Through this week’s study, I learned about Professional Learning Network (PLN). The picture below is my PLN. 

Through my 6 roles——mother, YouTuber, student, family member, dancer, and teacher, I list my network of connections. I also list social medias I use frequently. I notice that I spend far more time with people on social medias than in real life. As a teacher, my time with colleagues is limited to group meetings. As a dancer, everyone is practicing without much communication in class. But as an YouTuber, I answer messages every day; as a family member, I regularly video chat with my family in China; as a student, I use D2L to take classes, upload homework, and communicate with other classmates and instructors. I use various Apps to find information and communicate with others. Hard to imagine life without Wi-Fi!

The strength of my current PLN is that through different roles, I can quickly and accurately find people I can connect with. However, I notice that my network maintain almost the same in the past 5 years. It is a signal of stepping out of my comfort zone and make new friends. Maybe join a book club? Travel to an unfamiliar place? Or go back to China next summer?

References:

Isa Yeter. (2021). Six Degrees of Separation [Photograph]. Neo4j. 

https://neo4j.com/developer-blog/first-proof-of-six-degrees-of-separation/

Menon, T. (2017, March). The secret to great opportunities? The person you haven’t met yet [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/tanya_menon_the_secret_to_great_opportunities_the_person_you_haven_t_met_yet

Paul Kirvan. (2022). Six Degrees of Separation. https://www.techtarget.com/whatis/definition/six-degrees-of-separation

PLN including social media, mother, YouTuber, student, family member, dancer, teacher, church. Created by Luxin Xue on mindmup.com.

你是否听说过“六度分隔理论”？它是于1967年由哈佛心理学教授Stanley Milgram提出的。简单地说，你和任何一个陌生人之间所间隔的人不会超过6个，也就是说，最多通过六个人你就能够认识任何一个陌生人。虽然在日常生活中，我并没有尝试通过六个人认识娱乐圈巨星或社会名人，但我们可以看到人与人之间的联系远比我们想象地更为紧密。

通过这个星期的学习，我了解到了PLN专业学习网络。下图是我的PLN。通过我的6个身份——妈妈、博主、学生、家庭成员、舞者、老师和社交媒体，我列出了我的人脉关系网络。当我在整理这份网络的时候，我注意到我在社交媒体上与人相处的时间远远多于现实生活。作为老师，我与同事的相处仅限于开会时间；作为舞者，上课时大家都在练习没有太多沟通。但是作为博主，我每天都在YouTube上回答老师们的留言；作为家庭成员，我定期和在中国的家人视讯；作为学生，我通过D2L学习知识、完成作业、与其他同学和教授沟通；我还在使用各种软件查询信息、与他人交流。我很难想象没有Wi-Fi的生活是什么样的！

现有的PLN的优点是通过不同的身份，我可以快速准确地找到我可以产生联系的人，通过他们，我可以进一步拓展我的网络。缺点是我注意到从5年前到现在我的这份网络图几乎没有变化，这意味着这5年我的社交圈很固定，我是否应该走出舒适圈是结实新朋友？加入读书会？去陌生的地方旅行？回一次中国？