Twitter: Why?
I just had a look at Twitter, mainly because I’d heard a bit about it in classes gone past and wanted to know what its purpose was and how it could be used. After watching the “Twitter: In plain English” video, I don’t hink I’ll bother signing up.
Basically, Twitter is a social networking tool where you tell people what you are doing at the moment. You have 140 characters to write in, and then it posts it, like a blog post, to your page. People who ‘follow’ you basically RSS feed you and get updates of when you write something, for example, “I am going to the shops”, or “reading [insert name of book]“. It’s like the tool on Facebook next to your avatar where you write what you’re doing. Once you write it up, it updates in the box below and shows up in all your friend’s faccebook profiles in their box.
What I don’t like about it is this: why hop on the computer every twenty minutes to say you’re mowing the lawn or going for a swim or something? Why bother? Just go and mow the lawn or go for a swim.
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on June 1st, 2008 at 10:14 pm
Jess
I initially thought the same about Twitter. However, there are a lot of people using it to exchange thoughts, ideas & resources.
Most of the people I follow regularly post great resources & I do the same. Check it out at http://twitter.com/caroldaunt
PS: I’ve posted to you on the LTUG Ning also.
Cheers
Carol
on June 2nd, 2008 at 6:35 am
Carol
I see, it’s more about how you choose to use the technology than hjow it is prescribed to be used.
I saw that you also left an announcement for a conference you are involved in (http://www.learningtechnologies.com.au/index.cfm?action=papers). It would be interesting to see how Twitter could be used as a communication tool in an e-learning program, to remind learners about due dates, etc. You could even go as far as creating a Twitter account which acts as the centrepiece of the program, linking to the resources and learning activities of the course.
Oh, ning, I need to go back there. I’ve been a bit busy with assignments and it went on the backburner, along with Facebook and all those other things
Thanks for the comment
Jess
on June 2nd, 2008 at 9:58 am
That’s an interesting thought about using Twitter with students. A number of students follow me & I sometimes go in to look at their tweets – it makes interesting reading!!! I’ve posted about this in the forum on the Ning – How out of touch with students are we? It’s at: http://tinyurl.com/5p277q