New Literacies and language learning

66 thoughts on “Teachers’ Self-initiated Professional Learning Through PLNs”

1. I had a similar experience with professional learning through PLN several years ago. At that time, as a new teacher, I asked some questions regarding teaching methods and student management problems on PLNs such as Zhihu or Baidu Forum and sometimes simply read the comments given by other teachers. This experience was to some extent helpful to me as there were a wide range of topics to guide my question search and I was informed of some brilliant ideas that I haven’t thought of.

   In my learning practice, I may still prefer to learn in a more traditional form of professional learning regularly because this provide me with better face-to-face interactions and give me more professional learning opportunities with experts in certain fields. People today are too busy to offer very detailed and constructive suggestions online and therefore are less likely to be tightly-connected with each other. The current PLNs are more like a platform where people randomly browse when they happen to be in the mood. However, I guess those PLNs can still complement the lack of sufficient answers we can possibly get through traditional forms as the virtual community enables us to reach out for a much larger audience.

   • Thank you for your comment, Daniel! You prefer to learn in a more traditional way. But you know, new literacy is an irresistible tendency. If you are going to be a teacher in the future, will you encourage your students to learn through PLN?

2. From my own experience of learning English, PLNs do help me a lot with my critical thinking. Because it allows me to get various ideas from teachers and classmates, which pushes me to think from different angles and be more tolerant and critical. However, on the other side, as stated on the post, information on PLNs are too fragmental. Sometimes I find it hard to make connections between ideas and knowledge, or decide what kind of ideas are suitable and useful for me. I think when using PLNs, teachers may try to become a role like coordinator to solve this problem.

   • Thank you for your comment, Cathy! This is an interesting one. What do you mean by saying “a role like coordinator to solve this problem”? Would you please give us an example?

3. PLN would be better than professional development. However, we do get CPD hours if we attend workshops. After all, it is hard to decide which is better than which.
   As I enjoy sharing my teaching materials with other fellow teachers, perhaps PLN would facilitate better collaboration between other teacher and I. After all, we can learn to use different new apps together. For instance, during the class suspension period, I shared with some of my teacher friends how to record instructional videos for their students to self-study. They also share with me how to use Google Classroom, Loilonote and Microsoft Teams to achieve better-flipped classroom experience.
   With the advancement of technology, it is worthwhile for teachers never to stop learning and to embrace the challenges that are ahead of us. Mastering these challenges also enables us to deliver more quality lessons to our students. The emergence of the MOOC and Learning Management System also allow educators to learn about new IT skills during their spare time.
   Nonetheless, I am also worried that students get to used to typing and using online channels but forgot how to write appropriately, given we have conducted more online teaching nowadays. After all, students are faced with pen and paper when they take the HKDSE exam.

   • Thank you for your comment, Warren. I guess this is the benefit of PLN. I also learned something form you: Google Classroom, Loilonote. Thank you for your sharing. You also mentioned your worry about the lack of handwriting. Do you have any suggestions to balance typing and handwriting?

   • I’m so glad my school principal counts watching youtube videos (of course, the kinds that teach you how to teach) as our CPD hours~ Though I never really dared to write them down. I feel like there’s an impression that watching youtube isn’t learning.

4. Actually, PLN reminds me of Ivan Illich’s learning webs. In his Deschooling Society, he says that, one ideal learning system should fulfill these goals: to provide all that want to learn with access to resources at any time in their lives; make it possible for all who want to share knowledge etc. to find those who want to learn it from them; and to create opportunities for those who want to present an issue to the public to make their arguments known (1973a: 78). And PLN’s existence does make Illich’s dream come true. As a possible English teacher, I might use it as a supplementary resource for my own professional training, because for example, when I cannot think of fun activities which can be used in class, I can resort to others’ suggestions or draw on their experience on this platform.
   However, I won’t use it as the main source, simply because it isn’t systematic, and without guide we novice teachers cannot distinguish between good suggestions and bad ones. Professional training has to be launched by those professional institutions at the beginning of our career, because they can offer us with theory-based and practise-proved-useful knowledge and skills systemically, while what PLN provides are just fragmented ones. Therefore, when a teacher has become an expert, PLN can be good for him.

   • Thank you for your comment, Flora. Hope that you can distinguish the useful resources from the fragmented ones.

