Journal #4

The article Social Media for Teachers: Guides, Resources, and Ideas provides information and links to articles that help teachers learn how to incorporate social media into a classroom. To be honest, before I wasn't sure if social media in a classroom was a good idea. I thought that there could be many negative consequences that may arise, such as cyberbulling. However, after reading a couple of the articles posted, such as 50 Ways to use Twitter in a Classroom, I am beginning to open up more to this new idea. With regulation and supervision, social media may actually be a good tool to use in this new digital age.

In the future, I would consider using Twitter in my social studies high school classroom. There are so many ways I can utilize this tool to in the classroom. Nowadays, student have easy access to social media sites through the phones. Twitter is especially helpful as it is accessible on both a phone app and on the computer. With a majority of the students using twitter, communication between the teacher and the students may increase. I would be able to post links to resources, post sample questions for an upcoming exam, or retweet an relevant articles for the class. It's an easy way to make announcements so that students will be more informed before coming to class. Also, it is a great way to communicate to parents. The twitter feed may be made readily available so that if parents have any questions about the site as a whole, they are free to access the class' twitter page.

Another cool feature that I didn't know before was that I could sync the class' twitter feed straight into my teacher website or blog site. My teacher page would then offer a one-stop site where both students and parents could access for all information that pertains to my classroom.
Student collaboration can be facilitated even more so. For example, students would be able to live tweet during an assigned movie or book. In this live tweet, students can post any initial questions or reactions from the movie or book. Students can then respond to their peer's tweets. Also, before students can ask me a question, I would advise them to post the question onto our class twitter page and ask at least two other peers for help. Something I also found interesting was that I could use my twitter page a discussion board for the class. Students would be free to post a quick response (only 140 characters allowed) about an activity or lesson from the day. Lastly, the easy use of hashtags can help organize and keep track of any twitter conversation pertaining to our particular class. So if a student misses class, he/she could search our class's hashtag and look at the twitter conversation for that day.

Ultimately, I would consider incorporating Twitter as a social media tool into my classroom in the future. With a new generation of kids who are tech savvy, it may pose more benefits than consequences in the classroom.





Sources:

Miller, S. (2005). 50 ways to use twitter in the classroom. Retrieved from: http://www.teachhub.com/50-ways-use-twitter-classroom

Davis, M. (2015). Social media for teachers: Guides, resources, and ideas. Retrieved from: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/social-media-resources-educators-matt-davis