TWITTER... Education? or Social Network?

Although some argue that young people already spend too much time using social media, other educators say it’s time to embrace tools like Twitter and use them to expand communication with students and develop innovative lessons.
Once primarily an outlet for celebrities to broadcast their latest escapades, Twitter has gone mainstream. The service is employed in business, advertising, personal communications and even education. Teachers at all grade levels are “tweeting” about using Twitter for connecting with students and parents as well as for intruction.Twitter is more useful than e-mail, because, although only about 50 percent of high school students have Internet access at home, about 90 percent have cell phones and can receive tweets that way.
Twitter also allows teachers to network with colleagues around the country. Teachers say that they can follow different education sites on Twitter, and post a question on Twitter nationally and got some good feedback from other education professional.

The main way educators have been using Twitter with students is to tweet the homework every day. Statement of an educator, Provenzano: “Students can see the homework posted on my Twitter account, which I have linked to my school Web site. Students who link their cell phones to my tweets receive a text message with the homework. My goal for using Twitter is to open another line of communication with students. The more available I can make myself to my students, the better the class can be.
“Another way I use it is for quick communication with students who have questions or other school-related ideas to share,” Provenzano continued. “Some like to share ideas they have about essays or other projects.”
Provenzano also has awarded extra credit to students who have sent him tweets related to a class assignment. “I once had a student send me a picture of Edgar Allen Poe's grave in Baltimore,” he said. “The student thought it would be cool since we had just covered his works in class. It was cool because I didn't ask the student to do it; but the student was thinking of the lessons outside of school and thought I would like the picture.”

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