5. I think PLN is quite useful for the ideas communication and resources sharing, but in my learning practice, I prefer to mainly acquire traditional forms of professional learning because they are more efficient and systematic, and also are directly to meet my needs. Just as the post said, the information on the PLN is fragmented, therefore, to find the effective information can be time-consuming. However, if consider PLN as a supplement to the traditional forms of professional learning, the problem of time-consuming will be solved. Moreover, PLN will become a ideal platform for practice and communicate what one has learned from a traditional lecture., and much more relevant resource are available on the PLN.

   • Thank you for your comment, Charlotte. You just mentioned the many advantages of PLN. Will you recommend PLN to your friends or colleagues in the future? Why or why not?

6. Thank you for your sharing!

   For my perspective, Personal Leaning Networks are very useful learning platforms. They benefit not only teachers, but also normal university students who will become future teachers. As we all know, apart from teaching practice which normally takes place once per school year, normal university students have little access to real class teaching. However, by resorting to PLN, they can watch teaching videos from experienced teachers form whom something like how to manage class discipline, how to give feedback to students’ response etc. can be learned. All these are related to real class teaching and it is difficult to for normal students to learn them in universities which can only provide simulated classes with no students. Actually when I was an undergraduate student, our teachers did recommend us to learn through some English teaching and research websites and I myself learned a lot like how to design warm-up activities, how to give clear classroom instructions etc. from watching videos of real class teaching. But one problem still exists here, that is, this kind of learning is not systematic and things you learn are separated. If you do not organize what you learn and make some notes, you may forget it very quickly. Therefore, I hold that the traditional form of professional learning should still be the focus, but PLN can be a supplement to it.

   • Thank you for your comment, Sophia. I guess you graduated from a normal university, right? Haha! For the problem that PLN is not systematic, what do you think is the best way to solve that?

7. As for my learning practice, I think I prefer to have the self-initiated way to study. Negatively receiving the knowledge from the outside simply limits my thinking in a certain field and makes me feel being forced to do something. However, when I compare the new online learning, PLN with the traditional forms of professional learning, I think I may still choose the traditional one at first even though in some conditions it has quite a lot constraint, because PLN was still at the beginning stage according to the post. PLN shows us a higher level of learning freedom which is I am willing for, but the users on it are not so professional compared to the traditional ones. The outcome of this way could not provide a comparably equal amount of the useful information that the learner needs in the traditional ones. And the system and standards of PLN is still under developing. Though traditional forms of learning couldn’t neglect the limits of the time and space, we should also realize the education difference under a specific context. It is still doubtful those suggestions offered by other people will be helpful in my specific situation. And through the traditional ways, we could meet the experienced experts and interact with them and other teachers in the same situations with more detailed and direct suggestions to the problems. Therefore, from this perspective, it is more reasonable to put the traditional ways at the first place and supplemented by the PLN. As a supplement, I think PLN could bring us with more creative inspirations that is hard to find in our original learning so as to sufficient our understanding of the knowledge in a more comprehensive view. By the same time, increasing our motivation to learning by talking and making more friends at the same level of learning.

   I think one of the comparably systematic PLN could be some apps for students who are willing to take the entrance examinations of the postgraduates. I have been recommended this by many of my teachers and senior students who had already achieved their goal to further their postgraduate study. In those apps, you can find the other students with the same objectives around the world and you can discuss with them about the preparation materials, difficulties in a certain paper and even encourage each other to keep on learning. I think this is a quite helpful community in this app, but just as the post has mentioned, you can’t expect the strangers on the other side of the line to provide a very useful and detailed suggestions.

   • Thank you so much for your detailed sharing, Connor~
     Your advice of taking traditional learning at first and adding PLN as a supplement later on is very reasonable.
     I also appreciate that you mentioned the use of APPs, which offer the learners a community of same-level students to study more efficiently and encourage each other.

