Author: bhum44

Engaging with Your Community: Think about how you engage with your PLN community. How do you participate in discussions, offer support and feedback to peers, and share valuable content?

How I engage with my PLN community on Instagram involves a dynamic approach to ensure I continue to gain meaningful insights and interactions with others. I like to participate in Instagram posts by commenting on my thoughts and ideas while replying to other people’s comments that I find intriguing. Engaging with users’ stories and sharing them online also allows for more personal and fast interactions to take place. Offering support and feedback to peers is another important step for engagement. When peers upload or share their ideas or work, I always comment encouragingly and show them that support. Sharing peers’ posts on my stories also helps them gain more viewers and followers, showcasing my supportive efforts to help them succeed. 

Sharing valuable content online is crucial for a PLN.  For myself, I frequently share posts and videos following the business entrepreneur community and send them to people who are interested in this topic like myself. Sharing posts from big creators helps me to start that conversation and gain knowledge from other people’s perspectives. I also enjoy sharing content to my stories, because it allows me to customize and share it in various formats. Check out this link here for how to customize Instagram stories to gain attraction! Instagram stories have helped me with sharing easy, valuable content online.  By consistently engaging with these different types of activities, it has helped me to create a more supportive and diverse community, where members feel supported and motivated to contribute. Overall, PLN’s help to contribute to a resourceful and encouraging learning environment if used correctly. 

Building a Supportive PLN: What steps have you taken or plan to take to build a supportive PLN? How do you identify and connect with individuals with similar professional interests and goals?

I have started to take steps on Instagram to develop a supportive PLN. I have identified numerous individuals with similar professional goals and mindsets through hashtags and googling about certain individuals. From following and interacting with these accounts, it has allowed me to continue to build a network and community online of similar-minded professionals and educators. To continue building a supportive PLN, I am dedicated to commenting, liking, following, and viewing other creator’s accounts. This helps me to share and discuss valuable information from these posts. I also like to interact with other comments, which allows me to gain and learn new ideas and perspectives. These things all help to continue to grow the Instagram community. Finally, I am planning on joining more Instagram lives to continue to gain knowledge and engage with people who have similar professional interests. I am able to ask live questions on Instagram lives and professionals and educators can respond in real time. This helps me to connect more with professionals in the business field.

Photo by Solen Feyissa on Unsplash

Diverse PLN Benefits: How does having a diverse PLN improve your learning and personal/professional growth? Share any experiences or examples you have.

Having a diverse PLN is super important in today’s society. A diverse PLN is great for personal/professional growth by providing global access to different perspectives, ideas, and resources. Having a diverse PLN allows people to connect with different cultures, giving them a unique perspective and better problem-solving skills because different viewpoints are highlighted. Having a diverse PLN allows for more opportunities and better growth/connections in the future. It is crucial to have a diverse PLN because it can help to build a supportive network, allowing for advice from others and a sense of mentorship. This allows you to be able to better connect with others.

Photo by Mimi Thian on Unsplash

Creating an Inclusive PLN: What steps can you take to ensure your PLN includes various voices and perspectives? Think about actions you can take to promote inclusivity

There are many different steps to ensure diversity and inclusivity in PLN’S. For instance, it is important to actively seek out different opinions/ideas. Making an effort to follow different cultures, backgrounds, and expertise levels allows you to create a more inclusive PLN. Being mindful of this helps to promote inclusivity. Another action to promote inclusivity includes joining various diverse groups and communities. This allows one to learn and engage with others, hearing different viewpoints and knowledge from professionals. Joining online communities is very easy, and you can join communities from anywhere in the world. These things all help to create different perspectives, emphasizing diversity and inclusivity in PLN’S.  Check out this cool video below giving ideas on how to overcome diversity in the business world! The ideas here can be transformed to online PLN’S to support inclusivity.

video by: AACSB International

Challenges of Inclusivity in Digital Spaces: What difficulties have you faced, or do you think you might face, in making your PLN inclusive? Consider ways to overcome these challenges and build a supportive and inclusive PLN.

