Twitter-It's Not Just What's For Breakfast...

For some, Twitter is a place where people talk about themselves, show pictures of what they are eating or a platform for celebrities to make sure they are even more a part of our lives. And certainly those tweets and tweeters are out there. A simple search of a few key words will reveal a world of misfits, narcissists and sometimes even worse.

And this is what I am up against everyday. You might be too. Trying to explain to people what Twitter is and more and more what it is not. And in education it is especially hard trying to convince Superintendents, School Boards, administrators and others that Twitter is a viable place for learning about real-time events and a place where educators can take part in some really meaningful professional development.

I get asked all the time how do I show the benefits of Twitter to skeptics. What is my ammo, go-to sites and examples that I point to when talking about all this stuff? So finally I have organized it all into a short list and will give it to you so you can arm your self with Twitter knowledge and head out into the world and start changing some minds.

An Intro To Twitter
This is a video that I noticed just recently and wished I had it since I started. While it looks cute and cuddly (which it is) the way these 2 really break down what Twitter is helps me explain it even better when I talk to people.



Twitter In 60 Seconds
This is another one of my "go-to" videos when I talk to educators about Twitter. I like the analogies and how it focuses on the conversation aspect of Twitter. And it is only 60 seconds. Can't beat that!



Twitter Misconceptions
On this site are the Top 10 Misconceptions about Twitter. Things like people only tweet about what they eat for breakfast, or to Tweet means you have to give up massive amounts of time. 

Twister
There are lots of services that will copy what Twitter does. This one is a little different. What do you think George Washington would have tweeted as he lead the army across the Potomac? Or what would Mubarak had tweeted as he watched Egyptian empire crumble around him? Using Twister, kids and teachers can use a simple form to create tweets, even full profile pages around historical figures. There are several examples to look at and lots of possibilities. 


Twitter Chats
I have written a lot about this before but being able to show that there are lots of educators with similar curricular areas talking on a regular basis is huge for changing minds. Many don't think there is a chat for their area but when I show them Cybrary Man's page for chats, the lightbulb goes off.

7 Things You Should Know About Twitter
This 2 page PDF from Educase really breaks down what you need to know before dipping your toes into the Twitter water and explains how educators can get the most out of it.

How Twitter Makes You A Better Writer
This is one I use all the time because this was me. I was a horrible writer and had an awful time getting my thoughts down properly and in a concise way. Twitter has really helped me improve both of those things and more. (Although I do have a very long way to go...)

Twitter Can Save You Time
Another one I have found recently, this simple example from a good friend of mine about how he went to Twitter out of frustration and found exactly what he was looking for when no one else could provide it for him really helps to show one of the daily benefits many of us get when using Twitter.

Of course if I have more time I show lots more examples about how Twitter is used in the classroom (like the UT Dallas Twitter Experiment), or have some special guests talk about how they are using Twitter to do some really cool things with learning (like my good friends Shannon and Nick and their Epic Romeo and Juliet project that all evolved out of Twitter.).

I always point people to my Twitter Livebinder (below) that has tons and tons of all my Twitter info that I keep so they can read up on all this and more.

An Educators Guide To Twitter

How do you explain Twitter to people? What are you resources? Leave some comments below.

Image From Geekandpoke-FlickrCC

Why Can't We All Just Get Along...

So, I just realized this is my 400th post. Neat! Thanks for reading and all your support over the past 2 years!




This is a post that has been brewing for a while now....


But after a conversation I had this weekend I think it's time to get some of my thoughts out there for reflection. 


I totally get passion in education. And really can you be an educator and not have passion for education? Perhaps that is a post for another time. 


But the way I see it, many have moved passed passion and moved to anger. 


Again, I totally get that. I am upset with many things in our current system. Sure, if asked, I would give a lot of the "reformers" a piece of my mind. 


But...


It seems like if  you disagree with one side or the other you are perceived as dumb, stupid, or much, much worse. 


My conversation started out with a Tweet that (to paraphrase) asked if a certain, central figure in the reform debate, that many admire and look up to actually had any ideas or if she just ran around the country telling us what is wrong without actually offering up any ideas. I follow this "reformer" on Twitter and her stream is filled with what comes across in 140 characters as anger. Again, I get that. (Remember, I am angry too.) But my point was that when you had the audience she did last week why not give them something tangible to take back to their districts to try or do? Seems reasonable, right?


