Twittersphere: the entire community of all Twitter users

To be honest, I have never really been all that in to Twitter.  To me, it has always seemed like a mini-Facebook, with the 140-word posts just like status updates.  And I must admit that I get slightly annoyed when people use abbreviations such as “gr8” for “great” in an effort to stay under the word limit.  I suppose I shouldn’t make too many judgments, however, seeing as I have never actually used Twitter, and my feelings could always change (I used to be opposed to Facebook, too, but then once I created an account I got hooked!)

Before reading the articles for Friday’s class, I had never before considered using Twitter professionally.  One thing that worries me about using Twitter as an educational tool is that it requires students to have access to the Internet, either at home or at school.  In the Matteson article, for example, the authors discussed the possibility of using Twitter to conduct a live discussion feed during lecture.  In order for this to happen, the students would need to have a phone with Internet access or a computer.  I do not think teachers should assume that all students will have phones with Internet access, and because it can be difficult to get access to a computer lab for class, this exercise may not be able to be realistically implemented in schools.

Supposing that Internet access was not an issue, several of the ideas presented in the article are quite intriguing.  For example, I really like the idea of the collaborative creative writing assignment, in which students work together to build on a prompt, one tweet at a time.  I think it would be interesting to see what sort of stories the students could create in such a manner.  It would definitely be a test of their creativity and ability to work as a team!

Overall, I think the idea of using Twitter in the classroom is a great one, but I am slightly concerned about how teachers could realistically implement it.

And so it begins

This past Friday, my fellow MACers and I had our first class in a course titled Teaching with Technology.  As part of the introductions, we were asked to explain why we wanted to become teachers.  You would think this particular question would have come up in the early days of the program, but it took nearly three weeks for a professor to ask us to share our thoughts.  In retrospect, I think it was better things happened this way.  Had the question been asked earlier on in the program, I probably would have been concentrating so hard on remembering everyone’s name that I wouldn’t have been able to really listen to anyone’s response.  At this stage of the program, however, we all know each other a little bit better, and so the thoughts and stories shared by each cohort member were more meaningful, at least on my end.  Several of the stories truly inspired me, and I thank you all for sharing.

Changing gears back to technology, I feel obliged to start the year by admitting that technology and I aren’t exactly the best of friends.  I can’t even begin to count the number of times I have had to call home for help while away at school because my printer wasn’t working, or because I couldn’t get the internet to work, or because my computer screen went black with a flashing bright-red warning sign (true story).  So I feel like I have a right to be a bit skeptical about technology.  On the flip side, as much as I rant and yell at my computer when it is not cooperating, I still have to admit that I don’t know what I’d do without it.  And I will be the first to admit that, frustrating or not, technology does have its uses.

Though my experience with technology in high school was limited and not particularly helpful when utilized, I am excited to learn about the possibilities of using technology in my own chemistry classroom.  I can already foresee the day when I will come across an experiment I would love to have my students perform only to find out that the school does not have the resources to allow for such an activity.  With the use of technology, however, I am not limited to experiments that can only be performed in the school’s laboratory.  So in that respect, I am quite excited about the advantages technology can have in a classroom setting.

I guess what I am trying to say, is that I am a skeptical optimist when it comes to teaching with technology.  I’m not entirely sure if it makes sense to be both skeptical and optimistic about something, but there you go.