Blog #2: Connected Educated Chapter 6

In Chapter 6 of the Connected Educator, the importance of a personal learning community is stressed. The author explains that building ones own network is equally as important as being apart of a community network. Whether that network consists of 15 people or 150 people, creating those connections is extremely beneficial. The author does not fail to mention that this takes a lot of work. When creating your own network there must be some sort of structure that allows the members to express themselves, but still reaches a common goal. The author urges for community involvement and allowing members to assume a roll so they feel their importance as well, and know that their opinion matters. With a good structure, teachers and students will be able to feed off each other. One way that is explained to be a method of building a community is through Twitter. On page 105, the author explains that through Twitter educators are able to "re-visit the ideas shared in a hashtag-driven...chat and work together to make thinking explicit." This is prefaced by explaining that a lot of educators don't always utilize their platforms to build up a network, but there is power in doing so and time should be invested into doing that. All in all "nurturing the network is important" as stated on page 107 because it allows there to be a successful space for learning and for co-creating.

 As someone who is interested in working in the law enforcement field, I feel like the skills   necessary for building a learning community are also necessary skills for the field. Right now the criminal justice system has some major improvements to make. Utilizing the skills of allowing other people to voice their opinions, building a system of order that works, and just basing your practices off the success of others are important. We are the generation of change and so implementing those skills that are necessary for personal learning communities into the real world and building repour in today's world are extremely important.