To Twit or not to Twit

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Jennifer Michele Harrelson on October 14, 2009 at 3:29pm

Attending school board meetings and then tweeting about the main points to parents may be beneficial. However, I have heard that handing out actual letters to students to take to their parents may bemore effective and not as pretentious to some parents who are not very literate or tech-savvy.

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Permalink Reply by Kim Watchorn on October 14, 2009 at 9:04am

Reading all these posts, I had lots of thinking. Being at a conference this week, I've tweeted often (with notes from sessions for in/out house participants & presenters). I don't "jot down" things, or if I do, I lose them. We had a session yesterday about Learning Styles. We took an inventory to identify our own and the presenter (an amazing Steve Barkley) gave us more insight and examples of what it "looks like" in real life to identify in those areas. He suggested that those auditory folks are the ones who keep leaning over to "mention something" during the session when another/others are 'trying to listen and focus.' I do that! And he said those same auditory learners are maybe on Twitter b/c they need to be heard somewhere (and don't want to be rude and make comments aloud). I do that, too. And I track/hold my thinking in my Tweets. Why not? There are many other places (this being one of them), but as a useful tool used in a purposeful way, Twitter can be helpful. I don't use it randomly about my "insignificant" daily moments...but I could see how that could make "intimate" connections (as someone suggested earlier).

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Permalink Reply by Nancy Bosch on October 14, 2009 at 9:23am

To each his own, it sounds like you have some good insights in to what works for you. Maybe it's my age, maybe it's because I teach and interact with dozens a people a day--I don't need anymore "intimate connections". I have my hub when I go home. (ASIDE: of couse I do use CR 2.0)

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Permalink Reply by Linda Kirkland on October 14, 2009 at 9:40am

When I tweet (not often) I feel like I am shouting into a canyon and leaving it to fate as to where the echo of my voice will resound. When I read the tweets of others, I find that I quickly tire of their often repetitive thoughts and opinions.

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Permalink Reply by Nancy Bosch on October 14, 2009 at 10:13am

linda--*whisper* "Don't tell anybody but I have some of the same feelings about facebook."

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Permalink Reply by Katherine Burdick on October 14, 2009 at 2:00pm

I am a Twitter junkie. I cull my list of those who follow me and those whom I choose to follow. I have two twitter accounts - one is for those who repeat and tell menial things that I never read and one is for those who are serious about a topic and actually give me helpful information. If they crowd my box with repetitive unnecessary verbiage - I block them. My knowledge about mobile learning and hand held devices has blossomed using this approach. I count Twitter as the single most thing that has kept me a life-long learner. I love it! I agree about Facebook - It is good to quickly read what my nieces and nephews and children are up to - it is a social meeting place but not a learning place in the academic sense. Or maybe I have made that distinction for myself. Both are really fascinating in how they can globally connect people.

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Permalink Reply by Jennifer Garcia on October 14, 2009 at 12:21pm

Hi I forced myself to tweet a few months ago after ignoring my twitter account for a long time. I couldn't see the purpose of it, but now I do.

Twitter is a micro blogging app that allows you to establish your personal learning network, by choosing to follow experts in your areas of interest. In my case I chose to follow many of the people who I RSS, then looked at who they followed and chose a few more. Now I am able to quickly scan my network (in a matter of minutes) to pick up new ideas, new resources etc..and am checking my rss feeds a lot less. It is a highly efficient manner of getting ideas out and getting a response too. Often when I have a problem with an app or need help with something I can send it out on Twitter and within a few minutes someone has sent me an answer or solution. When at a conference you can really build up your network by following the conversations and adding people who you find have interesting ideas.

I use it to promote online activities that our kids our doing...when we are streaming live at Ustream.tv I send it out on twitter in order to establish an audience, the same can be done for getting responses to blog posts, bringing in an audience or experts for presentations etc..

