“twitter”by [e-aprendizaje] is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

A newly appointed administrator recently entered my shop space as he enjoys seeing students engaged in project based learning, and has a fondness for speaking to the students about their creations. After completing his tour, we engaged in conversation and he told me that, although I have established an amazing learning environment, if I really wanted to get ahead I needed to continually tweet out all of my class innovations. As I have no aspirations of climbing the ladder to achieve an administrative role, I initially dismissed this idea. As I now reflect on this past conversation, some questions come to mind: 

– Why am I working alone to establish a great shop space for students? 

– If my shop entices and motivates so many of the students in Fort St. James, would it not be prudent to help others by making my teaching methodologies accessible?

– I find establishing a discourse to reflect upon what I am doing one of the most effective ways of learning. This said, why am I not establishing an external network to enable this discourse?

In a previous post on my blog I reflected “that I am able to establish my twitter feed as a group of like minded people that help provide a discourse around problems I am encountering.” Indeed, many of the ideas I have acquired are extraneous and generally denote a single transfer of information; that is, I download and acquire the information to implement. Take, for example, my favorite YouTuber The Wood Whisperer. I would watch his videos, and subsequently attempt to incorporate some of what I have learned from him into the classroom. By using Twitter I can now establish a link to him, and provided he is receptive, engage in a more meaningful discourse. This ultimately, should lead me to answer the above questions as follows: I am establishing a network so I am not working in isolation, I am making myself available to provide feedback for others, and I am constructing the ability to have a discourse with other professionals in the field. 

Although I still feel some apprehension towards Twitter, every meaningful interaction I have helps improve my comfort level. For example, when reading Getting to Grips with Perspectives and Models In: Action Research in Education by Mary McAteer I felt compelled to reach out to the author, as this methodology and article resonated meaningfully with how I reflect on my own practice. With the advent of social media, I was able to find Mary McAteer on Twitter, send her a message, have her respond, and save her as a contact on my network for future communication. This simple act would have been substantially more difficult without this technology.

In closing, although it has only been a little over a week since I have created my Twitter account, I have started to see the immense potential this app has as a networking and communication tool. I believe that, as I become more proficient in its use, I will be able to further reflect upon, and improve, my teaching practices by establishing a more comprehensive network of professionals. Perhaps once school opens again in the fall I will also analyse the ethics of using Twitter as a tool to communicate with my students. It is as DeGroot, Young, and VanSlette write in Twitter Use and its Effects on Student Perception of Instructor Credibility, “research suggests that Twitter has the potential to be a valuable communicative tool for instructors” (423). I have been impressed by what Twitter has had to offer me thus far, and if he helps me connect with students in a meaningful and professional manner, then why would I not use it?