techKNOWtools

Learning Community, Micro-Blogs, PLE, PLN, web 2.0

Happy My Twitter Story Day! #mytwitterstory

November 16, 2011November 16, 2011 Laura Pasquini

I often talk about my personal learning network (PLN); however I cannot deny that a large part my PLN is located on Twitter. In honour of the #MyTwitterStory Share event happening today, I will tell you about my Twitter experience, involvement and why I engage. Thanks for your story and initiating the #mytwitterstory blog prompt, @michaelmgrant.

Once upon a Twittersphere, there was a Canadian Princess Laura who moved to Texas to for a new job, new place, new academic program, and a new life adventure. While relocating from the metropolitan county of Toronto to to the Dallas realm, she thought it was wise to stay connected to friends, family and colleagues she was leaving behind. Princess Laura was socially connected via Facebook, Skype, blogging, Flickr, LinkedIn and more. Then in August 2008, she was introduced to Twitter by a new @NACADA friend, Eric Stoller, who wanted to use this tech tool for the 1st #NACADAtech Seminar.

Although Princess Laura was not quite sure about the 140-character perimeters or the random personal updates, she did fancy the cute little bird and thought she would keep an open mind about it. In the beginning, Princess @laurapasquini decided to lurk on Twitter to figure out why others were using this social media tool. Through her observation, Princess Laura discovered a couple of great learning opportunities using Twitter (and other social web resources with@courosa ‘s #ECI831 and #CCK09 facilitated by @gsiemens & @olddaily. While engaging in these open, online classes Princess Laura found the value in connecting to others to share resources, swap ideas, hold discussions and ask questions. Twitter was a space to participate in on-going learning and training initiatives to enhance her personal & professional development. The experiences in open learning courses, conference backchannels, Twitter lists, hashtag communities, following supportive Tweeters, and the participation in a few of the many Twitter Chats opened Princess @laurapasquini up to the educational potential of the Twittersphere.

By using third-party clients like Hootsuite & Seesmic, Princess @laurapasquini was able to discover the power of micro-blogging with great learning communities such as #edtech, #SAchat, #AcAdv, #SAtech, #HigherEd and MORE! Princess @laurapasquini continues to archive her tweets & URLs to her Delicious account via packrati.us, which also pays it forward and shares and RTs. Now Princess @laurapasquini places great value in the tweets of others for news, information, trends and happenings for her personal, professional and academic interests.

This Twitter tale really expresses Princess @laurapasquini’s love for her PERSONAL LEARNING NETWORK…

maintaining old and new CONNECTIONS…

and most of the FRIENDS who make her #MyTwitterStory complete.

The End! [Or is it? Follow along for more Twitter tales @laurpasquini.]

AcAdv, BreakDrink, Collaboration, Learning Technologies, PhD, PLN, Professional Development

Why Networked Anything Matters…

October 30, 2011August 12, 2019 Laura Pasquini

Time sure flies when you are catching up from conferences and travel! October has been a very productive academic and professional month for me, which has left little time for blogging here. Let me re-cap the conference fun that has been happening & that I might have mentioned on Conference Review/Preview BreakDrink #CTCX show last week.

October kicked off with a bang as I discussed in previous blog post about the #NACADA11 Conference. The altitude and momentum was quite high in Denver for the advising group and it left me wheeling with some new ideas in my new gig with the Office for Exploring Majors. More to come on that end soon…

Mid-month I said aloha to a great group of advising/counseling professionals as I joined the University of Hawaii System Advising Workshop. This was my first keynote where I was wearing a lei, and I enjoyed discussing was the importance of holistic advising in order to support the needs of our students and the campus community.

Here the slides and the open Google doc http://bit.ly/UHAdvising2011 of resources I shared:

The goal of this workshop was to introduce technological and systematic changes happening across the UH system and discuss how they can continue to connect across the many islands as counselors/advisors to support their student needs. I want to send a very big mahalo to the amazing group of advising professionals who invited me to speak, and who I have learned a great deal from during the conference and beyond. The friendly and welcoming attitudes there just might have me visiting the gorgeous state of Hawaii again.

My first visit to the state of Hawaii could not be complete with a few sight-seeing trips. I joined a moped tour to see some of the best waves, beaches and of course some adventure:

I could not leave the island without another professional development opportunity – the AACE E-Learn 2011 #elearnconf. I spent the next week connecting and learning about research, models and instructional design ideas from a wide variety of colleagues from around the globe. A big shout out to my adopted Australian/Kiwi/Dutch #elearnconf family from Deakin University. I think that Bosely knows how to effectively with his angels, and I hope to meet up with you all someday in Melbourne. Did someone say the PLE Conference might be there in 2012?!?!

