Early Education Blog

" The Art of Social Media " by  mkhmarketing , licensed under CC BY 2.0   The thought of connecting an early years classroom can be daunting, especially for a first time blogger with a brand new blog page and Twitter account #ECETammy. Where shall I begin? What can young children do? They cannot possibly write blogs or have their own social media accounts! How can we safeguard the children in the process? Where and when am I going to find the right people to connect with, and who might they be? What topic shall we connect about? How can I turn this into meaningful learning for the young learners at my preschool?  At first I limited myself to connecting with an early years classroom in another school setting through video conferencing, where students may interact live, but will this be of interest to other classroom teachers? Then I shifted to thinking about what I would like to share as a learner-educator. What am I passionate about that is worth sharing - sustainabl...

Social media has developed vastly and changed the way people connect. While as life-long learners, educators are blessed to have access to new education research findings, connect with educators alike to build a Personal Learning Network (PLN)  and share best practices from all over the globe at the comfort of their home, the overload of information can be confusing and screening out unrelated data and sourcing the right information can be challenging and extremely time consuming. The convenience of connecting online also sets an expectation for people to offer instant replies, and less popular posts are likely lost amongst the million posts within seconds.  Striking a balance between work and life is already challenging for educators who work a 10 to 11-hour work day. Managing between virtual and in person interactions is an art. Social media may seem to bring people closer together in some ways, but it also sets people further apart as it cannot fully incorporate the persona...

" Connected Learning " by Giulia Forsythe , licensed under CC0 1.0 Universal (Creative Commons Zero) In his speech on Changing Education Paradigm , Sir Ken Robinson shared "Most great learning happens in groups. Collaboration is the stuff of growth."  An educator who seeks for continuous growth and professional development should not work in isolation, but to be connected with the wider professional learning community. Connected educators need to be aware of new educational trends, engage in professional exchanges, be open-minded with feedback, offer constructive feedback to fellow educators, analyze, adapt and experiment new ideas where appropriate, share resources, collaborate with others, regularly reflect on their practice and share any new findings.