 I want to take you back through a little bit of a history, too, to give you a better understanding of myself. Some of you may know me personally, or through Twitter, but I want to tell you about the story of how I built a personal learning network. And as in most cases, people need a nudge to move from a comfortable position to discomfort. I think it's really important for leaders to understand that we're going to have to nudge people to get them from comfort to discomfort. The biggest piece, though, is make sure it's in a very trusting environment. In my example, my director of learning was very blunt and very polite, but still very blunt and it was just very simple. Chris, you need to join Twitter. At that time, I really didn't see the opportunities that presented themselves by engaging in social media. I don't do Facebook. I never have and I probably never will. So social media to me with Facebook, don't do it, why would I want to? So my initial reaction was that if I was going to use Twitter, it was only as a form of getting my blog out in the public. There was no realization of the power of Twitter as a professional learning opportunity. That was May 2011. And while I would suggest I still read books and I still read articles and I still go to PD and conferences, I would suggest that my greatest learning comes through engaging in my personal learning network, which expands across the world. So it is so comforting to connect with someone in Australia, to connect with someone in the US, connect with someone across the street and be able to engage in professional conversations around teacher pedagogy, leadership, and anything else that has to do with education. There's no doubt that education is becoming increasingly complex. And the ability to do it on our own is almost impossible. The days when a teacher or a leader can simply shut their door and do it on their own is rare and it's rare for two reasons. One, it doesn't work and two, it doesn't work. It can't happen that way. And so my world with Twitter offers a number of advantages to me. The first one is I'm not alone. I have the ability through Twitter to engage with people, whether they be educators or non-educators from all around the world. And what I can get from them is the ability to hear multiple perspectives and the ability to ask questions and receive various and varied feedback. In Alberta, there are only a little over 60 people who share my same experience as a superintendent. And although I'm well involved in my professional organization, CAS, I just can't always get to them face-to-face or even on phone. So Twitter allows me not only to connect to my local superintendents, but to superintendents across the world, but especially in North America. The second thing that I'm a great believer with Twitter is it has no hierarchy. So while I'm engaging, my role as superintendent is irrelevant. I'm simply a learner and a contributor. And it provides me with an excellent opportunity to really do a check-in and gain whether it be a teacher's perspective or a parent's perspective or an assistant's perspective or just someone from the public. I think when we look at leadership, we don't necessarily recognize all the different perspectives that are out there and how much they can help us in making better decisions. So through Twitter, I've met people virtually all over the world who have really shifted my own thinking. And I know that I may or may not ever have a chance to meet with them personally. The third thing that I value Twitter on so much is it's on my own time and it's quick. So in my desk, I have two screens that are going. And one always has a tweet deck on it. And so as I'm doing my work, I'm always looking over to see if there's something that interests me. And if I see something, I do one of two things. I either open it right away and I read it or I like it and so I can come back and read it later. To be honest, I've become a blog snob. And so I look for articles that can challenge my thinking in 500 words or less. And part of that is my own time. But if I'm asking teachers to read those, I know what how valuable their time is. So if I have a quick snippet of information that I can send out to our teachers that they don't have to read 6, 8, 10 pages, but can get the essence of what I'm trying to say, that's far more efficient. We know that emails rule our lives. And so by sending article after article to our leaders or our staff, typically that's inefficient and ineffective. And so they're not going to likely read them. But if they rest on Twitter, if they stay there, they're always accessible and then teachers can go to them on their time and when it's appropriate. We have a hashtag for a division that's HS4. Whenever I see something that may be of interest, I quote the tweet and add our hashtag. So in that I'm building a knowledge in our own hashtag that teachers can always access, leaders can always grab and get. The last thing is the Twitter allows for some autonomy for the teachers. And we know that in today's work world that's very, very important. They have to be able to have some decisions about their PD. There is no way that any school division can offer the smorgasbord of PD that a teacher is going to require throughout their career. To even hint that would be ridiculous. And so what Twitter does is provide so many different opportunities for PD. And it's again when the teacher wants to. So given those four points that I've just gave, I'd like to ask some follow up questions for some table talk. And there's two. The first one is how are you engaging in social media to impact your own learning? And the second one is how are you contributing to your staff's learning through the use of social media?