8. Personally speaking, compared to learning through a PLN or in a self-directed way, I’d rather learn through traditional forms of professional learning. In my experience, it’s of critical importance for a new teacher to receive adequate and timely suggestions/advice as well as comments from an experienced teacher, since it’s highly possible that one has no clue at all how to teach at the very beginning. A “predecessor” can provide useful help to them by simply letting them observe classes, or by observing their classes and giving feedback about advantages and shortcomings. Expereinced teachers can also help new teachers resolve classroom management problems more effectively. All these activities above somehow require faec-to-face interaction for the perfect effect. While on the Internet, feedbacks from anyone would be much less vivid and efficient.
   I’ve had a similar experience with professional learning through PLN. When I first started teaching English in a primary school, there weren’t any really experienced English teachers to guide my teaching, therefore I resorted to an onlilne teaching forum/database (I forget the name) where numerous recorded sample classes by experienced teachers from all over China are available at a click of mouse. I watched these classes over and over again and jotted down some of the phrases the teachers frequently used when managing the class discipline or transitioning from one part to the next one(eg. from revision to introduction). I then tried to apply these strategies/phrases in my own classes, and found out some of them worked while others didn’t. Anyways, the forum really helped me a lot.

   • Tina, I absolutely agree with you that PLN cannot replace traditional learning. Just like under the novel coronavirus condition, we use ZOOM to learn instead of the traditional face-to-face learning. PLN helps in a way, but traditional learning is irreplaceable.

9. I personally prefer to learn through PLN for several reasons. First, usually I get to choose to learn about topics that I am interested in or relevant to my teaching (e.g. problems I face). It’s hard to find seminars or workshops on the exact topic that I want to learn. Secondly, it’s convenient to learn on PLNs. I can start and stop whenever I want and wherever I am. I do dread going to a 3-hour seminar (even good ones).

   I like your analysis on the pros and cons. It does take time to find good resources online. Sometimes it’s a hit or miss with youtube videos. For example, today I just spent 15 mins skimming through 3 videos that I hope would give me tips on how to teach online through zoom, but they turned out to be irrelevant. It’s also true that content provided on PLNs are fragmented, as you say. I’d say they are usually more hands-on, frontline teaching tips that could solve problems but couldn’t give you perspective or the philosophy behind those skills. For the latter, which is essential in the long-run, one needs to go to books or take a course.

   • I have to admit that e-learning products sometimes frighten me because I am not familiar with all those dazzling fonctions, which may take me a lot of time. Plus, PLN do provide us massive materials, but sometimes it feels like looking for a needle in a bottle of hay when we look for something. It’s overwhelming!

10. Personally speaking, I prefer to learn through more traditional forms of professional learning compared to through a PLN or in a self-directed way. From my expereince, it’s of critical importance for an inexpereinced new teacher to receive various kinds of assistance and guidance from an experienced teacher. A new teacher is very likely to have no clue at all about how to teach at the very beginning, by observing classes conducted by their “predecessors” , they can be inspired about forming their own teaching style, they can also immitate some strategies used by experienced teachers. On the other hand, expereinced teachers can provide suggesions/advice as well as advantages and shortcomings of new teachers’ classes too after observing them. While on the Internet, suggestions from anyone would be much less vivid and efficient.
    I do have a similar experience with professional learning through PLN. When I frist stared teaching in a primary school, there weren’t any really experienced English teachers at school, therefore I resorted to an online database/forum where numerous recorded sample classes by experienced teachers from all over China are available with a click of mouse. By watching the classes online , I learned many phrases and tactics the teachers used when managing the discipline or transitioning from one section to the next(e.g. from revision to introduction), I then applied what I learned into practice and found most of them helpful.

    • It is true that PLN for teachers could only be much beneficial when we receive comments of our classroom observation from experienced teachers. However, we can also learn a lot if we can read the comments of a demo online lesson from other teachers. These suggestions on the advantages and shortcomings may serve as a reference for new teachers to improve their own lesson in the future.

11. Through the group works and discussions on canvas, I have learned a lot by viewing my Classmates’ and teachers’ comments. But to tell the truth, I would still prefer to learn through more traditional forms of professional learning when I was a novice because the learning through PVN is not systematic enough, and I think it is essential to “get it right at the beginning.” And another reason is that the other users may comment mostly positive words on your ideas, which may blur your thinking and learning. We can supplement the traditional ones when we already have the basic knowledge of English teaching, and thus, our learning would be more comprehensive since we can absorb those meaningful and useful ideas shared through the PVN.

    • I agree that learning through PLN is not systematic enough since we cannot always enaure whether comments or suggestions from other users are professional or not. Sometimes they could not point out some of our mistakes authentically. Therefore, I would suggest that PLN can be served as a supplement for language learning instead of the main tool.

