HHES Within-School PLNs
As a third grade teacher at Harford Hills Elementary School in Baltimore County, I find myself constantly looking for new ideas that cover a variety of topics all the time. I am always discovering new ideas on my global PLNs, such as Twitter, Instagram, or Pinterest; however, I also am able to find resources within my school as well. I collaborate with my teammates on a daily basis, discussing ways to differentiate instruction, classroom management routines, other ways to incorporate technology, etc. Even though this is a small group, this is still considered a PLN because we are connecting on a professional level and exchanging different ideas. Below, you will find three other ways I am able to connect to not only just my teammates, but also other teachers in my school building.
Shared Drive
In every school, faculty and staff should have access to a Shared Drive, which is a computer drive accessible to all teachers on any school computer or device. At HHES, this is an easy and quick way to share ideas with colleagues. The shared drive is filled with several folders with different titles, such as each grade level, PD Resources, Data, etc. All teachers have the ability to create or modify folders on the shared drive, as well as save files so that everyone who has access to the shared drive can use the resources. This is a great way for teachers to share things they have tried in their own classrooms or gather new ideas from some of their work colleagues.
HHES Twitter
At HHES, I run the school-wide Twitter account. On this account, visitors will find pictures or videos of things the students and/ or faculty are doing around our school. My colleagues simply send me the photos or videos with a brief description, and I post it to the account for them. This is a way for parents to connect to the school and see what is going on inside many of the classrooms. This account is also used to post any updates that may need to be noted to parents regarding school events. As teachers, we are not able to visit other teachers as much as we would like to, so this is a great way for us to stay connected and see what is happening down the hall or on the other side of the building.
Follow our HHES Twitter!
At HHES, e-mail is the prodominant source of communication between faculty memebers. It is the easiest and quickest way to send a message to another teacher, especially during the school day when you are unable to leave your classroom. We often use a distribution list in order to share updates or new ideas with all teachers in the building. It is also helpful if a teacher has a question. He/she can send the question and whoever is able to answer can simply reply to that specific person or everyone. This year, I found myself helping many teachers with technology issues or sharing ideas of how to incorporate technology tools into daily lessons, especially since all students in grades 1-3 had their own devices this year.