Using twitter in education

As well as being a great networking tool for teachers, Twitter can also be a fun way to engage your students. Twitter can be used as a colloaborative tool to allow students to work on a project or used in a lesson as a class response system. You could even set up a Twitter account for a school trip to allow students and parents to keep up-to-date with what's happening. 

Meabh Ritchie has published a thought provoking article on TES which investigates the potential uses and pitfalls of using Twitter in education. Read the article here: Chirping about Twitter 

TES has a range of ideas for using Twitter to promote learning across a wide range of subjects and age ranges, all submitted by teachers via Twitter. Download the resource here: Ideas for using Twitter in the classroom 

Staying safe

One of the biggest issues with any form of social networking, particularly in education, is Privacy. Many teachers have already fallen foul of websites such as Facebook and MySpace with some extreme cases resulting in dismisal. i-How has published an article, aimed at teachers, on how to use Twitter in education and includes details of how to sign up, how twitter works as well as tips on how to stay safe and how to gain more followers. Read the article here: Using twitter in education - A teachers guide to using twitter. i-How also features an article on how to create cartoon characters of yourself for use with online profiles: How to create cartoon characters of yourself.

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