of my people, I'm following re-tweet”.“I really don't plan to expand my Twitter network”.“People find me when I present at conferences”.In case of “personal recommendation.”“I mostly watch the timeline for interesting info, and then add those users. Sometimes I also add people that start following me, but not always”.“I just follow the serendipity”.“I especially expand my twitter through people - if I follow someone who I think he or she is interesting I follow as well the people they follow”.

What is the structure of your friends in Facebook?

Series10%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

82%

68%

74%

34%

66%

11%

real friends

family members

colleagues

other interesting for you people that you do not know in real life – in personal aspect

other interesting for you people that you do not know in real life – in pro-fessional aspect

strangers

Series129%

30%

31%

32%

33%

34%

35%

36%

37%

38%37%

34% 34%

32%

search toolrecommendation toolweb sites func-tionality (Twitter add button)other

How do you expand your Facebook network?

Other :“I do not try to expand it”“ I add friends in real life”“I accept request”“I do not wish to expand, only use it an alternate mode to broadcast my activities and ideas”,“I add family members”“from joining other people's conversations”,“I do not actively expand my Facebook network”,“I normally ask actual friends”,“ I add the same of twitter”,“I rarely use it”“I add people that I have met in real life, and lately researchers that (I guess) find me through their own networks. I also have lots of students and ex-students, something that is not included in the options for previous question”.

How often do you add a friend to your Twitter network?

17%

58%

19%3% 3%

oftensometimesrarelyneverwait somebody to add me

How often do you add a friend to your Facebook network?

8%

42%45%

5%

oftensometimesrarelyneverwait somebody to add me

When do you do that? (Twitter)

Series10%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

14%

62%

49%

11%

when I need info or advice when I meet an in-teresting person when I feel need to learn something newother

Other – “I do not add people”, for “professional development”

When do you do that? (Facebook)

Series10%

10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%

13%

71%

26%

when I need info or advice

when I meet an interesting per-son

other

Other – “if and only if I know the person”, “Friends from my village and friends from my job”, “I do not use it for friend but a s a delivery mechanism”, “when I hear a family member or long lost real friend has an account”, “when I find a person I know”, “It’s random - if I like the look of them”, “ I add less and less people lately, I guess I have been using it for a long time so I more or less have covered my "old" acquaintances. Now I add new people when I actually meet them, if there is interest from both sides. I also accept requests.”, “Like to meet the person in real life before add him/her”, “When I find someone I know in real life and want to connect to”, “onl if I know in real life that person”, “When friends ask for friendship”

How often do you remove a friend from your Twitter network?

27%

59%

14% oftensometimesrarelynever

How often do you remove a friend from your Facebook network?

6%

68%

26%

oftensometimesrarelynever

Why do you do that? (Twitter)

Series10%5%

10%15%20%25%30%35%40%45%50%

30% 30%

46%

38% The friend annoys me I do not still in-terested in this friend I do not learn anything from this friendother

Other – “Never”, “Not a relevant person”, “When the contact unfollow me”, “Person tweets too much and fills my stream”, “useful tweets”, “Spam”, “I want to follow people more interesting and can't follow more people because Twitter has its limits”, “If the person is a sales-based entity”, “I don’t know the language – Asian for e.g.”, “Too much posting, spam, don’t know the language”, “I have only stopped following someone once or twice because they made me feel uncomfortable with their opinions”

Why do you do that? (Facebook)

Series10%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%34%

29%

18%

11%

The friend annoys me I do not still in-terested in this friend I do not learn any-thing from this friendother

Other – “if the person is responding badly”, “if I think he will be harmful for my profile”, I don’t remve friends”, “I have only de-friended one person and that was for continually offensive postings”, “I prefer not accept them than remove”, “Most of the time is people I haven't met in real life and which whom I haven't ever interacted on Facebook. Also students/ex-students when the academic relationship ends and it does not extend into friendship”, “Networking with friends that are not on Twitter”

Series10%

10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%

30%

70%

yesno

Series10%

10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%

27%

73%

yesno

Do you think that the friends’ number influences on your efficacy as a person? (in a learning aspect)Twitter Facebook

Series10%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

8%

92%

yesno

Series10%

10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%

22%

78%

yesno

Do you think that the friends’ number influences on your efficacy as a teacher? (in a learning aspect)Twitter Facebook

What are the purposes of Twitter usage?

Series10%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

81%

35%

43%

68%

51%

81%

14%

sharingcommunicating with col-leagues from your uni-versitycommunicating with col-leagues outside your universityprofessional community forming collaborationlearning new things other

Other – “promoting mself”, “friendship”, “personal brand creation”, “following events”

What are the purposes of Facebook usage?

