Josie Fraser - Twitter Workshop - getting started (March 2014)

Twitter for educators:
Create your Twitter presence!
#digilitleic
@josiefraser March 2014

This session will get you up and running with
Twitter, and will cover the basics of creating a
profile, understanding Twitter conventions, and
finding and connecting to others.
Josie Fraser March 2014

Twitter
Twitter is a microblogging service which
lets users share updates, information and
resources
Twitter in 30 Seconds

Three basic online identities
• Personal
• Professional
• Organisational
SocialTech: Personal - Professional - Organisational:
three basic online identities (2009) http://bit.ly/vcRv5

Department for Education:
Teachers’ Standards
Effective from 1 September 2012
Part Two: Personal and professional conduct
A teacher is expected to demonstrate
consistently high standards of personal and
professional conduct.

Top tips for managing your online
presence
• Don’t drink & tweet
• Check information before you share it
• Give credit where credit is due
• Think about who you connect to & promote
• RTs may not constitute an endorsement but
many people will assume they do
• Friending students, parents & carers?

Basics
• Username - think short & sweet
• Avatar
• Bio
• Location
• URL
• Custom background
• Public/private

Avatar – pre-workshop task
Please make sure you have created and have access to an image that you can use for your Twitter avatar - the
picture that will represent you - prior to the workshop. Your avatar could be a photograph of you ('selfies' - or
photographs you take of yourself - are completely acceptable), a picture of something more abstract (a robot,
kittens, kitten robots...), or you can use one of the many only avatar generators (Google for these - I particularly
like the Lego minifig ones like http://www.reasonablyclever.com/mini-mizers/mini-mizer-2-0/ ).
1. Take a look at Twitter - which avatars do you think work best? What kind of backgrounds do your favourite
avatars have? How are the pictures you like best cropped?
2. Think about your Twitter Avatar as a professional representation of yourself. This doesn't mean you can't
have any fun with it - but pick something you would be comfortable with students, parents and other school
staff seeing.
3. Pick a picture. If this isn't a picture you have taken yourself - think about copyright! Do you have permission
to use this picture?
4. Polish it up. Cropping an image can make it look very different. Pic Monkey is a great free way of tweaking
your photos: http://www.picmonkey.com/ - You don't have to edit your picture, but if you are fussy about how
your head or robot kitten looks, this step can be fun.
5. Mail your image to yourself, so that when you are in the workshop, you can access it via a web based email
account. Alternatively, save it to a USB stick and bring that along.

Twitter Bio Generator
http://twitterbiogenerator.com/
Probably best to create your own

Profile

Your microbio: 160 characters
• People search – other users will look at your
bio when they are deciding if they should
follow you
• Machine search - you are searchable by your
bio in Twitter and other search engines
• Think about context – third party services you
link to your account may use your bio – i.e.
the same text maybe used on another site

Task 1: Create your microbio
Use this time to write your bio.
• Check the spelling!
• What do you do?
• What are you interested in/passionate
about/an expert on?
• Hashtags?

Sign up!

You can unfollow obligatory celebrity signups here

Desktop tour
• Home
• Connect
• #Discover
• Me > Unfollow
• Search
• Direct Message
• Settings & help > Edit Profile
• > Security & privacy
• Compose new Tweet

Basics
• Username
• Avatar
• Bio
• Location
• URL
• Custom background
• Public/private

Task 2 – send your first tweet
• Swap usernames with someone in the group
• Send a message, starting with @username,
and include the hashtag #digilitleic

Task 3 – Twitter basics worksheet
• Work in teams of two
• Complete the sheet – the names of the six
tweet elements highlighted, and what they do
• Sheets will be swapped for marking!

Task 3 – Twitter basics worksheet

Key conventions
The at: @
The retweet: RT
The hashtag: #
The direct message: DM
The url shortner: http://goo.gl/

Follower/following
• Don’t follow too many people too quickly –
take your time
• You don’t have to follow everyone who
follows you
• You can check who doesn’t follow you back –
Google ‘check Twitter followers’ to see a range
of services

Task 4 - Finding people to follow
In this task we are going to use Twitter’s search feature as
a simple way of finding interesting people to follow.
Search by keyword – try searching for your subject area,
or for topics that are particularly interesting to you. Try
using hashtags. Find at least three people to follow.
If you have time, look at who the people you find follow.
You can do this by clicking on the ‘following’ button on
their profile.
Share a recommendation with the group.

Task 4 - Finding people to follow

Josie Fraser - Twitter Workshop - getting started (March 2014)

More Related Content

What's hot

Similar to Josie Fraser - Twitter Workshop - getting started (March 2014)

More from Josie Fraser

Recently uploaded

Josie Fraser - Twitter Workshop - getting started (March 2014)