{"id":28,"date":"2014-01-06T02:49:04","date_gmt":"2014-01-06T02:49:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/sarahbylsma\/?p=28"},"modified":"2014-01-29T22:29:30","modified_gmt":"2014-01-29T22:29:30","slug":"can-twitter-be-an-effective-tool-in-the-classroom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/sarahbylsma\/2014\/01\/06\/can-twitter-be-an-effective-tool-in-the-classroom\/","title":{"rendered":"Can Twitter be an effective tool in the classroom?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Screen<\/a>After my first Cohort21 meeting, I was instantly drawn to Twitter, but I began to question how Twitter could be an effective tool in the classroom. How could I use Twitter in the classroom to teach students 21st Century skills and encourage literacy (especially in only 140 characters)?<\/p>\n

While my first post began with Dickens, it was actually Charles Dickens use of language, specifically his ability to use an economy of words, \u00a0that inspired me to teach students how to write, short, concise but deeply descriptive sentences. Then it was through Twitter that I found @VeryShortStory that sparked an idea. I would have students write and publish their stories on Twitter; we called them “Tweetlitures”. But how would I assess a short story of only 140 characters?<\/p>\n

First, students read excerpts from Dickens and I explained to them that we would try to emulate his style and usage of language by writing economically. Then, students outlined the five key elements of their short story (plot, characters, conflicts, setting, theme and point of view) that they wanted to convey to the reader. This became the source of their rubric; a peer must be able to identify the five key elements of their short story from their Tweetliture. Once students outlined their stories, they wrote and published them on Twitter. Students then used Twitter to respond to their peers Tweetlitures and provided suggestions.<\/p>\n

Overall, I was very happy with the way this lesson progressed and the students responsible use of Twitter. The best part of all was I was provided the opportunity to teach students how to use technology as a learning tool instead of a social tool. I now maintain a class Twitter page to post links to interesting articles, follow discussion between peers and suggest readings. Twitter has also allowed students to connect with each other, share resources and continue the classroom discussion outside the classroom. I am very interested to hear about how you use Twitter in the classroom and whether or not you think Twitter can be an effective tool in 21st Century learning. Next, I want to try to connect students to authors via Twitter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After my first Cohort21 meeting, I was instantly drawn to Twitter, but I began to question how Twitter could be an effective tool in the classroom. How could I use Twitter in the classroom to teach students 21st Century skills and encourage literacy (especially in only 140 characters)? While my first post began with Dickens, … Continue reading “Can Twitter be an effective tool in the classroom?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":62,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[12,17,16,15,14],"class_list":["post-28","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-21stc","tag-classroom","tag-dickens","tag-learning","tag-twitter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/sarahbylsma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/sarahbylsma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/sarahbylsma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/sarahbylsma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/62"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/sarahbylsma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/sarahbylsma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/sarahbylsma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/sarahbylsma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/sarahbylsma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}