Twitter and Web 2.0 Tools!

I believe that by using Twitter within the classroom it could be both a benefit to me and to my students.  It could personally benefit me in the way that I could type in key words related to a class project or activity.  I could find someone on Twitter that specializes in that particular area that I am looking to incorporate into my lessons.  This person could have ideas out there that they have posted comments on or ideas related to a certain event.  For example, I love history (especially American history)!  I could find a historian that tweets and find out some wonderful information that I could incorporate into my social studies lessons.  My students could use Twitter to help them find information on a certain topic, along with keeping in touch with classmates about homework assignments or questions.  It could also be used as an after school communication tool between parents and teachers.  If parents had homework questions after school they could tweet the teacher for a quick and easy response.  E-mail works the same way, but to me a tweet seems to be a quicker response (especially if it is connected to a cell phone that sends an automatic response).

Twitter and other microblogging tools could be used in many areas of education within the classroom.  While viewing the slide presentation “31 Interesting Ways to use Twitter in the Classroom” many ideas came to me on how I could personally incorporate Twitter into my lessons.  One way students could use Twitter within the classroom would be to research various areas of their curriculum.  I thought it would be interesting to follow an author or a historian.  These were ideas suggested within the presentation.  Students could also bookmark links to share with other classmates on what they have found while researching.  I thought it would be neat for students to follow another student their age in another country.  This could be used as a pen pal.  They could be learning at the same time about their pen pal’s home town and country.  I also found it very interesting that there were games that were mentioned on the presentation about Twitter.  There seems to be endless ways that students can use Twitter with education tied into it.  I always thought Twitter was just another instant messaging tool, but I have learned that there is much more to it than I originally thought!

I looked at the web 2.0 tool pages that were created by my classmates.  The following three areas were tools that I believe I could use within my own classroom lessons.

1)      Concept Mapping - I believe that students could use concept mapping in many subject areas.  It is an outline format that can be used to organize a set of notes, reading, or research materials.  I have heard of Inspiration in the past, but have actually never used it myself.  I am excited to use this area of tools within a research project with my students.  They could use the concept mapping as an outline to neatly organize their notes, along with creatively thinking how to organize these notes.

2)      Quizzes and Polling - I have used quizzes and polling such as Survey Monkey in the past to take quick surveys online.  I did not think of using it within my own classroom, but after reading about the uses of the tool I believe I could incorporate it into a classroom lesson.  I could use it in a couple of different ways through assessments and surveys.  I could quiz my students on a lesson through basic questions, along with surveying my students on how they believe a certain lesson or activity went in class.  I had not thought of using this before, but now I am thinking of incorporating this into my unit plan as an assessment strategy.

3)      Google Sites & Weebly - I could see myself using Google Sites& Weebly within my classroom.  In the near future I would like to set up a classroom website.  I could list class assignments on this site, daily notes, and resources the students could use for extra help.  I am not sure I would use it with individual students, but a class website would be a nice tool to have within the classroom.

Source Cited            Creative Commons.  (n.d.).  31 Interesting Ways to use Twitter in the Classroom.  Retrieved from https://docs.google.com/present/view?id=dhn2vcv5_118cfb8msf8.