Thing # 7A

Twitter in the classroom? Oh my! Well, it is catching on at the university level if not in grammar and secondary school. I follow the
LISNews Librarian And Information Science News Blog which had an article titled 50 Ways to Use Twitter in the College Classroom by AndyW.

This article caught my attention because of all the Twitter craze that is happening lately. I have to admit that I am not a Twitterer (is that a word?) yet, and even though I now officially have a Facebook page, I am horrible about finding time to update and monitor it. I wanted to see how the university is able to incorporate micro blogging in the classroom.

Some of the most obvious ways that Twitter is being used in the university classroom is to communicate between students and professors, collaborate with peers, share websites, make announcements, take surveys, and brainstorm. Some of the more creative ways it is being used is to follow news stories, practice foreign languages, practice succinct writing and brevity, twittories (each person contributes only 140 characters to a story that the class writes a a whole),, follow occupations, search for jobs, and follow researchers.

This article was very interesting and offered several links and ideas for using Twitter. I don't see this happening in our schools anytime soon, but it is an interesting idea! We would have to break the taboo of having and using cell phones as an educational tool. I do wonder how many side conversations and tangents go on when students are supposed to be Twittering for class :)