Connected Educator Month @iES
Day 3 - Twitter
Twitter is a microblogging service, accessed from your computer or mobile phone, that connects you to a worldwide network of people. Think of Twitter like a very short blog—Twitter’s “tweets” are microposts of a maximum of 140 characters. Like blogs, the tweets may contain videos and photos, but these are shown as links in order to stay within the character limits.
Just as you have readers and subscribers for your blog, you have “followers” on Twitter. Your followers see your messages (called tweets or updates) as you tweet them, along with the chronological tweets from all those they follow.
To find out more about Twitter and how you can use it, watch this short video: Twitter in plain English. Then complete the activities below to get started with Twitter.
Twitter in Plain English
- Visit Twitter and create an account.
- Visit Sue’s site that shares tips and tricks to consider when creating your Twitter account.
- Create a few tweets.
- To get started, follow a few connected educators you know like @camcalis (Cathy Mcalister) and @Mason4learning (Elizabeth Mason) View their lists of followers as well as who they are following, and then follow some users that are interesting to you.
- Some other suggested by CEM: @snbeach, @lanihall, @edcocp, @dcambrid, @pammoran, @mtechman, or @plpnetwork.
- Want more people to follow? Check out this collaborative list of connected educators to follow on Twitter. If you have suggestions of who to follow, add them to the document!
- Once you’ve followed a few educators, retweet someone’s tweet. Look for the retweet link when you place your mouse over an individual tweet.
- Find even more educators to follow at the Twitter4Teachers Wiki.
- Make sure you update your profiles around the Web with your Twitter name so others can follow you.
- Watch the video below from Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach about why being a connected educator is important.
Why be a connected educator?
Great job! That’s all for today. Tomorrow, we’ll explore hashtags, and how
you can use them for even more DIY professional learning.
All text, links and videos are from the Connected Educator Starter Kit.