Cultivating a PLN

When I first began learning about a PLN, I was worried.  Not because of I’m afraid of technology but because I feared I would get sucked in and lose track of time.  After playing and getting more comfortable with Diigo, Twitter, and YouTube, I had to make the conscious decision to learn the art of time balance.  While I do see that these components of my PLN can be used to learn more about my work, they could not take priority to preparing my proposal and completing the many tasks of a school administrator.

Don’t get me wrong, I very much see the value is using a PLN.  I am hooked and I will continue to use it.  As a matter of fact, at last month’s staff meeting, I showed all  of my teachers how to use twitter, tweetdeck, diigo, and igoogle.  I also shared Jeff’s idea that he has learned more since using his PLN than the time prior to his PLN use.  This quote resonates with me because I can easily see how this can be the case. There is so much valuable information being directed to you. In addition, you can take an active role and share your knowledge with others.

I took the initiative to start a #homelessEd hashtag because I saw this focus missing on twitter.  I am hopeful that with proper cultivation, that hashtag can become a rich source of information for educators serving students experiencing homelessness.

Another area of personal growth has come from the exploration of the world of Google.  I am seeing that google is the key to the world.  There are some many applications that I started using because of this class: docs and forms, YouTube, calendar, music, igoogle, and google+.  The beauty is that every single one of these has an application of for my workplace.  I can directly use each of these in my role as a school leader.  Moreover, teachers could certainly integrate these applications with their more direct work with students.

I’m excited to see how technology will evolved in the next coming years and decades.  As an educator, the key will be to continue to stay up to date, dedicate time, and learn from and teach others.  

Reflections of the journey toward cultural proficiency

Lessons Learned

I learned two valuable lessons from conducting my interviews:  1) there can be a significant difference on particular topic depending a person’s cultural experiences and 2) in general, people are willing and comfortable talking about sensitive topics such as race, religion or faith, ableness etc.  

I interviewed a couple of family members for this project.  While interviewing them was fascinating, I was more impressed by the stark differences of perspectives on issues such as gender roles, religion, education, etc.  I was really struck by this because I also had some areas that were very different from my family members.  Logically, I suppose I know that but I guess I expected something different when I looked at my own family members and all of our experiences.  This reinforced the message that Dr. Lindsey shared in class: “There is diversity among groups.”

Next Steps

At Monarch School, there is much work to be done in the area of cultural proficiency.  I believe we need to continue having discussions about race and the achievement gap but we also need to include other components of culture.  Although my current school site serves students experiencing homelessness, we do not currently offer formal training on how to effectively work with people from this socioeconomic group.

When I think of our school’s work, I truly believe we are committed and dedicated to serve our students.  However, commitment and dedication may not be enough if we are not reaching stages of cultural competence or proficiency.  Specifically, I want to look closer at how to best serve our students and their families.   Jonathan Kozol wrote a book titled Rachel and Her Children: Homeless Families in America.  In the next month, I will read this book and assess the possibility of using it as a book club with our staff and board members.  It is critical we change our paradigm from “our kids are underperforming and how can we ‘save them’” to recognizing that our students have so much to contribute and valuing and using those resources they bring.  Equally important will be to advance on the cultural proficiency continuum and identify areas where we are not serving our students effective.  We need to become more self-accountable.