Thing #23: Networking with Ning

Alright, so I spent most of my time on exploring Ning, because that's kind of just the way it worked out. I thought that Gather was interesting, but it didn't do a whole lot to entice me to explore much.

Ning, however, I really enjoyed exploring. My overall impression of the site was that it was not only easy-to-use, but it made connecting with other educators very low-pressure and open. In fact, I spent a lot of my exploring time kind of surfing the forums. It was interesting to note how respectful most of the discussion was, simply because a lot of people lose their filters when they're commenting online and tend to make things more personal than they are. For whatever reason, these forums were pretty well behaved, and I actually enjoyed reading them, even when the group consensus didn't line up with mine. I can see myself using this as a "sounding board" resource through the different groups, often without even having to ask the question myself.

I can spout off a lot of different uses for social networking in the professional and educational fields, such as idea sharing or resource lending. However, if I'm completely honest with myself, I would have to admit that my only current plan to utilize social networking is through my students. I'm planning on having the students create a group for the Yearbook this year to promote it, where they'll post photos that they've taken recently in addition to the public wiki/flickr account we're going to set up.

Sometimes it's good, in my opinion, of course, to set boundaries between your personal and professional life. In my case, I'm much more comfortable keeping social networking purely social and personal, rather than trying to overwork my tools and burn out on this idea. In the future, I may choose to broaden my networks with Ning and other sites, but I think for now, I'll focus on the long list of other tools you've presented us with and leave social networking where I like it: outside of work.