M5: Journal of Connections to Professional Community

June 13, 2022

M5: Journal of Connections to Professional Community

i: Preface

I joined Instagram on September 10, 2020. My image and post was just about optimism at the start of the school year. I joined the #teachersofinstagram community on September 15, 2020. This was where I started sharing my lesson activities and process behind unit planing. It's not that I was particularly skilled as an educator, but for some reason I felt the desire to share what was happening in my class, in case others wanted to follow suit. This was a while back, so I can't recall what the particular impetus was, or from where burst of confidence emerged. But if we view my Instagram persona as the "teacher" and the audience (who, presumably, would also be educators) as the "students" - insofar as they are the recipients of this content - I began my Instagram account from a rather essentialist philosophy (Ornstein, 1991), insofar as my purpose was to disseminate professional development tools. As much as soft skills like capacity-building were at the centre of a lot of these activities, I am saying I was based in a more essentialist lens because I was not really opening up my content to collaboration, to open-ended questions, to inviting ways for adaptation. The content was merely, this is what I did. I understand that Ornstein (1991) connects essentialism with realism, but I would have to clarify here that by "essentialism" I am distinguishing away from realism, insofar as realism would also include, from a perrenialist scope, the idea of open-ended discussion and guiding the student/ audience towards constructing their own logical conclusions (pp.105). I invited no such conversation in my earlier posts. I also did not have an audience, ending up with around 5-10 Likes/ interactions with each post.

The purpose began to change with my heavier involvement in the #teachersofinstagram community. The "trending" topics of successful content creators were focused on teacher self-care, on revitalizing curriculum, and (of course) on shifting pedagogical strategies for Covid-19 learning. I began to follow the trend, and you will notice that my content reflected this. There were still posts that I created, and those of others with which I engaged, that were focused on subject-design (Ornstein & Hunkins, 2013) - so, for my context, specifically English. But there were also others that dealt with more how to adapt lessons and activities as a whole into this covid-19 context. To this end, we were sharing ideas about how to identify the essential learning outcomes of our curricula (pluralized, because I was communicating with more American and Australian teachers, and just one from my own BC); we were trying to determine what our students needed socioemotionally (through which, as a high school teacher, I learned a lot about SEL - typically a topic which I feel elementary school teachers were more versed); we were trying to figure out how to develop resiliency but also cathartic expression in our activities. There might have been avenues to make this content reflect a problem-centered curriculum, but to be honest, these challenges were so close to home for our students that it was challenging to invite them to review our situation from a reconstructionist lens. Moreover, the content I produced and that which I engaged of others reflected more of a progressivist philosophy and a learner-centered curriculum (Ornstein & Hunkins, 2013). Really, we were responding to the needs at the time, which was not that students learn to memorize Hamlet's To Be or Not to Be soliloquy or write a 10-page essay contrasting three novels, but rather how to use the curriculum as a vehicle with which to develop the life skills they needed to navigate Covid. I cannot stress this more. I wish I could communicate this more emphatically.

my first post to re-start my account activity

Somewhere along the line, I also became involved in sponsorships. In a study on 841 educators, Carpenter et. al (2020) noted that Instagram is a popular use among teachers, but also distinguished between sponsorship-driven creators and pedagogy-driven creators: "Some educators' purposes for utilizing affinity spaces can be prompted in part by motives related to teacherpreneurship (Carpenter, Cassaday & Monit, 2018; Shelton & Archambault, 2018), rather than, for example, wanting to engage in professional learning or community" (2). This makes me think that I am/ was not able to exist in both spaces, as a contributor to learning and promoting jewelry and protein bar brands - even if the posts were separate. This is a contentious issue that may extend beyond the scope of this particular assignment - is it possible that a content creator negates all value of their contributions just for the fact that they have occasional posts that are brand-specific, and from which they receive points (where I did receive free samples of protein bars) Indeed, this complicated the purpose of my Instagram account. these ran for some time, during which I did have moral quandaries about my presence and purpose online, and then I stopped using my account. While I haven't taken the time to change my Bio, my sponsorships are no longer ongoing.

But, when we began discussing PLC's in this course, I decided to call back to this community. What follows is my journey back into this sphere. Please note my process journal is included at the end as an appendix, and that I will be referring to #teachergram, #teachersofig, and #teachersofinstagram interchangeably.

1: PLC Selection

there is always a conversation around teacher health

I joined two PLC's for this assignment: edWeb.net, and #teachersofinstagram. As noted in my M4 blog, I found that there was limited activity on the edWeb groups I'd joined, and my posts from last week had not received activity over the course of a week. This was my sign to look to #teachersofinstagram on which to focus this M5 reflection.