12. 1.In your learning practice, do you prefer to learn through a PLN, aggregating and discussing resources in a self-directed way, or through more traditional forms of professional learning? Why? How might a PLN supplement traditional forms of professional learning?
    2.Have you had a similar experience with professional learning through PLN? If yes, please share one of your experiences with us.
    I don’t really have a preference for a PLN or a more traditional form of professional learning. I would say the combination of both would be better. The more traditional way might be too teacher-centered. There are a lot of IRF practices. PLN can add more peer interaction into the learning, facilitating critical thinking and self-learning.
    I think the learning pattern we are having now is a kind of PLN. We are writing comments here replying to certain topics. We use the discussion function on Canvas. We cowrite on google doc to share ideas, etc. I also agree that the negative point may be neglected in the process, especially when we cannot come up with an idea and then we take other people’s ideas as ours and cannot produce output sometimes.

    • I agree that our discussion on this virtual space is a kind of PLN, since we can share our thoughts and receive some excellent insights from others, which can facilitate our learning. It is also true that our ideas might be stolen by others. Therefore, it would be better if discussion forums can have a reprint permission button like Zhihu to avoid plagarism.

13. I think both PLN and traditional forms have their own place for language teachers. While if I am a green hand, I prefer traditional form more since it can give me a comparatively full picture within a shorter period of time about the teaching field which should be the basic structure for my future teaching and research. If a new teacher are facing endless information without a clear structure at the very beginning, they are more likely to get confused and lost in the knowledge world. However, for much more experienced teachers who has formed their own characteristics or teaching styles, it should be a better choice to use the PLN more because they need to both find the likeminded partners to get support and listen to different opinions to avoid fossilization of their teaching methods. And they can find a balance between the two more easily with a more mature attitude about teaching.

14. I would say I prefer the combination of both, just like what we have in this MA program. One reason this my learning habits have been formed by taking traditional learning, and PLN requires more learner autonomy. PLN does not have that instant feedback from instructors and peers compared with the traditional one. On the other hand, PLN provides more interactive and convenient ways for us to assess to learning materials and interactive activities.
    I am actually impressed by Canvas and Zoom as I don’t have such platforms before. I like the function that people can upload learning materials on PLN, I remembered back to my BA, I often approached to teachers after class to enquire them if I can have a copy of their PPT, which was really inconvenient. Before and after the physical instruction, teachers can conduct discussions and quizzes on PLN to help students have a better understanding of the course. But for teachers to combine PLN, it all depends on whether to school have such platforms or resources, otherwise it would be demanding for teachers.

15. Thank you for sharing such an interesting topic.

    Learning from your post, I think both forms have their merits. We can construct a systematic and critical knowledge framework through traditional forms of professional learning, which is a more efficient way for the beginners, since it is quite time consuming to struggle for selecting useful but fragmented sources. If there is an experienced teacher to consult, you won’t feel confused and get lost in the field you learn. However, after accumulating a certain amount of professional knowledge and practical experience, the importance of PLN is embodied. When we encounter bottleneck or some specific issues, we can socialize with other people in the same field and get support from them through PLN. And we can also absorb the latest resources in our field.

    • I agree that PLN can be helpful when other users who gave comments are professional teachers. If our PLN include users from the same academic field, we can get more professional insights from others.

16. Compared to traditional forms of professional learning, I tend to prefer Personal Learning Network (PLN) where people can share their knowledge, ideas as well as experience about any topics at any time in any digital spaces. However, when it comes to traditional forms, they usually happen periodically and cover limited subject matters. Taking teachers’ professional learning like workshops and lectures as an example, it is more likely to happen during the summer vacation and on weekends. What’s more, due to its limited time, it hardly makes room for participants to connect the content with their own contexts to build understanding and it fails to offer chances for participants to learn skills and strategies by trying them out. However, with the help of PLN, it enables us to try and collaborate with other teachers, give feedback and reflect more effectively. Meanwhile, the best way for personal development is combine traditional forms and PLN together.

    Actually, I had some experience with professional learning through PLN. In Mainland China, a wide range of forums are provided online. When preparing for IELTS, topsage club did offer me plenty of useful resources, like recommended books, vocabulary list, preparation websites and so on. The questions students raise are responded quite quickly.

    • Thank you for your comments, Catherine. You have proposed me topsage club, I will try it and find if it is efficient and I can recommend it to my students.
      And I totally agree with you that the best way for personal development is to combine the traditional forms with PLN.

