Saturday, 3 March 2012

Learning Network

Learning and professional development should be an ongoing process. Having access to printed resources like professional and academic journals is always an option. The other option is having a group of professional and academic people who can guide you and inspire you.

I have had an informal learning network which has expanded over the years. This learning network comprises of my university professor from MBA days and class fellows, my boss from my first job as an investment banker and my colleagues, my second boss who was/is the dean of business department and fellow teachers at the university I used to teach at up until 2008. But because life is so busy and we all live so far apart, I feel hesitant to reach out to them now but I am still in contact with them through email and Facebook. My learning network grew organically as over the years my students graduated and became professionals. I am in contact with almost 500+ alumni from the university I taught at through Facebook. At my current place of work, my first Supervisor is very supportive. Again, over the last three years here, some of my students have graduated and I see them and share work place experiences with them. But my contact with them is very limited once they graduate.
I do feel the need for a professional learning network. There are times when I would like to reach out to a colleague or supervisor seeking their professional opinion on an assessment I just drafted or how I handled a discussion in class. But everybody has tons of work and I don’t want to disturb anyone. It feels great when you are able to share with another teacher your teaching experiences and challenges. But such genuine opportunities are rare.

9 comments:

  1. I agree with you that genuine opportunities are rare. I think this has to do with the opportunity cost of maintaining a network. True networks require investment of time and energy to build and maintain. Ultimately there is a tradeoff between maintaining the network and utilizing the network.

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  2. Couldn’t agree more!
    Networks entail a lot of investment in terms of time and energy… the tradeoff being its use and its maintenance. In retrospect, subgroups within these networks have been formed pertaining to the consistently evolving professional life.

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  3. Hi Seema! Personal Learning Networks (PLN) are a vast area indeed to explore. I'm currently in a teacher education conference and it seems a lot of people at least talk about PLN, but it is still an ambiguous concept to many.

    Sometime I actually wonder if we think about it too difficulty. If you think about what you want to achieve with your learning (e.g. you have an area that you would like to understand better), you might grab a book or read someone's blog to get more information from that author or researcher or whatever. Then you have the possibility to directly send him or her mail or comment the blog. And then, maybe something more sustainable grows from there or not.

    To give an example: A while ago when I was reading some theories from Etienne Wenger about Communities of Practice, I felt that I wanted to read some more of his articles (which I couldn't find online at that time). I then sent him mail, thanking him for his interesting work with CoPs and other things. He replied to me, sent me his articles and actually have sent me mail even later, about a workshop he nowadays conducts (again, a new learning possibility!).

    So back to what I was saying: if one is interested in something, I think might drive the network that is starting to build, and it can be very small things sometimes that you do, and you can call it a personal learning network. And actually in the end, because in truth, we all actually learn all the time, we might even have parts of a network which we don't sometimes even see that is affecting our learning. Learning is a tricky thing!

    Did I make any sense? :) Thanks for a post that gave me a stimulus to respond. ;)

    By the way: Love your quote by Einstein! I think remembering it with PLN, or actually with any other matter, is a great vision statement!

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    1. Thanks for the insightful feedback Marco! And yes you make a lot of sense :)

      I agree with you when you say that maybe we look at PLN in a very complicated way. I believe, we are all born into a PLN, we actually inherit it in the most informal form as in parents, siblings and extended family – don’t you agree? They are all part of our first ever and most natural learning environment! What we might choose to refer it to as or in which direction we might want to take it, is entirely up to us.

      You are spot on when you say that what we are interested in might actually build the network in that direction. I think having a clear understanding of what we want to learn more or understand better is the basis of any fruitful quest. Once we have clarity on that, only then can we seek it out proactively. I once seriously contemplated embarking on a research degree. I wrote to my Professor from University days to understand the real difference between a DBA and a PhD and what each one of these entailed. After discussing with him, I wrote to one of his contacts who then enlightened me more with his personal experience as a DBA. After having complete clarity, I then contacted an Academic in George Town University regarding the possibility of publication of articles in journals. I also contacted and spoke to the Dean of one of the Universities here in Dubai which offered a distance learning program in the same discipline.

      Learning is an ongoing process on so many different levels, almost like breathing but we are not aware of it all the time…

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    2. How cool, Marko! When I first started my dissertation, I emailed Wenger and he responded. It's so nice that people are willing to connect.

      On the other hand, I also invited him to sit on my committee and he didn't respond. I'm not telling you this to be negative about him. It is an illustration of how people will meet limits in their ability to interact.

      Dean

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  4. Hi Seema, I also share your feeling in that with time you do feel you are somewhat distant from your old friends and colleagues. As you pointed out that we tend to be sensitive towards others and in the same way that we feel we are busy with our own professional and personal lives, we tend to make excuses on each other’s behalf and slowly we grow even further away from each other. But I think you are doing a magnificent job in keeping up with many of your old students through Facebook. Do you think mixing your personal and professional contacts in one Facebook profile can be a problem or perhaps you have two accounts like I do, one for personal circles and one for professional contacts?

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    1. Thanks for reading the post Munther and the interesting feedback!

      To be honest the thought of separating my personal and professional contacts through two different Facebook accounts did cross my mind in the beginning. What prevented me from doing so, however, was the time factor involved in such an exercise. Also, the option of customizing the security settings on the Facebook helps bifurcate the information I share with different categories of contacts. The privacy settings help me separate the information I share with different groups on the same platform.

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    2. Hi Munther, Hi Seema,

      I use Facebook only for friends and family. I use LinkedIn for my professional contacts. Google+ seems to be a middle ground, but isn't much used by my non-professional contacts.

      Dean

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    3. Dean, Thanks for sharing your experiences!

      I have been contemplating to get LinkedIn but have been a little ‘web shy’. I do feel the growing need to have one though, and I think this is going to be my summer project :)

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