Series10%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

63%

37%

42%

34%

39%

50%

21%

sharingcommunicating with colleagues from your universitycommunicating with colleagues outside your universityprofessional community form-ing collaborationlearning new things other

Other – “connecting with people who are far away”, “Family contact”, “I read news from UGT, FETEUGT, STPV”, “Facebook is an important tool to keep up with my friends from when I lived in Egypt”, “Connecting to remote places”, “connecting with family and old friends”, “Communicating, mostly personal”, “Communication with friends”, “generally I use my personal profile for keep in touch with family and closed friends and the professional profile for all the above points (having two accounts)”, “generally I use my personal profile for keep in touch with family and closed friends and the professional profile for all the above points (having two accounts)”, “Networking with friends that are not on Twitter”

Do you think that Twitter support your personal or/and professional development?

Series10%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

14%

35%

62%

16%

personal de-velopmentprofessional developmentbothI do not think so

Do you think that Facebook support your personal or/and professional development?

Series10%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

45%

50%

19%

6%

43%

32% personal devel-opmentprofessional de-velopmentbothI do not think so

Do you use Twitter for educational purposes

to support teaching or students learning?

Series148%

49%

50%

51%

52%

49%

51%

yesno

Do you use Facebook for educational purposes

to support teaching or students learning?

Series10%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%70%

30%

yesno

Series10%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%78%

35%32%

3%

30%

16%

share resources and links announce class events give opinionannounce class results stimulate class discussionother

How do you use Twitter in your teaching practice?

Other – “gather the informative resources”, “everyting I have in mind”, “do not use” Series1

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

50%

26%26%

11%

24%21%

share resources and links announce class events give opinionannounce class results stimulate class discussionother

How do you use Facebook in your teaching practice?

Other – “My learners don’t need Facebook tool to learn”, “I don’t use it at all for education”, “spotight people, thank people, make up-to-the-minute changes/adjustment”, “I do not use”, “I use it but with a different account - as a teacher”, “chat, polls”, “I never use Facebook for my lessons”

What do you prefer to read and RT the others posts or to contribute?

14%14%

68%

4% observe

contribute

both

do not answer

What do you prefer to read and like the others posts or to contribute?

32%

5%53%

10%

observecontributebothdo not answer

Advantages Disadvantages“Growing as a learner / a better communicator / improving my teaching styles”

“Time consuming / missing important information / too large the PLN”

“Brings down barriers between student/teacher, which can be both beneficial or not, depending on the respect and the relationship”

“Can be addictive”, “Overflow of information”

“It is very easy to learn so many new things and communicate with inspiring teachers”.

“It can be very time consuming!”

“instant communication” “spams, at times”“Immediate feedback to followers and friends” “Cannot keep up with twits”“As teacher, I can learn from people and share my experience. As person, I don’t use”

“It has not disadvantages for me”

“continuous real time learning/collaboration” “can get lost in learning (spend more time then intended)”“The bigger advantage is the opportunity of growth” “the disadvantage is the impossibility of see everything that

is in the timeline”“I get to know new things, resources in education” “no impact on my teaching”“It is at the very heart of my PLN. It allows me to learn new information and spread and add to new info”

“real time information to many tweets that I cannot read or even see”

“It is a way of sharing experiences in few words. It is a way of communicating with others.”

“lack of a good archive; poor conversational potential; 140 character limit; URLs in message and not in metadata”

“Connections and learning on a Global basis” “I do not carry a phone around, so it is not easy to follow twitter”

“Discover new things, Connect to interesting people” “Addictive, consumes much time”“Remembering to read & follow up leads” “I don't like Twitter. I think that it doesn't advantages or

disadvantages. In future I will use twitter for my students”

What are the advantages and disadvantages of Twitter for you as a person and as a teacher?

Advantages Disadvantages“I can connect with people far away and whom I cannot approach through phone calls”.

“Lack of integrity and ethics in the ownership of the company”

“It helps me to share my proud/emotional moments (personal and professional)with my loved ones. It also helps me to exchange ideas with each other”.

“The disadvantage I see on my "teacher site" which is different and not connected to my personal site, is that young people feel free to say rude things”.

“It is a tremendous advantage to me to be able to write a quick note to my real friends, who are on several different continents”.

“I don’t like Facebook’s lack of privacy”

“create a group, share information and find resources” “There’s too much information and not all of it is appealing; sometimes I just waste time browsing and I feel gossipy and I don’t like it”.

“I have two accounts. One is personal (to get in contact with colleagues and real friends). The other account is for students and their parents. I usually post important information. I also get to know them (and they get to know me) in a whole different light”.

“I have no control; I can’t use it as a way of getting students to focus”.

“a way to stay connected and available informally” “For me it’s only for personal use”.“I find people that I know and they are far away communicate Facebook creates a fake world”

“Due to less choice in privacy settings, information cannot be selectively published”

good for swapping ideas, and mutual support though “privacy issues; questionable corporate culture and practices; breaks the web; silo; navigation issues; bad archiving”

“It is a creative way of sharing, communicating, and collaborating”

What are the advantages and disadvantages of Facebook for you as a person and as a teacher?

