Twitter for my classroom?
Twitter
is only as useful to you as the network of people that you connect to. (Burgos,
2011)
I
agree with this statement, as I also believe this for my LinkedIn account. They
used to say “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know.” Today, it’s what and who you know, and how you connect
these dots.
I
am very new to this connected world. Blogging, twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook,
TeacherTube, YouTube, etc. all require time, something that is very precious to
me at this point in my life. I am not sure that I have time to maintain all of these connections, but the ease
of opting to do so is attractive to me. I now have a slew of resources at my
fingertips, should I have the time to participate. It is constantly updating itself.
In the future, I hope to blog more, as my life circumstances begin to allow. I
look forward to reflection, and the possibility of having some sort of an
impact on an audience.
As
for Twitter in particular, I do not see myself using twitter in the classroom
in so many ways. I read a list of over 60 ways to use Twitter in the classroom.
I went through them all, and with many of them I found it applicable to a
college level course. A Must Have Guide On Using Twitter in Your Classroom
listed very great ideas- in theory.
I
find myself sounding very negative and pessimistic, when really I want to embrace the connectivism theory
and advocate technology in the classroom. But…I have taught for 7 years in a
high school classroom, and I find that the vast majority of the teenagers that
I teach would not be able to steer clear from the distractions of twitter. My
main concern is that Twitter is flooded with distraction. Upon first encounter,
I saw Twitter as an unnecessary tool. I saw a tool for the toolshed- not the
workbench!
After further consideration and experimentation, I could tweet to my
students as simply a means of communication. Like a birdie in their ear TWEET, TWEET, TWEET
I
could see myself adding a teacher profile of the course that I was teaching and
asking my students to follow me for updates- I could see this freeing up some
of my own stress if I wanted to decide to cancel or postpone a test at the last
minute, for example. In a way, it’s like texting your students (which is not
allowed), because for many of my students, their tweets come in to their
smartphones and automatically alert them.
The
thought of a tweet from me, streaming to them while they are watching tv at
home is an enticing opportunity. Perhaps once the novelty of connecting to
Justin Beiber wears off (huh!), I may consider using Twitter in my classroom
for grammar, writing, and language exercises.
The
only question now is how? I am new to twitter- what is a hash tag! See this Twitter Cheat sheet I need this extra
help right now. Do you?! Happy Tweeting.
I commend your caution about using Twitter in the classroom with high school students. It is a tool that would be very hard to monitor. However, you have also mentioned a few ways you might try Twitter and if they work for you, you may find tweeting useful.
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