Prior to this class, I had already declared myself as anti-Twitter. I’ve already hopped on the Facebok bandwagon where I am able to share my comings and goings with others and vice versa. Personally, I’d rather live my life than keep up with “updates.” However, when it’s part of the class assignment, one doesn’t protesteth too much. After exploring a little on Twitter and thinking about it in terms of educational possibilities, I’ve come to a few conclusions.

 

For one, I think that Twitter is like a little mini-autobiography about certain people that I might be interested in or that students would be interested in. For instance, I am following Oprah and Dara Torres. It’s interesting to see what each is doing, to hear what quotes are currently inspiring them, or what random thing in the world each has noticed today. When we are interested in someone, we read about them…hence the publishing of biographies and autobiographies. Although these types of texts provide the history on someone, they lack the most up-to-date info about the person. Because I do a biography/autobiography project with my students each year, I think Twitter could be a cool supplemental literacy genre to add to the research component of the project. I’m pretty sure my 6th graders would love seeing what the person they choose to study is up to on a daily basis.

As far as using Twitter for parent communications, homework help, etc., I don’t think it’s the most practical way. I think that a blog, website, or threaded discussion board is a more effective and feasible way to go about these applications. Again, I just don’t see me updating something more than once or twice/day….I do have a life outside of school.

I think that students would like Twitter and I think there is value in exposing students, particularly those in a very rural school such as the one I teach in, to a new trend in technology..if for no other reason, it does give students practice expressing themselves and they aren’t “in the dark” compared to other kids around the state, country, globe.

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