There was a time in which I borrowed space on #teachersofinstagram as a microinfluencer, and a growing leader. I shared lesson plans, unit plan processes, my Pro-D workshop research, sometimes my PME journey. In included the hashtag #newteacher and/or #newteachertips because that was my audience: I don't have the years of experience to be a mentor to older teachers, as I am currently just in Year 5 of my practice. So I specified that it would be newer teachers to whom I spoke and wanted to assist. Most of the interactions with teacher instagrammers, at least the ones that spanned multiple replies, were on topics of work-life-balance and self-care. To be honest, though, I think I learned more from them than what I shared/ taught them. So I wasn't a leader in this sub-section of #teachergram, but I definitely benefitted from their generous comments and kind suggestions for teacher-guilt (which the online community seems to have taken, as inspired by mom-guilt. Honestly, there's an internet term for everything now).

responses from kind followers when we talk about balance

I mentioned earlier my Pro-D workshop. I led one Pro-D session at my home school, just for our staff. And I will recognize that the #teachergram community was helpful in collecting ideas and receiving support in preparation for this event. I could have collaborated with my actual in-person colleagues for this, but I chose to turn to the digital PLC because I wanted my workshop to be a surprise to my audience.

II: Challenges Encountered

I detailed challenges around self-promotion vs. Watson's (2014) collective/ "civic good" in my M4 post, as well as the need for regularly-updated, active PLCs on edWeb.net.

To expand from my 2020-2021 #teachergram content creator, I decided to navigate the specific realm of a digital Game-Based Learning (GBL) in the community. It's been a topic I've been wanting to explore in my class, but don't yet have all the skills and ideas to actually bring it in, meaningfully, into my classroom. My June 2nd post was meant as an entryway into this conversation, but I did not receive any comments - and minimal engagement through Likes, at that. I connect this to the fact I have not been active in a long time, so my content does not regularly pop up on my followers' feeds. It easily will be hidden in the hashtags I use, too. Content creators know that the key to engagement is regular posting on relevant topics, and I know from previous experience I received the most engagement when I was posting daily (typically around the same hour), and responding to other followers' posts on the daily. I think one of the reasons I had temporarily quit instagram was the amount of time it took from my day - whether it was follower engagement, sponsorship work, or even just constructing posts themselves and caring so much about how many Likes they received. So challenges included engagement.

GBL tags have a lot of commercial posts

tags related to GBL

The other challenge, as not the content creator but content engager, was the lack of posts in the GBL realm. I thought, at first, it was a reflection of the tag I was using. I searched for similar tags, and found even less results. There are, to be clear, many GBL posts. It's just that they are not often specific to teaching, and if they are, they are commercial posts, from companies that are trying to sell a workshop or a product. I tend to veer away from these, as the whole point of a PLC, to me, is to engage with real teachers - real, authentic educators using and/ or creating these resources.

minecraft examples came up multiple times online!

I really liked this user's info, so I shared it on my page

a really cool resource shared through a teachergram account

I did find some useful ideas, which I detailed in my journal (Appendix - June 9 & 11, 2022). Aside from connecting me to my in-person colleagues, I also found a website that I have bookmarked for future use.

But as a whole, the GBL online category is indeed in its primary stages. Instagram might not be the best place if this is what you are seeking.

III: Theoretical/ Philosophical Connections

I have spoken at length, and will continue in my analysis, to speak to the discipline-design/ subject-centered frameworks that #teachergram readily reflects. It should also be noted here, though, that Instagram is a currently-trending social media service. I define "currently-trending" to reference tools that are popular with the teenagers at present; it is among the likes of TikTok and Snapchat right now, whereas students now see Facebook as "archaic" (to quote one of my delightful students, who likes to remind me that I am, by their standards, "old"). This does allow for the inference that its audience, both creators and viewers, are possibly more active with societal trends.

We have also seen, in this drive to define and develop "21st Century skills," a need for student-driven learning, and choice, and a shift from a teacher-centered instruction to either student-centered or a hybrid of the two (in some co-created space). Along with this, to speak to the Revised BC Curriculum, there has been a shift from Prescribed Learning Outcomes (PLOs) to skill-based proficiency. This is to say, at a societal level, we are focusing more on learner-based designs that honour choice and autonomy in the learning process, but then also society-culture design, insofar as educators are questioning now what the most necessarily skills/ concepts are for students, in a rapidly-developing world (Sowell, 2005).

