Happy (belated) Digital Learning Day! Digital Learning Day is a day to encourage and to celebrate the use of technology in classrooms. It's unfortunate, but there are many "old school" teachers who reject the shift towards technology for their students. There are so many opportunities and advantages for both teachers and students, it's great that there is a day to encourage and promote technology in schools.
One thing I've noticed at Platt High School, where I am interning, is how addicted students are to Twitter. Even though they are not allowed to have their phone out during the school day (another can of worms that I will begin to open shortly) I hear them talking about Twitter, tweets, subtweets and trending topics all day long. They literally can't get enough. Therefore it only seems logical that a teacher should try to take advantage of this niche of an interest and make use of it in the classroom. A teacher, Kathee Godfrey, made the attempt to incorporate Twitter into her classroom. She wrote about the experience with her students in a blog on the National Writing Project site.
Godfrey was surprised that her students responded so well. She had them discuss an article they read together, using Twitter for the first time. This assignment would be amazing at Platt High School -- students are already so adept at using Twitter that it would, most likely, be a very fluid lesson they would enjoy. It would be something so out of the norm of their regular day that they would remember it for a long time.
The only problem with trying to use Twitter in a lesson, is that at Platt students are not allowed to even have their phones out while in school. Another blog post on nwp.org addresses the problem of phone restrictions in school. It's the 21st century and cell phones are a huge part of students' lives (and many teachers', for that matter). They have grown up with technology and it is almost an extension of themselves; to punish them for having their phones out during the school day really creates a disconnect between school life and home/social life. If we, as teachers, want to bridge that gap and get students more involved in their own education we need to help unify the separations -- and incorporating technology in the classroom is a perfect first step.
Hi Kayla,
ReplyDeleteI have wanted to use Twitter in classes with students. How would you suggest embarking on this journey? I've done some early work examining this...but haven't gone in fully on it. What suggestions might you have?
I was thinking of using Twitter in the classroom at a really basic, easy level to introduce it. The teacher would tweet a question with a hashtag and then each student would tweet a response with the same hashtag. The idea is pretty much the same as polleverywhere.com, but using a more interesting platform (rather than just a text).
ReplyDeleteUsing Twitter in a classroom seems like something that would need to grow from the needs and reactions from the students in individual classes.