Coming Soon to Your Child's School

I went in search of some good news today and found an interesting article about another positive use of social networking on the front page of USA Today. Students are using Twitter and Facebook to develop "PLNs", or Personal Learning Networks.

PLNs were developed by a loose consortium of teachers to help their students access experts on every subject imaginable. The idea is to give students access to learning beyond the school building and beyond the scope of their teacher's knowledge base. It's said to be especially needed and effective in rural school systems.

As both a former teacher and parent, I love this idea on lots of levels as long as it's implemented with rigorous safeguards. I believe that education should be weighted on the side of developing life-long students, people who love to learn and know how to access the desired information, more than rote memorization (which is also legitimate learning and has its place). PLNs would be a great way for a teacher to be able to tell a student that there's a way to access the information that she doesn't have and point them in the right direction.

I think it also has the potential to add to a child's list of mentors and expand a child's idea of what's possible career-wise. Will Richardson, c0-author of a book on PLNs, says that although only 5% of teachers are currently using them, he believes that their use will soon become commonplace.

Have any of you heard about PLNs being used in your child's classroom? What do you see as some positive uses for social networking?