17. Generally speaking, I prefer a more traditional form of professional learning. I have to say that learning through PLN is convenient and it makes learning more accessible. As long as you have a digital device and internet, learning can occur. Learning in a more traditional way, however, keeps reminding the learners of their learning focuses and it leads to higher efficiency. In a traditional lecture, they normally are well aware of their learning objectives at the beginning, and reminded to review or led to review what has been taught at the end of the class. Moreover, teachers give a lecture of one topic and learners learn it who are not easily distracted. The knowledge or opinions contributed by other learners through PLN is not neccessarily and exactly about the topic being discussed. In other words, it is fragmented requiring learners’ scrutiny and summary.
    Learning through PLN can be implemented out of class, before or after. For the limited time allowed in class, learners cannot gain much access to much knowledge about a specific topic. Learners can acquire more with the help of PLN according to their interest and time. The effort teacher can invest before and in class is also limited so his/her opinions of him/her is probably restricted. Learners are able to communicate with other learners in order to broaden their mind.

    • Thanks for your comments, Olivia. I agree with you that the traditional forms can make learners more focused on the topic and their learning objectives. And I think you mention a good point that learning through PLNs can be implemented before or after class.

18. Personally speaking, I tend to use a traditional way as a main source for teaching and a PLN as a supplementary resource. We are unexperienced teachers who hasn’t established an overall system of teaching. In other words, we may not know some basic theories on how to teach such as how to simply design a reading class, how to motivate our students or how to choose different materials for different learners. This sort of knowledge can be learned more effectively through a traditional way like reading some monographs on teaching or attending relevant teaching courses rather than a PLN undoubtedly. Therefore, I think we need to learn from a traditional way to build a systematic methodology for teaching in the first place and then we can resort to a PLN to search for some thought-provoking and up-to-date teaching materials to be more in line with the modern teaching trend.
    Recently, I am using a PLN for teaching. I have attended a voluntary program launched by an HKU student which aims to help high school students in Hubei province learn English. I am in a Wechat group which contains nearly 500 teachers all over the China. Many teachers share lots of learning materials for free every day. Some of them are quite useful, whereas some are not that helpful, which requires we teachers to be discerning. And whenever a teacher encounters a teaching problem, he can send a message in the wechat group and many other teachers would help him. I find this PLN quite useful as it helps me tackle with teaching problems much more effectively although it has some downsides.

    • Thank you for your comments, CoCo. You mentioned an important point that we are now inexperienced teachers. So it may be better for us to begin with traditional ways and than use PLNs as supplemental methods.

19. In terms of my learning practices, the combination of both would be the best choice. If I have to choose one, I would give my preference to the traditional forms. The first reason is that we can get other teachers’ responses and give feedbacks instantly through real-time face-to-face discussion. In this case, we can quickly make adjustments to our teaching according to the enlightenments through discussion. Otherwise, through the long-term communication on PLN, the improvement of the class and students’ progress would be delayed. Secondly, teaching context is a crucial element in teaching. Traditional forms of professional learning are often restrained to a specific teaching context, for example, primary school English teaching in Zhejiang Province. Teachers from Zhejiang province can get together to discuss some English teaching issues particularly happen in its context. We use the same textbook and follow the same curriculum, so the practices and research findings would be more practical and applicable to implement into daily teaching practice in Zhejiang province. And thanks to the PLN platform, it does make up for the deficiencies of the traditional forms. Through PLN platform, we can easily approach to the world’s latest educational researches and examples on how they bring new notions into the classroom teaching. Therefore, I think we can combine both in this mode like daily massive research sharing on PLN and Small-group discussion about the specific teaching context on traditional forms.

    • Thank you for your comments, Kystal. I’ve noticed that most of you consider the better way is to combine traditional ways with PLNs. And many of you even prefer traditional forms, so do I. I agree with you that in face to face case, we can quickly make adjustments

20. Thanks for your sharing. Learning through the personal learning network is a useful and efficient way for novice teachers to seek advice on some teaching problems and gain some hands-on experience. It is a place where both novice and in-service teachers could share their initial teaching experience, we might mend and innovate our teaching methods according to their teaching practice. It also breaks the restriction of traditional patterns, having realized student functions such as online learning, asking questions, upload and download the teaching materials in gleam. So does it mean that we can abandon the traditional forms of professional learning? Definitely not, personally, the traditional one still has its unique advantage. We can systematically learn practical techniques of teaching English at home and abroad as well as how to design a scientific and logically feasible course.

