What is Twitter?Twitter is a social networking and micro-blogging service that allows users to send and receive updates to each other. These updates are text-based posts (known as tweets) of up to 140 characters in length and are displayed on a user's profile page (like a webpage) or mobile phone. Users can send and receive updates via the Twitter website, SMS, RSS, or through applications such as Tweetie, Twitterrific,
and Feedalizr.
The offical description from Twitter is, "Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate
and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to
one simple question:
What are you doing?"
Watch this video to find out more.
Animated Explanations also has an excellent demo video - What is Twitter? (duration 3.30mins)
Who's twittering?Scoilnet is now on Twitter and tweeting for two audiences, primary and post primary. Tweets are daily and consist of updates to the Scoilnet site. More and more Irish teachers are quickly exploring the possibilities of
twitter and so far many are using it to make announcements to students.
Check out the following teacher's blog on using twitter for Maths.
Ollie Bray.com - Using Twitter for MathsOllie Bray.com - Using Twitter and Google Earth in the classroom to make the most of the weather! As for students, currently there are only a few twittering mainly due to the fact that its educational potential is yet to be fully realised and there are some personal safety implications.
5 reasons to use Twitter1. Be part of an educational community and receive school and teacher news, alerts and broadcasts
2. Share hyperlinks, notes, answers to maths problems, results from science experiments or findings from field trips
3. Improve writing skills by reponding to or summarising texts or poems covered in class
4. Be creative: Set up an account for a famous historical figure and tweet about his role in events eg. Michael Collins in the 1916 Rising " or create a haiku for English class
5. Face it, if this communication tool connects with the the learner and makes learning more fun and engaging it is worth exploring
Find out more:A Twitteraholics Guide to tweets, hashtags and all things Twitter NewHow teachers can use Twitter to maximise their professional development NewTwitter your way to happiness (pdf)
Twitter handbook for Teachers Teaching with twitter7 things you should know about Twitter50 ideas on using twitter for educationTwitter: An EvaluationCan we use Twitter for educational activities?