Earlier this week, I saw some posts and discussion from my friends and colleagues @thecleversheep and @zbpipe about a framework that they had developed around the idea of connectedness in a Professional Learning Network context. I found the idea of being able to parse out how relationships can exist in multiple ways and that this existence can lead to the richness that is a PLN.

I urge you to check out the original post and thinking, as well as the follow-up infographic. It makes a nice introduction to the concept for people who maybe have not participated in any sort of online network as a professional.

Like all good things do, it got me thinking. I remembered a conversation about this from ECOO with @danikabarker and I got to wondering when this whole thing began for me. Thanks to my ability to look back in my personal time machine (my work calendar in the FirstClass email client) I was able to pinpoint it.  On October 8, 2008 at 9:00 am, I participated in an Adobe Connect conference with Suzanne Riverin, who was our Regional eLearning Contact about some work I was doing in preparation for presenting at a regional conference on eLearning later that month.  She thought that I should meet and talk to one of her colleagues about some of my ideas. It was at that time, that I was introduced to Rodd Lucier, who I came to know as The Clever Sheep, and through whom my journey to online relationships was kick-started.

It’s so interesting to reflect on this all now, and how these relationships have expanded and crystalized over the years. I have more stories about other PLN’ers, but those can wait for another time.

So, how did it start for you?