The benefits of having a diverse and inclusive PLN is that you get to hear the opinions and practices of people from a variety of different geographical locations that have an assortment of different experiences. This provides a more complete viewpoint on different topics compared to if your personal learning network was more homogenous. To truly be well-rounded in your knowledge of educational practices, it is important to expand who is included in your personal learning network so you have a greater ability to learn from others. The point of having one of the networks is to expand your views on education, and gain knowledge that you did not have prior to having this network. Having greater diversity allows you to hear about the lived experiences of people from different cultures, backgrounds, locations, and experiences. One of the great things about using social media to do so is to connect with people that you may not be able to communicate with, at least not on a regular basis had it not been for social media platforms.
Social media has become a meaningful way to communicate with one another. Social media engages communications by allowing you to communicate with community members that you may not normally have the ability to converse with. When you are engaging in conversations with people through social media, it is enabling you to build relationships with them. Through social media, you can both listen and respond, which creates a two-way conversation.
However, social media also challenges communication with one another in a few ways. One way is that since people get many messages on social media platforms, they may not have time to respond to them all, or some messages may never make it to them, so that person does not reply. When people are not getting responses, that person who is not responding may get a reputation that they have bad communication skills since they do not engage in conversations. Also, social media requires the person who is posting to be more engaging in their communication because there are so many individuals posting on social media that consumers are picky about which post they actually read. If it does not seem entertaining they are unlikely to read it.
My PLN could be more inclusive than it currently is. I currently use a few different social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, but I could add ones like Linked In and YouTube. In addition, on my social media sites I created my network by following people who cared about the same topics that I am interested in, and share a similar view. Because of this, I mainly have a PLN that amplifies the views of others because I am more likely to repost and comment on ones that I agree with, which causes them to have an amplified viewing of theirs. I could be more inclusive by also following people who have differing viewpoints. However, a good inclusive practice I have is that I have people from a variety of different geographical locations so I can hear about diverse view-points.