Normally I don't tweet things like that. I don't. I like the discussion but there are people out there in ol' Twitter land that use the screen as one of anonymity and they believe because they are behind this screen they can say and do whatever they like. Don't get me wrong. Again, I love the conversations. I totally enjoy for my thinking to be pushed. However I have limits....


So after my tweet, which I figured would draw some comments I got plenty of, "I agrees," and a few people who disagreed, which was great. I had fun engaging and talking to them. Then there was one who, has passion, but that passion has grow to anger. And if you cross them, say anything negative about the reformer  whom I mentioned earlier, well, you might as well pack up and go home. 


This tweeter had solid arguments for certain types of reform and the direction we should be going, many I agreed with. However, it was the personal attacks and just general poor language that really made me loose respect for this tweeter. 


Disagreement is cool. Makes us think differently and see other sides, but to move from disagreement to creative hashtags, none appropriate to even write here, really just make your arguments look weak. 


This isn't the first time I have written about this or even encountered it. In a post from late last year I wrote about Education Nation project from NBC and how it was getting all sorts of negative attention from the Twittevers and blogsphere. Again, there I tried to say we needed to move from talk to action. 


In my most popular post ever on this blog I wrote about why we should all think before we Tweet. 


For me I keep coming back to this idea that I believe people who use social media or tools like it feel some level of anonymity and they can say, really what ever. What if we were having a face-to-face conversation? Would the person who I had my conversation with this past weekend behaved the same and said the same things? I am doubtful. 


I am not the only one to notice this trend. My friend Michelle, just wrote a post today about the exact same issue. In it she says; 

What do we tell kids about comments on blogs, online articles, Facebook status updates?

1. PLAY NICELY.
2. If you disagree, you can do so without attacking another person’s character.
3. If you wouldn’t say it in person, don’t type it online.
4. Remember, there are human beings on the other end.
5. Remember, you are also a human being.
6. Rule #1 is really all you need.

So why so much animosity amongst educators in online spaces lately? I would say that the current turmoil in which we find ourselves (perhaps related to education reform discussions) is part of it. But are we practicing what we preach? I don’t think so.

Couldn't agree more Michelle. And Seth Godin had a piece this weekend where this last line says simply, "Anger, on the other hand, makes us smaller." 

We are going to disagree. And you know, that makes us smarter, pushes our thinking and helps us see all sides. But is it possible to do it without anger? Passion, sure. But anger?

What do you think? Is this a problem today? Is it a result of the anonymity I say the screen provides or is it something else? Leave some comments below. 

New Posted Resources 02/24/2011

• QR Codes In The Mainstream

  tags: qrcode favorite

• A Step-by-Step Guide to Global Collaborations

  tags: collaboration favorite

• iPads for Education | Victoria, Australia

  tags: iPad favorite

• What is a QR Code?

  tags: qrcode favorite

• Creating Content with iPads

  tags: iPad favorite

• Student Learning with Diigo

  tags: diigo favorite

• 5 Tips For Assessing What Students Know

  tags: assessment favorite

• Defining Professional Learning Communities (PLC)

  tags: plc favorite

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

#Edtech Over The Pond

On Friday, Ken Royal had me back on his BlogTalkRadio show, this time to talk to Joe Dale, an educational technology consultant, living on the south English coast. I was thrilled to be able to exchange ideas with Joe and the conversation did not disappoint. We talked about the importance of educators getting connected, how they can do that and even had a chance to do a mini smackdown where we shared some of our favorite tools.

I think for me the conversation affirmed that the same issues we face in the US are similar else where in the world. Joe and I both struggle with helping educators see the value of getting connected in these online spaces and getting them to understand how they can grow as an educator using something simple like Twitter.

Below is the player with the interview. Take some time and listen, not to me but the exchange of ideas. And listen some of the other great interviews Ken has done with some of the great thinkers in the edtech world.

Listen to internet radio with royaltreatment on Blog Talk Radio

When We Will Start Our Egyptian Revolution In The Classroom?

It has been an interesting past few weeks around the world. First the govenerment in Tunisia was brought down. Then a similar situation in Egypt. And now people are taking to the streets in Bahrain, Iran and other places. For whatever the reason the people in these countries were upset with their government and protest to the point where they brought down governments, some that had been in place for 30+ years.

