… on Jaybird street, love to hear that Robin go tweet tweet
tweet” (Lyrics quoted from "Rockin' Robin by Bobby Day)
Note: This post is in response to ESC407 Week 12 Module 10 Blog 1
Twitter. Pointless snippets or powerful collaboration tool?
Like many technologies, it seems that once again it isn’t about what you
implement necessarily but about HOW it is implemented. Twitter is a social
media micro blogging platform which allows users to post “tweets” of
information up to 140 characters long. The character limit originally came
about through the limitations of a text message on a mobile phone (160
characters) – 20 characters are used for a unique ID. It could be thought that
such a small amount of information is virtually useless in an information rich
world, however Twitter has been incredibly successful and is used by an
enormous range of people from your average person on the street to celebrities
and politicians. News stories are sometimes first broken via the platform, going
back to as early as the 2009 Hudson river crash (https://www.brandwatch.com/blog/44-twitter-stats-2016/).
So what use could it be in education? For teachers to start
with, there are many active Twitter users who post about education and the
latest research/trends. There are also groups denoted by the a hash symbol such
as #aussieED who hold regular discussions. From a student perspective, a study
showed that making it compulsory to use twitter for a course increased both
student engagement and academic results. Key to this however was “Faculty
engagement on the platform” (Junco, Elavsky, & Heiberger, 2013).
Although the Junco et al (2013) study was in a
university environment, I believe similar principles could be applied in a high
school setting. Ultimately, like so many of the topics on this blog, the use of
technology needs to be carefully designed such that it enhances outcomes and
encourages the desired behaviour (in this case student engagement and
collaboration). I would like to experiment with a group on a platform such as Twitter for engaging students both in and out of the classroom. The interactive
nature would hopefully create many opportunities for both formal and informal
collaboration amongst students and teachers alike.
References
Junco, R., Elavsky, C. M., & Heiberger, G. (2013). Putting
twitter to the test: Assessing outcomes for student collaboration, engagement
and success. British Journal of
Educational Technology, 44(2), 273-287.
doi:10.1111/j.1467-8535.2012.01284.x
Hi Michelle,
ReplyDeleteWhile reading your article I was curious why you chose Twitter over other websites like Wikispaces, Moodle, Edmodo etc. that are labelled as being ‘educational social platforms’? Do you think it would be more beneficial for schools to collaborate with social media websites that students are using in their everyday lives to engage them in learning? I came across this article written by the BBC Active (n.d.) titled ‘How Social Media is changing education’ where it talks about lecturers working alongside social media in education to engage students in learning in a more informal and familiar atmosphere. This article (Reuben, n.d.) specifically looks at the possibilities of Twitter after observing that “seventy-five percent of students admit to being on Twitter “all the time””. Maybe the future of education lays in embracing social media that is common place in students’ lives, acknowledging the power it has to bring people together, improve communication and share information with one another (Reuben, n.d. & Brady, Holcomb & Smith, 2010)!
BBC Active. (n.d.). How social media is changing education. Retrieved from http://www.bbcactive.com/BBCActiveIdeasandResources/Howsocialmediaischangingeducation.aspx
Brady, K., Holcomb, L.B., Smith, B.V. (2010). The use of alternative social networking sites in higher educational settings: a case study of the e-learning benefits of Ning in Education, Journal of Interactive Online Learning, 9(2), ISSN: 1541¬4914.
Reuben, R. (n.d.). The Use of Social Media in Higher Education for Marketing and Communications: A Guide for Professionals in Higher Education. Retrieved from http://www.fullerton.edu/technologyservices/_resources/pdfs/social-media-in-higher-education.pdf
Hi Isabella, to be honest I think that some of those products have their place, in that they insulate the students somewhat from the outside community. Unfortunately I think they have the side effect of kids (and teachers for that matter) thinking they're a completely safe place (which happened with my own daughter on Edmodo) when in fact anything on there can be easily captured and sent out by any other user, like the SnapChat screenshot controversy (https://splinternews.com/teens-are-freaking-out-about-the-new-snapchat-update-1793848855) a few years ago.
DeleteIn general, especially in a secondary school setting, I think it makes sense to take advantage of students familiarity with the tools they already use and to leverage that knowledge. As well as that, I have a fairly strong bias towards using "generic" tools in innovative ways rather than completely reinventing the technology wheel every time we come up with a new idea for teaching if that makes sense.