Tweets

I credit Kylene Beers with being the first person to tell me about Twitter in the Summer of 2007 when I was enrolled in a week-long course she was teaching at the TCRWP Summer Reading Institute.  Beers took some time to explain a variety of Web 2.0 technologies.  Until Beers talked about tweeting, I thought it was something that was only for the birds.  How wrong I was.

I started using Facebook about two years ago to keep up with friends, family, and former colleagues.  (Ruth and I even created a Two Writing Teachers Page on Facebook.)  However, I haven’t gotten into tweeting.  First of all, I’m not into being followed.  Second, I’m not sure I want everyone knowing where I am or what I’m doing at a given moment (I resisted getting a cell phone until October 2001 for a similar reason.).  Third, I’ve heard some horror stories from a dear teacher-friend of mine about some negative experiences she had with people who followed her tweets.

Despite the things I’ve heard about Twitter, I’ve been curious about it.  So, when I saw Kappa Delta Pi link to an article touting the benefits of Twitter for teachers (written two months ago on TPN/edweek), I figured it was worth reading.  “Teachers Take to Twitter” is about the professional benefits of being part of a network like Twitter.  Just like communities of teachers who blog about writing, there are communities of teachers who tweet about teaching.   I found it fascinating to learn about tweeting for a pedagogical purpose.

While I’m still not ready to open a Twitter Account, I’m definitely more intrigued about the tweeting for educational purposes after reading this article.