I think some challenges that I have faced with making my PLN inclusive is some unconscious bias that I have. For instance, Instagram tailors a feed based on pictures and videos that I am interested in. This limits my viewpoints and perspectives because I only see videos of people who have similar life experiences to me etc. This hinders my PLN diversity, reinforcing existing perspectives. I try to overcome these challenges by purposefully looking to connect with diverse individuals so that I can have a more inclusive feed. Another challenge in creating an inclusive PLN is language barriers. For instance, I would love to understand more languages so I could connect and learn knowledgeable information from others. I know there are various communities that I would be interested in joining, but it is hard to do because I don’t understand the language. This is something challenging to overcome, but I have become motivated to learn more French and Italian on apps like Duolingo. Learning new languages is an important skill, that can help support an inclusive PLN.

Check out this website here from Oxford on how to overcome language barriers!

Research on Social Media and Learning Communities: What topic did you research from the task above? What social media platform did you use, and what learning communities did you find?

For our pod group project, we will research the astronomy learning community on Tiktok. We have found that it is quite a big community with so much information ranging from black holes to galaxies far away. I have found lots of younger adult accounts explaining different things about astronomy, and I find it fascinating how people close to my age know so much about such an interesting topic. 

Photo by Jeremy Thomas on Unsplash

Building Your Personal Learning Network (PLN): What social media platforms do you use or plan to use to build your personal learning network (PLN)? How do platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Reddit, or Youtube help you connect with others and stay updated?

I mostly use Instagram as my main social media platform. I am planning on developing my PLN through an Instagram account as I know how to navigate and tailor it to my liking. Instagram helps me connect with things I’m interested in because I am notified often when a new post drops or a story is up. I enjoy using Instagram because of the “live” feature. Big creators or professional accounts can go live, and I like to watch these with my new Instagram account I have created to follow business entrepreneurs for this class. I am able to learn valuable insights and tips on things I am interested in which is great for me. I also think YouTube is a valuable tool because I enjoy watching videos compared to reading articles. YouTube helps me to stay informed because I am notified when videos are posted. I often find that YouTube videos are very relatable, making them easier to understand and comprehend.

Protecting Your Information and Ensuring Ethical Behaviour: How do you protect your information and ensure ethical behaviour in your PLN? Discuss any security measures you take to keep a safe and trustworthy digital environment.

I am protecting my information in my PLN by using a username which is different from my name. This makes it harder for people to track me. I also use a random profile picture to protect my identity. I also make sure what I am commenting on is ethical and appropriate. Being aware of how Instagram stores and collects information also helps me to be ethical and safe in what I do online. Since it is hard to make an account that is untraceable to the user, being aware of how to protect one’s info online is very important for the user’s safety. Being mindful of accounts and posts helps to keep a good digital environment and a “clean” digital identity.

Privacy Concerns and Online Participation: Do/How do privacy concerns affect your willingness to join online communities or share information?

Privacy concerns affect my willingness greatly to join online accounts or communities. I am typically very conscious of social media privacy concerns because I know so much info is stored and with AI, unwanted info can be given to these companies. This stops me from joining certain social media platforms like Twitter because I don’t want companies to get and store my personal info. I am also mindful when it comes to sharing info online because what you say can negatively affect you if a person takes it the wrong way.

What is digital identity?

Digital Identity is tracked information and it is stored from everything you do on the internet. Digital identity is your presence online, from personal to professional accounts. Digital identity is an online version of you. It is important to be digitally aware of what you are posting online because keeping your online profiles private and secure helps to keep users safe online. Digital identity can be anything from accounts created online, online interactions, and written articles online. There are many different digital identities a person can have. Digital identity is important because it allows other people to view people a certain way online. For instance, if a person posted lots of drinking/fighting videos online and a future employer saw them, the employer would be less likely to hire them because they can see how they act. This is why being mindful of what you are posting is so important because in today’s age, AI can even warp or transform pictures of someone to make them look bad. This is because of information being easily accessible online. I found this video which helps to explain digital literacy really well. The youtube video below explains digital identity in only a few minutes! 

