What is a PLE?

PLE - Personal Learning Environment

Based on Web 2.0 technologies. According to http://www.microbiologybytes.com/tutorials/ple/

"a system that helps learners take control of and manage their own learning. This includes providing support for learners to set their own learning goals, manage their learning, manage both content and process, and communicate with others in the process of learning."

The aforementioned site also provides a video which provides a general overview of the strengths and weaknesses of PLEs, and compares them to Learning Management Systems (LMS).

Personal Learning Environments allow students to collect, arrange, describe, articulate, and otherwise process information that they feel is important. The purpose of a PLE is to enhance the learning process by allowing the use to proactively focus on the material and information that is most important to them.

This process is important, because by allowing learners to decide what material is important to them, to organize that material in a way that makes sense to them, and to articulate their own thoughts and opinions on the material, we are fostering and enhancing the learning process.

Web 2.0

"Web 2.0" is a term that is used to describe the next generation of interactive websites characterized by the user's ability to publish, share, collaborate. There are two major rules:

#1 - The user has control. Allow me to write, post, create, publish, share anything I want!
#2 - Thin Client Computing - Don't make me install any software on my computer to do it!

• Web 2.0 technologies allow people to publish to the world!
• They facilitate creativity, collaboration, community
• Creation is a godlike quality. Everyone can receive joy from creating.

More resources to come...