    Actually, I have some experience with professional learning through PLN. Lack of systematic knowledge about the teaching methods and detailed instruction from my advisor, I was completely overwhelmed before delivering my first lesson. Thanks to the PLN, I can get access to the teaching materials like some powerpoints and applicable handouts for better delivering the course. However, when it comes to some VCRs of famous teachers’ lessons, most of those teaching approaches are applicable while some of them didn’t work with my students because they are not at the same level as the learners in the videos.

    In the future, I will still regard the traditional form of professional learning as the predominate pattern, supplemented by learning through PLN. It’s also worth noting that we should learn through PLN critically but not mechanically.

    • Thanks for your comments, Yvaine. I agree that in traditional ways of teaching, we can practice the teaching methods and approaches, which can be more efficient than talking and sharing.

21. Thanks for sharing.

    As for me, I would like to take the combination of both forms because each of them has different advantages. PLN requires more learner autonomy while traditional ways is more instructor-guided. I would say the best way to learn is implementing traditional forms with the support of PLN. Instructors can collect and organize the fragmented materials into comprehensive knowledge. It is time-consuming for individual learners to integrate knowledge though it is beneficial to student’s learning.
    However, PLN might not be a efficient option for novice learner since it requires time, self-discipline and a certain level of knowledge base.

    • Thank you for your comment, WANG A! Right, it is definitely a good way to combine the traditional forms of learning and PLN together. If you take full advantage of them and balance them, it will be really helpful for your professional learning.

22. I previously experienced the PLN for professional learning. I bought the online class series of IELTS writing, hoping to learn some useful techniques for my own teaching. The course is said to welcome both students who are preparing for IELTS and teachers who teach IELTS. That is a well-known course with a famous instructor, but my experience was not so satisfying. Firstly, the instructor spent quite a lot of time to analyze and comment on students’ written assignment, which sometimes occupied the whole 90-min class. Though it is also a good way to reflect on my own judgment towards IELTS writing, the effects of each session are not so salient. Secondly, some students asked some ridiculous (or stupid) questions, which I believe they should have figured out elsewhere or by themselves before they signed up for this class (because this class is for advanced learners). To answer their questions also occupied a lot of class time. Besides, the instructor and his assistant did set up Wechat group for communication. Most of the members ask only for scoring for assignment. Though it is OK to contact the instructor or assistant privately, the efficiency is not so high because they also need to reply to a large number of students, which is understandable but a little bit disappointing.

    Of course, I did learn something from the course and refresh my mind to some certain extent. But I want to mention that the self-learning way is far from perfect because you may not have reliable resources to count on during the process. Therefore, I personally prefer the self-learning way combining the traditional way as I do enjoy the self-controlling part but also have some reliable counselors or people in charge for better catchup.

    • Thank you for your comment, Phoebe! And I am sorry to hear about that you have such an unsuccessful experience with PLN. Don’t feel down. Nothing is perfect. If you are prudent with PLN, I believe in the future, you will learn a lot from that.

23. In my learning practice, l would prefer to learn through more traditional forms of professional learning. Despite the fact that PLN is indeed an efficient and wonderful platform for me to receive the latest information and to exchange ideas, one of its advantages might be the confusion instead. That is its endless resources. It is always difficult to make a choice. Moreover, a systemical knowledge structure is quite important for teachers. What we have access to on PLN is not integrated but fragmented.

    • Thank you for your comment, Brenda. Maybe you can have a try next time. The more you use it, the more you will get familiar with choosing the right resource.

24. To be frank, I prefer to learn through the more traditional form of professional learning that is to say the face to face academic forum and classrooms. The problem is on me not the technology, because it is hard for me to arrange time properly when everything needs to be done by the Internet. The other reason is that I do prefer the face to face communication which means there is less distractions.

    • Thank you for your comment, Tiffany! I see, you are easy to get distracted when you are surfing the Internet. Maybe it is better for you to use the traditional way. But you can also have a try and try to control yourself not to be attracted by other things on the Internet.

25. I prefer traditional professional learning over PLN. I’m more familiar with how traditional professional learning operates and the use of PLN may cause anxiety and failure of getting involved, although PLN would offer me more existing resources and guidances. What PLN can supplement traditional professional learning is self-initiation. Over the course of developing teaching professionalism, teachers will go through an active process rather than passive one.

