Reflexive Pins

I've tried to use Pintrest many times. My friends use it and post wonderful things, and I wanted to be a part of that, so I made an account. And while I'm usually good at picking up new things, for whatever reason I couldn't use Pintrest. I would click on a picture of some lovely-looking cookie and get a picture, not a link. I would find something interesting to pin to my dance board and not be able to figure out how to get the Pin It button on my toolbar, even though I thought I loaded it. And so I decided that I didn't need to use Pintrest. I'm not usually so visual (I prefer to write than draw, for instance), and this was one social network in which I didn't need to participate.

So I was skeptical last week when Jessica presented her reflexive Pintrest board.

I thought about it over the weekend and opened up my Pintrest account for the first time in a very long time and tried to think how this could possibly be useful for reflection. I came up with nothing and closed the window.

So when we were asked in class to just search for something to pin, I really didn't know what I was looking for, and I had no idea what I would write. Then, as I scrolled down, down, searching for something...anything to write about, I came across this book cover:



... and my brain started racing!I have no idea what this book is. I didn't look it up. I didn't have to. The cover flooded me with thoughts I've been trying to put into papers for a long time. It conveys so much about how people think about (a) professional development, (b) online learning, and (c) learning with technology.

The Title: The title alone - PD in your PJs... - gives the impression that one's professional development can and should be easy. No sweat! Don't even shower. You don't have to invest a lot of energy into your own growth as a professional. Get it done with minimal effort at home, at your leisure. I do understand why people might want PD to be this effortless; so much professional development for teachers involves day-long or half-day sessions (Corcoran, 1995) listening to someone drone on about test scores or inspirational technology your school can't afford, making few connections to a real classroom context. And it is so hard to sit through. But that's just the problem. It shouldn't be hard to sit through. One shouldn't passively sit through their own development process.

There have actually been many calls to reform professional development, and many have offered new approaches based on contemporary social learning theories and what we know about how teachers learn. But much of this research never gets past the small implementations (Borko, 2004), so the majority of classroom teachers never see it. These teachers are excited about getting their students interested in their own learning, and I believe many of them want to grow themselves, but they need professional development opportunities that are meaningful in their own classroom practice. This is what my research aims to do, and we are in the process of making it happen.

The Photo: This photo is not just an example of how a person can complete the professional development. Being on the floor, barefoot, in pajamas projects the notion that a teacher can whiz through an online course over their morning coffee or evening tea, and get it out of the way. It indicates that professional development is something one has to do, not something they strive to do regularly. More broadly, this photo conveys that online courses should be quick and easy - no pressure, no challenge.

I am aware that it is unlikely that I will change the way the world thinks about online learning with one dissertation, but the work I am doing now is the beginning of my goal to participate in the movement to show people that online learning can be interactive, meaningful, challenging, and relevant. My focus is on teacher learning, but I write carefully to show that new, meaningful teacher learning environments pave the way for teachers to change learning environments for their students, whether they teach online, face-to-face, or in a hybrid setting.

The pin only let me use 500 characters, so I couldn't say all of this there, but it got me thinking and, most importantly, it got me to put those thoughts in writing. A big part of the battle for getting this work out there has been finding the phrasing and the references to support my claims. This little pin and the inner dialogue that flooded from it made me realize just how much I have to say and why I am so passionate about teacher learning. It also made me realize that I've read other authors' reports on teachers' feelings about professional development and that I have more than anecdotal evidence with which I can frame my argument. 

And of course, all of these thoughts were coupled with our readings and discussion around the ethics of using online tools. I see another pin in the near future exploring the ethics of online professional development.

This little pin brought up so many thoughts. I'm looking forward to conducting more searches and getting all of these reflective ideas down in writing, even if it is not finessed. The process of putting these reflections into typed words and phrases helps me clarify my thoughts and aims both as a teacher and a researcher. I'm looking forward to using Pintrest in a reflexive way.