I’ve been immersed in a personalized learning experience for over a year now.  I’ve written a good bit about the opportunities for learning that Twitter presents for educators.  Joe Mazza once said Twitter is a 24/7/365 real time professional development tool with access to like-minded professionals.  I’ve carved out such an awesome PLN (professional learning network) in just over a year.  Todd Nesloney is one of those amazing educators I’ve learned from recently.  Todd is principal at Navasota Intermediate, but that’s just one of Todd’s great accomplishments as a young educator.  Todd took the initiative to create a summer learning series himself.  He engaged educators through social media to join him in this summer learning series quest.  Once signed up, you will begin receiving Todd’s weekly emails as part of his summer learning series challenges.  Each week presents a new challenge.   For example, Todd challenged educators by presenting them with videos like this one from Dave Burgess.  Todd created a hashtag on Twitter #summerls so that educators could network and backchannel thoughts and reflections from his learning series.  He also hosts a chat using that hashtag.  Last count that Todd sent out indicated over 1500 educators had signed up for his summer learning series.  What an awesome accomplishment and what an incredible tool!

I just finished teaching a digital leadership course at AFT-WV summer camp for teachers.  I decided to incorporate a version of Todd’s learning series for my participants.  Most of my participants are new to the world of Twitter and certainly new to opportunities available to take control and personalize your learning as an educator.  I took signups through this form and will continue to engage those participants in support as they begin this journey to proactive growth and development through Twitter and other opportunities.

I am still amazed at what technology and connectedness allows us to do as educators.  The model schools conference is now in session down in Orlando Florida.  I’ve never had the opportunity to attend that conference, but I’ve heard and read several good reports from that conference.  Thanks to Twitter and the #22ndMSC hashtag, I’ve been able to follow the events at the conference almost as if I was there myself.  On Sunday evening June 22, I was able to follow Dr. Daggett’s keynote through Twitter.  I caught a glimpse of just how in tune Dr. Daggett’s presentation was with the changes needed by schools today.  What an amazing opportunity provided by technology.  The backchannel discussion during the keynote was full of thoughtful comments that pushed my thinking about school improvement.  I’ve been aware for some time now that the environment students experience inside of school is far different from the one they experience outside of school.  Societal changes brought about by technology have created a tremendous disconnect between the way our students learn outside of school and the way they are forced to learn inside of school.  Effective leadership and effective school improvement acknowledges this gap.  Dr. Daggett’s keynote was full of great information and resources about what, why, and how schools can shift to better engage students in learning for their future.  My favorite quote of the night was “how can we educate today’s students for tomorrow’s future with yesterday’s schools?”

I was given the great opportunity to teach a summer course at AFT-WV’s summer camp for teachers.  I chose to teach a course on digital leadership.  Digital leadership is not just one thing and it’s certainly not just technology.  I modeled the course after Eric Sheninger’s book titled Digital Leadership: Changing Paradigms for Changing Times.  I chose to focus the first two days on the pillars of professional growth & development and communication.  I have tried hard to stray from the typical presenter-based format and simply share my resources and engage the participants in conversations aimed at reflecting on our current practices.  It didn’t take long for the group to agree that the impact that technology has had on society is tremendous.  We acknowledged the pace of change in technology is so rapid that it’s nearly impossible to keep up.  This causes tremendous challenges for schools as they try to adjust, adapt, and transform to remain relevant institutions of learning.  We began to accept that if educators are relying solely on their school and/or district to provide opportunities for growth and development, it’s simply not enough.  Regardless of how effective those opportunities are, the task is simply too tall for any school or district to meet.  As a result, students are beginning to get further and further disconnected from the environments that many educators can provide inside their classrooms.  It is time for educators to take control of their own learning and arm themselves with consistent give and take of communication, collaboration, acquiring resources, eliciting feedback, and sharing ideas, data, strategies, and information.

In the last two days educators in the course have been exposed to Twitter and how it is an effective tool to build a powerful professional learning network.  We also tackled the pillar of communication.  We were so fortunate to have 3 principals meet with us via Google Hangout and share how technology has transformed communication at their schools.  Donald Gately (donald_gately) is the principal at Jericho Middle School in New York.  Donald shared about how effective his video newsletters have been at communicating the awesome things going on in his school building.  Donald has been a vital part of my PLN and I value that things he’s been able to share.  Craig Vroom (@vroom6) is the principal at Hilliard Weaver Middle School in Ohio.  Craig was attending a conference in Cincinnati but literally stepped out of the conference and connected with us via his smartphone in order to share for a few minutes the impact that technology has played on communication, as well as the impact it’s had on his professional growth and development.  I’m so grateful of the impact Craig has had on my own practice thus far.  What an incredible statement was made by his sacrifice to spend a few minutes joining our class and exposing the participants to such excellent models of digital leadership.  Later in the day, Bobby Dodd (bobby__dodd) joined us to share what technology has done for communication at his school.  Bobby is the principal at New Lexington High School in Ohio but will be moving to Lincoln Gahanna High School this coming school year.  Bobby provided our participants an insight into the impacts he’s made on a community not unlike the ones represented in my course.  Many of our participants come from rural communities where broadband access is not afforded to everyone and sometimes computers don’t exist in every home.  Bobby shared ways that his school is able to implement effective solutions despite these challenges.  I really enjoyed Bobby sharing about how his school partnered with several community businesses to provide free unrestricted wifi at their locations.

I’ll be sharing the resources and presentations created throughout this course.  Each of my presentations have been given a URL address that has been accessed by all the participants this week.  I’ve encouraged them to save those resources and share them as they see a need.  A tremendous community of change agents has been developed in such a small amount of time.  I’ll be writing later about the supports we’ve put in place to continue the learning beyond these few days.  More about the digital leadership WV summer learning series later 🙂

My school allows teachers to complete an end of the year evaluation each year.  This is just an effort to allow everyone an opportunity to provide feedback on the strengths and weaknesses of the school and offer suggestions for improvement.  I’ll be sharing a version of my evaluation that is hopefully a help for others.  I have learned so much over the past year from engaging in 24/7/365 professional development on what I want when I want.  I’ve learned from some incredible leaders in the field of education that have been carving out a presence on social media for some time.  These leaders are constantly sharing the successes and failures from their own schools in an effort to allow others to learn and/or provide feedback.  In the past year…

• I’ve attended two Edcamps, co-organizing one myself.  Both of these Edcamps have lead to the opportunity to develop connections with innovative educators like Bobby Dodd and Craig Vroom.
• I got the opportunity to meet and listen to Dave Burgess, author of Teach Like A Pirate.  He’s been the most incredible educational speaker I’ve been fortunate enough to meet.
• I’ve begun reading Eric Sheninger’s book Digital Leadership: Changing Paradigms for Changing Times.  Eric is principal at New Milford High School in New Jersey.  Just read his page about his typical day and you’ll be amazed.
• I’ve engaged in conversations lead by front-line leaders in public education: Brad Currie, Joe Mazza, Rick Wormeli, Tom Murray, Jimmy Casas, Oliver Shinkten and many others.  The biggest reason for my growth as an educator is due to the time I’ve set aside to read tweets, blog posts, and engage in conversations with educators like these.  They have opened my eyes to a world I would have never known otherwise.

All of these things have lead to real, sustainable change in my practice as an educator and a leader.  I’ve had numerous opportunities crop up as a result of my growth and I’ve been able to make some awesome changes to my practice, all of which were not included in this post.  Completing my school survey caused me to reflect on my growth over the past year and I wanted to share it with you.