The #teachergram digital space reflects these trends, as many content pieces will be focused around socioemotional learning, on inquiry, on research and self-management and creative/ critical thinking skills. This PLC is very much skills-based. In education, these topics are very much "trending," and it is possible that content creators who engage in this space are, by correlation, also those who respond to such trends in the literature and in the curriculum.

That said, while I will discuss the demographic in Part IV: Analysis, it should also be recognized that my statements here do not reflect the entire contributions within the #teachergram space.

What type of curriculum theories/ philosophies does this group connect to? Is this easily apparent or is it harder to determine? Why is this?

IV: Analysis

an example at communication with the users

The #teachergram community is perhaps a model example of an active, inclusive community. I will begin this first with my own anecdotal evidence, and then support it with literature. Perhaps due to the nature of being "content creators" and understanding the role of the position, many users are quick to respond to comments with replies and/ or Likes. There is, also, a self-serving impetus here, as engaging with a post will move it up on people's feeds. This aids in content creators receiving more attention. Beyond this, though, the actual content of the messages are, I've found, so warm and welcoming and supportive - this leads me to believe that, even aside from any self-promotional purposes (like Carpenter et. al's "teacherpreneurship" (2018)), the people who engage in this space do so in order to support each other as educators.

These findings may be backed up by Carpenter et. al (2020), who studied 841 educators for the extent to which they used Instagram. They found that 87.7% of respondents used their teacher Instagram account to look at other educators' posts, with only 35.5% saying they engage to share their own content (p. 5). Carpenter et. al (2020) found that "84.3% stated that learning from other educators' wisdom and experience was a major motive for use. Over half the participants described building an educator community or support network and collaborating with other educators as a major reason for use" (p. 5).

Scholar Maggie D. Muir (2022) completed a dissertation, analyzing the plausibility and effectiveness of teacher mentorship through Instagram. Through consultation with the research, her measures for mentorship included items such as commitment to the role (of mentor), inclusivity, an ethos of lifelong learning (p. 124-125). For the most part, these criteria were met through her interviews and investigations; however, it should be noted that she found that teacher instagrammers largely felt that "Instagram was an educational inspiration regardless of personalized support... Teachers used social media... where they felt they needed more professional development... Mentors may not be aware of the impact they are having.... However, because of the inspiration and ideas obtained from Instagram, classrooms are impacted" (P. 131). Thus presents Muir's (2022) concept of an "informal" mentorship, as obtained through Instagram.

While there are a set number of users with whom I have regularly interacted, I can count them with two hands, and we all teach different subject areas. This pushes us to work together to collaborate on more learner-centered curriculum (more than subject-specific or discipline design). But again, as stated earlier, I also do use instagram to breathe life into my discipline, specifically, where possible. And with this in mind, I believe the most accurate way to describe what #teachergram is to me, as a PLC model, is just what Muir (2022) presents: an informal mentorship.

At the same time, while #teachergram reflects my own philosophy of innovative, experiential activities and reflection, I should also state that the space is populated by specific subject/ age-group educators. I find that many SEL attitudes are transferable between grades, but at the same time, a Grade 12 Calculus teacher may have different needs than a Kindergarten teacher. For those who focus on a subject design or discipline design-based curriculum, Instagram will be more useful for the latter. Of those who engaged in Instagram and participated in their study, Carpenter et. al (2020) found that 56.7% were elementary teachers, with high school teachers comprising just under 20% (middle school being just under one-third of participants) (p. 6). As a whole, not distinguishing between grade levels, almost 70% of users taught ELA, and 54.3% taught Social Studies (noting that numbers will not add to 100 because it is possible, and common, to teach more than one subject) (Carpenter et. al, 2020, p. 6). That is, if one is looking for discipline-specific activities, Instagram may be most useful to the Humanities educators, and specifically in the elementary range.

V: Conclusion - On Modes of Communication, Curricular Design Practices as a Whole

Sowell articulates in the topic of curriculum reform that it is "increasingly difficult" for schools to exist and function without reference to their global contexts, and that teachers are "bombarded by increased societal demands to upgrade students' skills and abilities that enable them to become productive citizens" (p.104). Especially as an English teacher, I would argue that one cannot teach in a vaccuum because a students experiences and demographic and intersectional identity fundamentally informs the way they access a text. Further to the point, we are constantly thinking about the big question of, What is education for? These are big topics, and it is challenging for one person to be able to step into the shoes of a variety of different students. And so, the feasible answer for this would be to collaborate. But then, we also know that there are constraints around this. Ornstein and Hunkins (2013) articulated that one of the bars to connected learning practices (i.e. correlation design) is the categorization of secondary school departments, and the time constraints of each class at the elementary school level (p.163). They also mention the limited time allowed for collaboration among colleagues, and for team-teaching (Ornstein & Hunkins, 2013, p. 163). The beauty of Instagram, aside from aesthetic posts, is that it offers an asynchronous means to collaborate with local and global teachers. Those I referenced in this paper were largely global, but if I was comfortable tagging my location, I could have more easier worked with colleagues in Canada or in BC.