By U of G Library

How do you present yourself on social media platforms for personal use? What kind of content do you share, and how do you manage your privacy?

I have multiple social media accounts on different platforms, and I enjoy using social media. I try to present myself on social media in a “good light”. I don’t really post pictures ever on my main Instagram account, however, I do post photos or videos of fun things on my story. I like the idea of allowing people to see what I’m up to for 24 hours, instead of a picture always being posted for anyone to view. All of my social media accounts are private, and I believe it is important to have private accounts. This allows me to accept follow requests and to check different accounts out before I allow them to see what I am up to. I do like to share funny videos to my friends on social media from Instagram to Tiktok, which is what I do for the most part on social media. I feel as if I am very mindful on my social media accounts from pictures I post to interactions because I know info is stored. Keeping a good digital identity is important to me because I want to have a good digital footprint. 

How do personal versus professional approaches to digital identity affect social media use?

Personal and professional approaches to digital identity affect the way people use social media. A personal approach on social media might include having a private profile or not posting much online. A more professional account would be a public account, allowing users to see and learn more about their product or service. I think a professional account has to be more conscious of their digital identity because more people would be viewing the account and what they post/interact with. If a professional service account tweeted something bad or made a rude comment online, that would negatively affect their digital identity, and many followers would see it. If you have a professional online presence and you aren’t mindful of what you are commenting or posting, it can ruin a reputation very fast. It is always good to have a personal and professional account as long as the two don’t get mixed up. This allows for the posting freedom with the personal account that a professional account is limited to. I think overall the way you post and what you say is largely based on the idea of a personal or professional account as you have to be careful.

By  Karsten Winegeart 

Hi everyone I’m Brooklyn. I am a bcom student going into my second year in the fall. I love spending time outdoors and hanging out with friends. I love travelling and trying new things, including learning new languages! I have a pet bunny who is adorable and named Oreo because he is black and white. He is super playful and acts like a dog. The idea of studying business entices me, as you can go into many different careers with it. The idea of being an entrepreneur and making your own hours really motivates me to learn and study hard. I am overall excited for this class!

Social media really interests me because it provides a unique platform for connecting with people from different backgrounds while allowing people to share ideas and creativity from anywhere. I find it interesting that social media can pay you money for doing certain things. I feel as if a lot of people have gone the social media route to make money, and the possibilities with it are endless. Social media has become a big part of my life, as I use it every day quite frequently. I use it as a way to connect with people while watching videos that I am interested in. I think social media is great in the sense that it can be tailored to your liking. This however makes it addicting, which can sometimes be a problem (even for myself). I love the idea of personalized learning because everyone learns differently, making it helpful for students. Learning that can be personalized makes me more interested in the idea of study because having a personalized learning plan can make it easier and more enjoyable.

Digital literacy is important in education systems becuase it gives students skills to navigate, evaluate, and create information in a digital world. Digital literacy is becoming more important today, as we are becoming a more digital-based society. As our society continues to rely more on digital technologies for communication and work, the role of digital literacy becomes more important. Digital literacy helps prepare students to succeed academically, and it allows them to thrive in a digital economy. This ensures students are well-prepared for the future. Since our technology has advanced so much, being online and creating that online digital presence is very helpful for students like myself. However, there is the reminder of the digital footprint which people must be careful of.

Throughout this course, I plan to develop my Personal Learning Network (PLN) by actively engaging with peers, participating in discussions, and by using social media to connect and stay informed on the latest things. Although I don’t have any experience with PLN, I hope to learn how to navigate it and use it for professional growth. I created an Instagram account and followed some influential people in the entrepreneur business sector, and I am looking forward to learning and seeing how they post and interact with their platform. I am hoping to gain knowledge from this so that it can maybe be useful for me one day.