Tweet This

I'll be honest, I consider myself a fairly technologically advanced person. I spend the majority of my time when I'm not in class at home on my computer. I see the Internet as an endless resource of information that is incomparable to any other resource. But I have just never understood Twitter.

As an educator, I am now beginning understand how it can be a very useful tool. Professionally, the ability to collaborate with other educators around the world is an invaluable resource. It is amazing that there is a never-ending stream of resources and insight into the next educational development at your fingertips at any given time. In the past I have been overwhelmed by Twitter--there is so much information coming so fast, and the majority of it seems to be completely mundane and trivial. As I have now began to target my feed to show me education-focused material I am beginning to see how it has more use than informing me what my friend ate for breakfast (I mean, that's what I have Facebook for).

Twitter is also a great classroom tool. It encapsulates our changing world quite well: terabytes of information flying at you on a minutely basis, all in little 140 character snippets. What better example of our fast-thinking, ever-evolving culture than a website that emulates this perfectly. Because of this characteristic, Twitter is a great tool for getting students to become active members in this culture. They can contribute to this conversation--whether it's by following a political leader, summarizing novels read in class, commenting on current science events, etc.-- and leave their own imprint on the viral world. For some great uses of Twitter in the classroom, click here.

Twitter also comes with a great accompanying program called Tweet Deck. Once you sign in with your Twitter account, Tweet Deck allows you to arrange the people you follow, easily access your message, and organize the hashtags you wish to follow. I find Tweet Deck a lot more welcoming than Twitter in that I can see what I want to see how I want to see it. This could be an effective tool in the classroom for the purposes of keeping your students focused and on task.