As stated earlier, much of the #teachergram posts reflect an interest in SEL, in revitalizing the curriculum, in finding innovative ways to address the whole child.

Just, if you're looking for tips on Game-Based Learning, know that there might be more varied places to look. Unless you're willing to wait, in the event I am able to kickstart that community further. Check back in 2023.

References

Carpenter, Morrison, S. A., Craft, M., & Lee, M. (2020). How and why are educators using

Instagram? Teaching and Teacher Education, 96, 103149–103149.

Muir, M. D. (2022). Informal Teacher Mentorship in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion over Instagram: A

Qualitative Study (Order No. 29063017). Available from ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global.

(2658212076). https://www.proquest.com/dissertations-theses/informal-teacher-mentorship-diversity-

equity/docview/2658212076/se-2?accountid=6180

Ornstein, A. C. (1990/1991). Philosophy as a basis for curriculum decisions. The High School Journal, 74, 102-109.

Ornstein, A. & Hunkins, F. (2009). The Field of curriculum. In Curriculum : foundations, principles, and issues (5th

ed., pp. 1–8). Pearson.

Sowell, E. (2005). Curriculum organization. In Curriculum : an integrative introduction (3rd ed., pp. 37–51).

Pearson/Merrill/Prentice Hall.

Watson, C. (2014). Effective professional learning communities? The possibilities for teachers as agents of change in

schools. British Educational Research Journal, 40(1), 18–29. https://doi.org/10.1002/berj.3025 Wiley. Pages 1, 3

14, 27-39, 52-60, 71-74.

Appendixes - Task 1 Journal

PLC Connections Journal

June 13 - report done and going to upload so people have time to comment :)

June 12 - Not sure if I should be documenting this, but just in case - I decided to consult the literature to see if there have been any studies on #teachergram. Surprisingly, there are a few! I also learned the term "teacherpreneurship" (Carpenter et. al, 2020), which includes sponsored teachergram accounts, but also things like TeachersPayTeachers. They seem to suggest that a monetized account is mutually exclusive from a pedagogy-based one, which I have mixed feelings about. Maybe I'm misinterpreting. But maybe they have a point - I mean, I did articulate similar concerns in my M4 post...

June 11 (later), 2022 - So my friend isn't a classroom teacher right now, but she told me her GBL was for a novel study in her Grade 6 class. It was still an emerging field at the time of study (6 years ago), but I was able to share with her some of the E-Lit exemplars I'd read about. I think this shows me that, at least for the GBL context, almost ironically, Instagram was a great place to start, but I realistically ended up using a combination of my real-life connections and Instagram. I don't know if this defeats the purpose of an online PLC, or if this is still "okay" because it shows more connectivity? If anyone is reading this, please share your thoughts.

June 11, 2022 - I remember one of my friends did GBL for her practicum, and wrote a paper on it. This isn't related to my Instagram searches, but I just messaged her on Facebook to ask what she had done, specifically, and if she's still practicing it.

June 9, 2022 - Made a few comments to people's posts today, just based on what came up on my feed. Also searched up #gamebasedlearning. Mostly commercial??? Maybe I'm using the wrong hashtags... But when I search up similar, I'm not seeing much more. This is either because

a) it's a developing field

b) there just aren't that many content creators using GBL.

I did find two interesting things: a blog that I posted to my Instagram Story, and then a bunch of Minecraft references. One of my colleagues is using Minecraft in his Socials class. He's busy with interviews/ Sept hiring stuff right now, so I'll make a note to ask him after this round of applications is done - mid next-week?

June 7, 2022 - if I just want Likes, I would post for the sake of posting. I know from experience that that's how to get more engagement. But I left Instagram because that's what I got in the habit of doing. So I'm not going to do that.

June 7, 2022 - edWeb.net post engagement summarized in one line: *cricket cricket*

officially switching to just focusing on Instagram

June 6, 2022 - Starting my journal now, but I technically started posting last week, just to make sure I collect enough data. Here's the site on that: https://kaitlinpme810.blogspot.com/2022/06/m4-foundations-and-principles-in.html