I presented two best practices sessions that discussed the alternative professional development opportunities from BreakDrink.com and the connected and informal blended learning environments of FYE courses. Both are current chapters I’m working on for the upcoming IGI Publication “Cases on Formal, Non-Formal, and Informational Online Learning: Opportunities and Practices” book that will hit the presses in the near future. Kudos for all the hard work put in by a few of my co-authors and researchers that I have been collaborating with as of late – Kevin Guidry, Melissa Johnson, Michelle Rodems, & Jeff Jackson. Thanks for your efforts and insights.

Finally, there was no better way to end the month than with the #NASPAtech conference last week. Unfortunately, my academic and professional obligations kept me grounded from being there IRL. I am grateful for the amazing backchannel of conversation and my excellent co-facilitators @jeffjacksonTX and @lesliedareNCSU to have me hangout in a couple of Unsessions via Google Plus Hangouts with extras.

I hope that both Unsession conversations about #AltProDev and #SAmobile [both open & shared Google docs] will continue long past this conference. I look forward to joining the next #NASPAtech, since I think this one sounded like it was such a success. High five @NASPAtweets & everyone who brought their #SAtech ideas/thoughts to the conference and backchannel.

AcAdv, nacada, NACADA Tech, PLN, Social Media, web 2.0

Getting Connected With More #AcAdv at #NACADA11

October 10, 2011October 10, 2011 Laura Pasquini

“NACADA. It’s like a family reunion you want to go to.” ~George Steele

I agree. The Global Community for Academic Advising has been a great group of advising professionals who I am happy to say are in my personal learning network. Many of its members have been in my own learning network for quite some time. I often engage with the #AcAdv community online and during our regular weekly chats. Many of these professionals in advising and connected to NACADA have been there to support me as a sounding board for a project or just to ask advice during a career transition. Last week’s #NACADA11 conference in Denver was a great way to connect and re-connect with advising pros from around the world to share some new ideas and of course have a bit of a chat.

A BIG Thanks goes out to the #NACADA11 Social Media dream team. This great group of advising pros kept the blogging and tweeting alive in the backchannel — while snapping photos and capturing videos. The Twitter backchannel was fantastic, and thanks to Paul Cox we have an excellent archive of the #NACADA11 Tweet HERE: http://bit.ly/NACADA11

I am happy to say that the #NACADA11 Tweet up was a smash! Around 65 advising friends showed up on Monday night sporting their Twitter buttons (created by Starfish) to the Yard House. It was so great to meet so many tweeting advisors IRL and get to know them beyond 140 characters.

Hoo-ray for the rocking #AdvTech Commission meeting! We tried to do some “speed-dating” intros to get to know the cast of characters around the room.

Since Clay is passing the NACADA Technology in Advising Commission Chair throne to me this year, I look forward to getting more of this bright group involved and supporting @NACADA’s move forward with technology. We are a connected & networked group, so one of the first points of collaboration at #NACADA11 was with the NACADA #LGTBA Commission get their NACADA: It Gets Better video channel fired up [Thanks Brian, Julie & Paul]. Are you a NACADA member interested in joining the #AdvTech Commission, but were not able to be there in person in Denver? Here’s the NACADA #AdvTech Sign Up Sheet.

The best part of the #NACADA11 conference, like any conference for me, is always the people. I look forward to staying in touch and continuing the conversation beyond the annual conference. Advisors are social. NACADA has a few ways for advising professionals to stay connected & social online:

Read the NACADA Blog: http://nacada.wordpress.com/

Central hub for social media with access to Twitter, Flickr, and Facebook
Comment on quick recaps of major events, videos, pictures, links, and more

Follow NACADA on Twitter: http://twitter.com/nacada

Tweeting about conference cancellations, schedule changes, and reminders
Use the Twitter Search http://search.twitter.com/ for tweets with #nacada, #AdvCon, #AcAdv #NACADAR{insert your region number here} , #AdvTech

View NACADA Flickr Photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nacada/

Features photos and albums during and after the conference
Start an account and add your photos to the NACADA Flickr Group:http://www.flickr.com/groups/nacada10/

Like NACADA on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/NACADA

Post your comments, photos, and engage with other members
Periodic updates will be posted during and after the conference

But best of all — we will be able to stay connected on Twitter and engage once a week for the regular #AcAdv Chat! Thanks awesome co-presenters & MOD-ers – @howardsj & @peacox – here is our presentation and handout:

For some of my advising friends who are just getting social with your media, check out the introductory presentation and handouts from @julieclarsen & me:

blogs, Learning Technologies, Reflections

I Tumblr For You… To Reflect.

