Chapter 5

 In chapter 5 we begin to explore some new tools that allow us to expand and bolster our Personal Learning Networks (PLN's). Apps and software that is so commonly used on a day-to-day basis are able to improve your network in innumerable ways. Twitter and Google Drive are two perfect examples of everyday apps that when utilized correctly can take you to the next level of your career. "You do not need to be a Web expert to take advantage of these tools(Twitter, Google Drive) many of them are used widely because they are easy to use." (Hall, 74)  Although public domain apps such as Wikipedia have been frowned on by communities of educators , this chapter gives us some insight on how crucial public domain/ contribution based apps can be to our development in our careers. In addition to these apps we also take a look at social bookmarking and tagging as a means of organizing the content you access online. 




Using all of the PLN strategies we spoke about in chapter 5, I can continue growing my own network of future music educators. Having access to this information has made the idea of growing my network easier to comprehend and made it seem less daunting as a many-year journey. I always looked at Twitter/X as a goofy kind of social network where there was more NSFW content than anything else but reading these past two chapters has given me insight into how I can use it to further my PLN. Google drive has always been a part of my education but rarely a part of my career, after reading I see several new and professional uses I could get out of it such as simultaneous file share with live updates and the ability to color and image code your entire portfolio. These will both help me in my future career as a music educator. As someone who will constantly be sharing files and needing to move documents around, Google drive will allow me to have peak organization and Twitter will allow me to stay relevant in up and coming trends as a teacher. If you could design an app that was created with the purpose of making parts of your job easier, what would it be? And, what would you call it?



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