I decided at some point last school year to try Twitter. I wasn’t sure whether I was going to hate it or become completely addicted to it. I’d have to say, after many months of using Twitter (mainly for sharing with other educators), I may not have become so addicted to it that I am losing sleep tweeting, but I have decided that it’s pretty cool and can be a great tool. You can use Twitter as a quick way to touch base with your friends, but you can also follow other educators to share information. It’s true that if you are using Twitter for work and as a social “Hey, how are you doing…this is what I am up to right now” kind of application, you do sometimes have to dig through your tweets…err messages (depending on who you follow and how often they tweet) to find the ones that apply to education. However, I’ve gotten some really good ideas, links, and resources from other teachers in the “Twitterverse” that I may not have found otherwise.
Navigating the Twitterverse is simple. To “tweet” (post a message), you simply type in a brief (140 characters or less) message under “What’s happening?” and click the “Tweet” button. That’s it. You can include links in your tweets. I recommend using some URL shortener like http://bit.ly/, http://tiny.cc/ , or http://is.gd/. (I use bit.ly and it’s worked for me so far.) You can also share links to pictures by uploading your images to a site like http://twitpic.com/ , http://yfrog.com/ , or http://twitgoo.com/ and posting the link to your image on Twitter. (I use twitpic – no problems there.)
What’s that? You have something fantastic to share, but you just can’t share it within the Twitter message limit? Well, then head on over to http://www.twitlonger.com/ - when 140 characters just isn’t enough.
Who should you follow and why? Well, of course, that’s up to you, but when you follow someone, his or her tweets will show up on your home page whenever you log into Twitter – and this is how we share information. You can also send direct messages (nobody else will see these) to people who follow you. You can follow people you know (if they give you their twitter URL) by going to their page and clicking the “Follow” button. You can also check out the folks your twitter pals are following – you might want to follow them, too. You can search for people by entering their names in the “find people” area, and you can browse interests – or tweeter categories - within Twitter to look for people to follow, too.
One site I found to be very helpful in locating people to follow is http://wefollow.com/. It is an index for tweeters. You can search for people who have categorized their tweets as, say, “education,” “educationaltechnology,” or “teaching.” Also, if you see something someone else has tweeted that you think the people following you might be interested in, you can retweet this message yourself by clicking “Retweet” next to their message – how easy is that?
You can make your tweets private by checking “Protect my tweets” under settings – in which case people can’t follow you unless you approve their request to follow you. Also, you will receive emails whenever someone follows you or sends you a direct message by default. If you don’t want those emails (or the Twitter email newsletter), uncheck these options under “Notices” in your settings. Managing your profile and design (also under settings) is pretty straightforward.
The bottom line is this…if you are not a tweeter, I definitely recommend at least checking it out! You never know what great resources or ideas you might stumble upon by way of a fellow tweeter! Follow me on Twitter, and I’ll follow you…then we can quickly share ideas and resources. Deal? http://twitter.com/laineymic