    • Thank you for your comment, Alex! Maybe you can try to use PLN next time. Except what you have mentioned, there are some other advantages that PLN has, such as social network.

26. I think most of us have had such similar learning experience in PLN. One advantage of PLN from my previous learning is that teachers can have various information of one topic in which they have encountered problem and puzzles. However, it is also challenging for teachers to select useful information from the huge data. And sometimes knowledge in PLN is well-organized and users just copy it down without any difficulty. My preference would still go to professional learning because it provides many chances for me to deduct and induct the knowledge. But sometimes PLN can assist professional learning.

    • Yes, I think many people(including me) have the same feeling that PLN can be time-consuing to some extent. A course about how to retrieve from the database can be helpful.
      You also mentioned that you prefer professional learning to PLN. Well, according to the materials, PLN can also be a way of profetional learning. The corresponding type of PLN is traditional learning I think. You think PLN is not professional maybe because its data is not systematical enough, right?

27. I would say that the combination of both PLN and traditional forms of professional learning
    seems to be the most effective way for me to improve my learning and teaching, but I am more accustomed to PLN since it minimizes the time and cost on finding out learning resources and gives me inspirations on teaching. As a possible ESL teacher in the future, without much teaching experience at the moment, I think peer support is very important and necessary for me, and through PLN, I am able to rebuild my confidence in improving my teaching approaches or regain the fun of teaching by having other teachers’ support on the internet, at least I know that I am not alone and there are still many voices supporting me.

    Nevertheless, traditional forms of professional learning is irreplaceable for me. Online resources sometimes might not be suitable in my teaching contexts and therefore learning from other experienced teachers in my teaching contexts are essential. I believe that it’s more systematic to learn from them in terms of issues like curriculum design, classroom management, teacher-student relationship and so on.

    • yeah, peer support is very helpful. The beauty of PLN is that you will feel connected and have a sense of belonging. You can make friends and gain confidence along with your learning process.
      We should also proceed from actual facts and choose the proper way of learning as you mentioned.

28. I prefer to learn through traditional forms of professional learning. I think the learning process is more systematic than learning through PLN. The teaching materials are usually written by many excellent teachers according to successful teaching experience. The lectures are well-organized by professors, so that new teachers can get systematic training.
    Although through PLN, teachers can get newest materials easily and it allows teachers to share ideas with each other, it still can’t replace the traditional way of professional learning. It is difficult to distinguish whether the information shown in Internet is applicable for teaching. In addition, some people might give some wrong suggestions for others.
    I think PLN can be a supplement for teachers to catch up with the latest information about teaching. Teachers can also improve their teaching skills in their spare time. However, it can’t be the only way for teachers to improve their teaching or exchange information with other teachers.

    • Hi Eva, thank you for your constructive suggestions of combining these two learning approaches.
      Inexperienced learners have to spend lots of time to select and evaluate the authenticity of the information through PLN. In this case, traditional learning is much more efficient and trustworthy.
      A combination of these two would be wise!

29. Thanks for sharing!

    Honestly speaking, I prefer the traditional form of learning, through which I could receive a more systematic knowledge structure. That’s because in traditional classroom, there are specific learning objectives, organized input and interactive output activities for students to obtain and grasp existing research results and essence indirectly and systematically. Furthermore, traditional form also includes assessment and evaluation step, which means students have to summarize, sort and memorize and apply what they have learned so that they can consolidate what they have learned more systematically. Compared with it, PLN is more fragmental. Sometimes it is hard to figure out which approaches are better due to the lack of scientific or sufficient research support. But in spite of this fact, it is also an effective platform for teachers to collaboratively come up with new ideas or opinions from different angles to supplement what cannot be obtained from the traditional form.

    • Hi Jiaxin, thank you for your informative response to the questions.
      You have demonstrated the advantages of traditional learning in detail, which is very impressive! If I am going to choose from traditional learning and PLN, I will make the same choice as you: the former is dominant and the latter is supplementary.