How do you optimize your Twitter network to support the best your personal and/or professional interests and to stimulate your personal/teacher’s productivity?

“Creating lists, using hashtags to follow, imposing a time-discipline in following the informational stream”“ I follow only interesting for me people”“I try to add only users that add something valuable”“No real strategies”, “Use Twitter lists and email notifications, instant communication”“Use hashtags, post everyday”“New interesting subjects, collaborative features”“I always use a column system like TweetDeck, I create columns to follow certain hashtags and certain people”“I don't know”“By using it regularly and contributing in discussions”“I connect with people that have same interests”“Feed it to Flipboard in iPad where I can flip through and read the tweets magazine style”“Finding people that tweets about my interests”“I follow educators and look to see who they follow. I post updates to my blog, and links to quality resources. I follow links from others that have promising tweets”“I try to find new, interesting people to follow; I try to learn from people whose use of Twitter I find very good; I try to interact with interesting people; I use Hootsuite to manage the Twitter stream”

How do you optimize your network to support the best your personal and/or professional interests and to stimulate your personal/teacher’s productivity?

“Looking for interesting groups to follow, professionals that accept to have students in their network, etc.”“Constant monitoring or accepting members by invitation”“I try to be specific when I want to communicate directly with my colleagues and alumni”“Regular checks on posts by others, block a few sometimes”“I ask a lot of questions and learn from the answers I am given”“I use it to build a bridge between me and other colleagues with their students. We share our cultures, problems and collaborate to find solutions”.“I don’t use it that purposefully. It’s a combination of social network and learning tool, so I take what it has to offer, I don’t try to shape it all that much”.“I add interesting people”“I keep my settings very much locked down so only viewable by my friends”“I usually add interesting people and organizations”“I add friend, colleagues and sites that support specific educational areas, such as dyslexia”.“I just connect and share with my friends and colleagues”.“I try to find new, interesting people to befriend; I try to learn from people whose use of Facebook I find very good; I try to interact with interesting people”“I don’t optimize it”

If you do not use Twitter, please explain why?

“I think it is a platform to gossip, but dint know it can be used for educational purpose also”.“I’m high school teacher, and many students aren’t twitter. But the last months I have been thinking how I use Twitter in my classes”.“Because I don’t use in real life, I will not use with learners. My learners age is from 3 to 12, they dont need Twitter, they need Etwinning, Blogs, Wiki...”“I don’t use it so much, because I prefer Facebook. I interact with more people there. Twitter is not so popular in Argentina”. “There are many other options that appeal more to me, maybe because I haven’t tried but I am not at all interested”. “I have all the resources I need from other sources”“I’m a little afraid I should be using it all the time. My day has less than 24 hours a day because I have children and a husband and other interests such as reading, walking...”“I rarely use it because I am able to communicate well and I am comfortable with the social networks like Facebook”.

If you do not use Facebook, please explain why? “They are children, not teenagers”“I don´t want people to know me that much”“too personal”“It makes me feel uncomfortable that non-educational friends see how active I am on education”“I think it cannot fulfill educational purposes with social network”

Is there any policy / strategy for social networks usage in your

school / university?

37%

63%yesno

Discussion(s) …

PLN optimi-zation

well defined public profile

identification and definition

of current requirements,

goals and interests

characteristics of (social)

learning

appropriate model of

individual and group behavior

automation of several activities

could facilitate educators in their connections making, promotion and suitable friends’ recognitions

could be saved time and energy in doing aimless activities in networks

what kind of learning best suits his/her nature, mood, style, background and how this is related to social possibilities of networks

rendering the networks’ dynamics and specificities

in information and friends searching, selecting, filtering, tracking, and management

Nee

ds f

or d

eve

lopm

ent

Nee

ds f

or c

onn

ectio

n,

com

mun

icat

ion

an

d le

arni

ng

Setting up of a public profile

(Pre) Definition of requirements, goals and interests

Recognition the characteristics of learning

Suitable individual and group behavior in a social environment

Automation of activities in social networks

Model for PLN optimization in a teachers’ presence

Instead of Conclusion•Most of the teachers like the networked world and wish to develop a sustainable social presence

•It will work for them only if their personal preferences and social behaviors in networks are well studied and understood

•They will benefit if understand other PLN factors like static view, structural dynamics and taking time

•The first variant of a model is created in order to indicate the opportunity for PLN advancement and to support the quality of the teachers’ participation

•Need future explorations concerning the analysis and optimization of PLN in support of efficacy use and productivity

Thank you for your attention!

@malinkaiva

@ggrosseck

@cami13