Now, I am not a political expert. I don't know each situation and why the people where unhappy. I have some knowledge but I don't want to speculate. But I do know that there is one common thread in each of these situations that is worth taking a look at.

Social Media

On Sunday 60 Minutes profiled the man credited with starting the revolution in Egypt. Wael Ghorim works for Google and started a Facebook page for Egyptians to post their experiences with police. And it is from that Facebook page and from Twitter posts organize protests that topiled a government. It was a great interview and you can watch it below.



The events in Tunisia, Iran, Bahrain, and other places and trace their beginnings to the use of social media by the residents in those countries. Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites allowed residents to organize in non-traditional ways to get their message out. Many of the governments don't know how to handle these new voices, so they knee-jerk react, send out the military to quiet the crowds. But they just get louder and louder and larger and larger. And in the case of Egypt and Iran, they attempted to keep control by shutting down Internet traffic for several days.

Any of this sound familiar?

Leadership is afraid of a new medium and how powerful it is. So they put up blocks, downplay it's effectiveness, and bury their heads in the proverbial sand.

When is our revolution in education when it comes to Social Media and the use of these tools in the classroom? Think about how powerful it could be if students in a high school social studies class in Nebraska could look at the Facebook page started by Wael. But, they can't because the district feels Facebook is a time suck, provides no educational value and they block it.

Or what about being able to look at the Tweets organizing the protests and have a discussion about why the people in these places feel the way they do and how their situations compare to those locally and nationally.

Those of us who know the power of Social Media and the value it can provide to learning are, sometimes, seen in the same way as many of the organizers of these revolutions. We are disruptive. We want to destroy the current system. Really? We just want change. We understand how these tools can be used to enhance, change and ultimately make learning better for students.

Maybe it is wrong of me to compare these events in these countries where many of the citizens have been mistreated for many, many years. But again, isn't the same true for our kids? Sitting in rows, drill and kill, teaching in isolation. Maybe that is mistreatment....

What do you think? When is our education revolution? Are their parallels? Or are the situations different? Leave some comments below.

New Posted Resources 02/15/2011

• The Three C’s of Social Networking: Consumption, Curation, Creation

  tags: socialmedia socialnetworking favorite

• 7 Video Tutorials to understand Google Voice Completely

  tags: googlevoice google favorite

• How Do We Encourage Students to be Advocates of Their Own Learning?

  tags: PBL favorite

• Facebook as a Professional Learning Network (PLN)

  tags: facebook pln favorite

• QR Code Resources From CybraryMan

  tags: QRcodes qrcode qr cybraryman favorite

• Recommended Follows From CybraryMan

  tags: pln twitter cybraryman favorite

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Get Your Search On!

Over the weekend my good friend Gwyneth Jones tweeted about an interesting search engine called Heapr. I am all about search engines so of course I had give it a go.

Basically Heapr is a quad search engine. With one search you get results for 4 different searches all on one screen. While built using Google search you also get returned results from Wikipeda related searches, WolframAlpha search and Twitter instant results.

So I just did a basic search for "Super Bowl" since it was the most watched program in the history of television over the weekend.

On the left you get the Google results. Instant search is automatically turned on so as soon as you start typing the results pour in. On the left you have the live results from Twitter search, that as you watch, update automatically. So during a live or breaking news event, this stream would be constantly moving.

Here is the result from WolframAlpha

And the Wikipedia Results

Of course, if you look hard at all the results, there is some good and there is some not so good. But isn't that the case with all search results, no matter the engine. What I think is the benefit is having all four different types of results on one page, especially the live search results from Twitter, the data results from WolframAlpha and the related results from Wikipedia. I really do think this allows for more deeper information that students can use for researching topics.

But the basic search engine is not all that Heapr has to offer. Looking for images? Heapr Images will return Google Image and Flickr results side by side. (For me the only downside is not being able to sort by license.)

Looking for video? Head over to the Heapr Video page and and you can do simultaneous searches on Youtube, Vimeo and Hulu.

Pretty basic in terms of search. But pretty neat in terms of results. And the ability to search multiple sites in one click is a big time saver for me. So head over to Heapr and get your search on!