30. Personally, I usually use the traditional forms of learning, but sometimes I also choose PLNs to improve my learning. It seems that I do not prefer to one method, as both of them may help me a lot. I think one of the advantages of PLN is related to people’s motivation. People ask PLN for help based on their own needs, then to large extent what they ultimately get can be the information they need and the knowledge they want to know. It provides a great number of resources in a short time, which may make the use of PLN very targeted for individuals. However, just as this network gives people access to various sources of information, the accuracy of the information provided by other users might be a bit difficult to verify. So the potential flaw may be that people need to spend some effort to judge and choose those that are really effective and meaningful. Traditional forms of professional learning may be better in this regard. I remember I once used PLN to prepare for a certain exam. Originally I had known very little about the knowledge involved in that exam, but after turning to PLN, I quickly found a lot of effective information and it gave me the opportunity to compare the experience and suggestions provided by others. It really helped a lot.

    • Hi Julie, thaks for your sharing.
      I can tell that you are a rather mature learning since you won’t have bias on any learnig approach. Instead, you make the best use of these two. With traditional learning ,you learn effectively and systematically. With PLN, you enhance your ability to assess a great number of resources and enrich your knowledge of certain field. That’s very ijmpressive.

31. I prefer to learn by traditional forms of professional learning if I have an urgent need to acquire certain knowledge. The traditional ways of professional training are more systematic and thus easier for learners to obtain the core information. But from the perspective of a lifelong learner, PLNs will be my first choice as they can provide up-to-date knowledge. And the problems occurring in teaching process are sometimes unpredictable, PLNs could offer some hints about how to solve them by referring to others teachers’ experiences. From the above, I think the traditional forms of professional learning could work as an emergence service to foster teachers’ teaching abilities while the PLNs could work as a search engine to deal with some problems which are out of expectation.

32. Thank you for your sharing! personally speaking, I would pretty much choose a more traditional way of learning as I’m really fond of interacting with other learners and sharing informations face-to-face. Because in a real-life conversation, there are lots of messages and codes ready for you to receive which in most cases cannot be observed through Personal Learning Network, such as subtle facial expressions, body gestures and personal moods. Receiving and understanding those codes can attribute to more meaningful conversations and thus collecting more useful knowledge for the learner. Thus, we can apply PLN as a supplementary tool to traditional learning and hopefully we can acquire more up-to-date resources and frequent hints and feedbacks from experienced learners.

    • Agree ! And since some subtle information may be not appropriate to discuss in the online platforms publicly, the face-to-face interaction becomes more important. But we’d better know how to use PLN as a supplement of our learning, because the information in the networks is resourceful too

33. In my view, PLN could be a supplement to the traditional way of learning. First of all, we could find any context that we are intersted in which can motivate our language learning. Another advantage may be there are more possibility for us to find partners to learn together and exchange our ideas. However, it could be time-consuming for us to find the text we are interested in and we might get lost in the endless resources that you mentioned. Any way, PLN could be self-motivated while it requires self-police. In my opinion it would be better if I regard it as a supplement.

34. Thank you for the post and your organization is pretty neat and clear. As a learner, I prefer traditional ways of learning than a PLN. Although PLN can supplement our learning with more self-directed information and resources, we may still need formal instructions from the teachers face to face. But it’s better for us to use PLN more frequently, because in online forums, there will be more people who have the similar learning experiences and can provide advice to you.
    I have learned through PLN when I was preparing for a job interview two years ago, and I need to know some basic knowledge about marketing and PR, and useful advice from the people who have already got the job. I downloaded a lot of lectures and files from a business forum and I posted some questions for detailed information about that company and the industry which I’m going to work for. Although I was not a teacher back then, I assume that it will be a good idea to learn form others through PLN after being a new-comers in school.

35. Personally speaking, I prefer to learn through a PLN because it is more effective than learning in the traditional way. I can search the topics that I want to learn from different Internet platforms and then choose the one I need. For example, if I want to learn some methods of teaching intensive reading, I can find some related resources, including academic articles, lectures and seminars, which can provide me lots of ideas to enhance my teaching skills. In addition to learning by myself, I can also exchange ideas with different teachers online and gain many useful advice about teaching methods.

36. Thanks for sharing.
    Personally, I would prefer to learn through PLNs, because then I get to choose what to learn and in what way I develop. It offers many more choices and presents a wide variety of possibilities for me. However, learning through this way requires a high level of self-discipline as well as self-recognition. Otherwise, you might guide yourself in the wrong direction and not even notice the hazard you are taking. In that case, learning through traditional ways is more safe, since oftentimes there is a tested system and guaranteed outcome. And in reality, I would like to adopt these two methods at the same time, so I can enjoy the benefit from both sides.

Comments are closed.