August 31, 2011August 31, 2011 Laura Pasquini

The Fall semester has been kicked into full swing. I like the smell of a fresh class schedule, used textbooks and new beginnings in the air. This semester I am making a transition to a new job with the Office of Exploring Majors in the Undergraduate Studies department at UNT. This is a new(ish) office on campus that was formed to help support undecided and undeclared majors at the University of North Texas. My new gig (that officially starts tomorrow) is working with these “undecided” students to help support effective academic/life transition into university and explore major/career options.

With this new role, I am instructing a section of the UCRS 1000 – First Year Seminar for Major/Career Exploration. I have been fortunate to teach similar course curriculum at Niagara University and Miami University, so I thought I would take a different spin on student reflections and processing of the various course themes.

I am a fan of blogging as a form of reflection, ideas sharing and document of experiences. I have been blogging with WordPress and Blogger for quite some time. I think that blogs are great spaces for learners to share and archive their transition and exploration in the first semester. For this course, I have decided to explore Tumblr as a blogging platform.

Since Tumblr has been ranked higher than my fav WP blogging engine, I thought it would be best for me to test out this favored space for blogging. I thought the UCRS 1000 course would be a great opportunity to learn (for myself and many of my students) how to use Tumblr and share reflections. In previous posts, I have shared with my thoughts on how digital literacy is lacking among our undergraduate students — so why not model & use an online tool with purpose to learn?

Start Tumblin’

Here are a few resources I have used to set the students and instructors up for success when implementing Tumblr into an learning curriculum:

1. Create your OWN Tumblr account. Play and explore with the blogging platform FIRST. Make it your own. Learn how to use it before you decide you want to use it for a class. Post videos, images, texts, and follow others online.

2. Set up a “go to” class Tumblr Blog. This will be a space for general class announcements, information, resources and model your blogging expectation for your learners. Here is the blog I created for my class this Fall semester: http://ucrs1000atunt.tumblr.com/

3. Outline and post a step-by-step approach that is simple & easy to follow both online on the class Tumblr blog AND in your course syllabus, for example: HOW TO: Create A Tumblr Blog for UCRS 1000 (Thanks to the folks at MakeUseOf for their “how to” ideas for Tumblr http://bit.ly/oy8Ts9)

4. Provide students with insider tips for Tumblr that will be RELEVANT for the class objectives:

Follow a blog or two: Encourage the class to “follow” the primary class blog; ask students their preference for sharing and following other Tumblr blogs with their peers
Uploading a photo: need to find an online JPG or other photos form website sources
Privacy: create a primary Tumblr and then a 2nd Tumblr blog for the class if they want to keep it private (but give the instructor a password so they can read posts)
Tumblr suggestions: there are many that are suggested, but let learners know they are NOT required to do this
Dashboard: When logged into Tumblr you will always return you to the Dashboard view; which is good since this is where text, photos, videos, quotes, etc will be posted and where you can read other blogs that are being followed

5. Academic Expectations: Detail your expectations and purpose for the Tumblr blog posts. Learners need to understand the WHY they are blogging and what you hope they will get out of it for the class. Also detail the specifics of what you require for your each blog post. For example, I told students that images, videos or quotes are welcome since it is a blog; however they are required to include a minimum of 600 words that address each assigned blog topic. Suggest that students draft blog posts in Word document or a text editor before posting online to check for spelling, grammar & proper sentence structure.

6. Follow and/or Bundle: It is easy to “follow” your student back on Tumblr in order to read and learn what they are reflecting about over the semester; however I have found it easier to group the Tumblr blog URLs into a single Google Bundle on my Google Reader (since that’s where I read blogs, news and other updates on a regular basis). These bundles are easy to share with other instructors, TA’s or students in the class as well.

I will keep Tumblin’ along this semester, and keep you posted on how this learning experience goes. Do you use Tumblr for learning or teaching? If so, please share your tips, thoughts & experiences.