Teaching With Twitter

Teaching with
http://vote4power.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/twitterbird.jpg

What we’ll cover
The what, how, why, when and where of Twitter
Twitter background
Twitter jargon
How to create an account
How to make your Twitter profile more interesting
How to RT and DM
What’s the ‘@’ mean?
What are friends and followers?
How to search for other edu-tweeps to follow
How to follow particular topics
Back channels at conferences
Mobile tweeting
Ideas and examples for using with students
Come away with an action plan to incorporate into YOUR teaching
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ilse/3389565299/

What is Twitter?
Free
Social network
Users send and read each other’s messages
Relatively new - Created in 2006 by Jack Dorsey
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ilse/3389565299/

http://twitter.com/Jack

Watch Video on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddO9idmax0o

Activity 1
Create an account
Make your first tweet

Go to http://twitter.com
Sign up
Login

Answer the question “What are you doing?”Could be “what’s catching your attention?”
Type in the box
Click update
First tweet done!

Activity 2
Edit your profile

Update your profile via “Settings”
Add your real name so people can find you
Username could be, and is increasingly people’s real name
Bio has to be brief – 160 characters
More likely to be followed if you upload a picture – can be cartoon/avatar
Show your interest - change the default design

Choose design available on Twitter or (when you have time)
Design your own wallpaper/background with these free services
FreeTwitterDesigner.com
TwitBacks.com
MyTweetSpace.com
PrettyTweet.com
Artweet.com

Watch Video on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGbLWQYJ6iM

Activity 3
Search for other participants & Carol (kiwicarol)
Follow them

Activity 4
On your home page or http://search.twitter.com/
Search for topics
Keywords
Hash tags
Look at trends

http://search.twitter.com

http://www.c4lpt.co.uk/connexions

http://www.twazzup.com/

Activity 5
Find a great tweet & RT it
Reply to someone’s tweet
DM to someone’s tweet
Mark a tweet as a favourite

RT - means retweet / sometimes written as (via @name)
@name - will be picked up as a reply or mention
d name – direct message, seen only by the person (note space, and no @)
#tag – like a keyword

Activity 6
Set up your mobile for mobile tweeting
Make a mobile tweet

You will get confirmation via your phone
Once set up send tweets to 8987 (twtr)
Costs to send tweets just like any other txt

Applications
http://tweetdeck.com

http://echofon.com

http://seesmic.com/

Using Twitter with students?
Ideas?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/victoriapeckham/164175205

As an experiment, Parry made Twitter a class assignment and got his students to engage in microblogging as homework. He observed how Twitter became the link that connected conversations inside and out of class. ... He also discovered that it changed classroom dynamics in a positive way, encouraging more respectful and productive interaction between students by turning the class into a community.
http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2008/03/twitter-breaks-down-barriers-in-the-classroom.ars

...the Stanford Study of Writing, a five-year study of nearly 14,000 pieces of student writing, done for class and beyond it. Though final data analysis has not been done, early results indicated that in their Internet writings, students took pains to cultivate tone and voice, and to address a particular audience. "The out-of-class writing actually made them more conscious of the things writing teachers want them to think about," said Paul M. Rogers, an assistant professor of English at George Mason University who is involved in the study.
http://chronicle.com/blogPost/Can-Twitter-Turn-Students-Into/7874/

Using Twitter with students?
Class chatter
Class community
Get a sense of the world
Track a word / conference
Instant feedback
Follow a professional / famous person
Public Notepad
Writing assignment
http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/2008/twitter-for-academia/

Action Plan
WHAT are you going to do?
WHEN are you going to do it?
With WHICH class(es)?
WHAT do you need to do to prepare?
HOW will you evaluate it?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tomswift/4837657/

Questions?
Carol Cooper Taylor
Cooper-Taylor Training
W: www.cooper-taylor.com
E: carol@cooper-taylor.com

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Teaching With Twitter

by Carol Cooper-Taylor on Nov 03, 2009

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Teaching With Twitter — Presentation Transcript