The other really powerful use of Twitter that I have just begun to experiment with, is in collaborative research with student groups. I assign a hashtag (basically a # followed by a series of letters or a word I have chosen) and they are able to tweet their research findings(which need to be a nugget of info, forcing them to think about what they are writing in 140 characters or less) to the conversation by inserting the hashtag into it. This allows others to search out and follow the conversation. I know that other teachers also create twitter accounts on topics or for a class to use in a similar fashion.

I am also using it now to post homework updates, and reminders on my class wiki as well as our library website, along with voki broadcasts...it is a good way to get messages out. All you need is to create an account for that website and then ensure you keep it up and encourage kids to use it. It is a superficial way of using Twitter in that the conversation isn't really rolling, it is one sided, but it is a great means to an end. You can also manage multiple accounts easily tweeting to one or the other by using Hootsuite(free). That way you don't need to keep logging out of one account to log into another.

As I said I disliked the notion of it for such a long time, but after exploring it actively for many months now I am convinced of its educational potential for both teachers and students. Apologies for the lengthy reply. As you can see I have a case of Twitter fever.

PS. I have been collecting a great many resources on how to use Twitter as well as different Twitter apps, that you might be interested in. If so let me know and I can share them with you.

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Permalink Reply by Donna Bills on October 14, 2009 at 2:27pm

Since I have been on Twitter:

I have met many awesome librarians and teachers who inspire me to do a better job every day,
I have motivated myself to stay more current with technology trends,
I read blogs,
I am more comfortable expressing my opinions on the internet and in person,
I have participated in amazing virtual professional development opportunities,
I have read more professional literature, including books, than in the past 5-10 years,
I have had a lot of enjoyable shared moments with people all over the world,
I joined Classroom 2.0.

I have always been a person who enjoyed random learning, open ended assignments, whispering and passing notes in class, and meeting new people. Twitter probably isn't for eveyone, but i have found it very useful and enjoyable.

Oddly, I would never have been interested in some of the edubloggers who have tired of Twitter, had they not Twittered for a while. Perhaps they did not find value for themselves, but they gave value to others during their time on Twitter.

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Permalink Reply by Jennifer Michele Harrelson on October 14, 2009 at 3:26pm

I have never twittered either but is it not a great way to communicate with fellow teachers? Also, twitter appeals to students who are tech-savvy and I think that they would appreciate their teachers reaching out to them on their level(using this technology) for posting prompts and other information which might be beneficial to the student's creative thinking.

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Permalink Reply by Mike O'Hara on October 14, 2009 at 4:14pm

For those of you who are still not sure about Twitter, it might be because of the frame of mind you have going into it. It's not a means to a given end, it's a means to something you haven't thought of.

I think the best way to describe how you should treat Twitter is from a quote in a moive (The Zero Effect):

Now, a few words on looking for things. When you go looking for something specific, your chances of finding it are very bad. Because of all the things in the world, you're only looking for one of them. When you go looking for anything at all, your chances of finding it are very good. Because of all the things in the world, you're sure to find some of them.

If you are looking for specific things, Google is your place.
If you want to find something different, Twitter is your place.

To help some of you who don't know where to start, here are some suggestions.
I follow Kevin Jarrett. I don't know the guy, never met him. However he is very passionate about Ed Tech, and posts a lot of links about Ed Tech. He posts a lot of stuff I have never seen before and am very interested to read. He also follows over 3000 people (most of whom are in the educational field). So if you don't like Ed Tech, chances are he is following someone you might be interested in.

Also, there is a thing called #followfriday. ( # = hashtag. # is the same concept as tagging a picture.) On Friday, people will use the #followfriday to tell everyone on Twitter who they think you should follow. If you want to find someone in education, I would tweet "Who are good educators to follow? #followfriday" Chances are someone will respond to you. And you find those responses under the link @yourname.

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Permalink Reply by Barbara on October 14, 2009 at 5:08pm

"For those of you who are still not sure about Twitter, it might be because of the frame of mind you have going into it. It's not a means to a given end, it's a means to something you haven't thought of."


So well put...in fact i am going to tweet that answer!
PS thanks for the tip on #followfriday...don't know how i missed that one

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