Journal #2- Join the Flock and Enhance Your Twitter Experience

Ferguson, H. (2010). Join the flock. Learning and Leading with Technology, 37(8), 12-15. Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/learn/publications/learning-and-leading/February-2012.aspx

Miller, S. (2010). Enhance you twitter experience. Learning and Leading with Technology, 37(8), 14-17. Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/learn/publications/learning-and-leading/February-2012.aspx

Summary:

In Join the Flock, Hadley Ferguson describes just how beneficial it may be to join Twitter as an educator.  Ferguson begins the article by defining PLN.  According to her definition a PLN “is a community of individuals around the world who are learning”.  Stated differently, PLN is a group of individuals that share a common interest.  For example, educators have the opportunity to join a wide variety of PLN groups via Twitter that work together to improve education.  As a member of an educational PLN community, Ferguson describes how the constant communication and collaboration that exists in her group has made her a well-informed educator because she obtains new ideas on classroom projects and the latest technology advances.

Summary:
Shannon McClintock Miller, author of Enhance Your Twitter Experience, touches on two important steps that Twitter members should take to enhance their Twitter experience.  The first step is to use a Twitter organizer such as tweetdeck that allows the user to organize all of his or her PLN communities.  Miller states, tweetdeck “organize(s) your Twitter stream into columns, such as All Friends, Mentions, Direct Messages, or any special lists or searches you follow”.  The next step which Miller invites users of Twitter to take is to use as a hashtag(#) in tweets.  Regarding the hashtags she states, “[hashtags] allows you to search all of the tweets containing that hashtag”.




Question 1:
What type of educational resources/ideas can be shared via Twitter?
After reading the article, I have learned that scholarly articles, educational websites and lessons plans can be resources/ideas shares among Twitter groups.  These types of resources can be read or used by educators who seek to try new teaching approaches or be informed on the latest tech-trends. This means that educators that do not live in the same state can share their knowledge with one another through Twitter.

Question 2:

How can the use of a hashtag help the sharing of information?

It is amazing how the use of a simple icon such as the hashtag(#) can make the sharing of information so much simpler.  As Miller states a hashtag highlights key ideas, words, and allows other users of Twitter to have free assess to them.  For example, if an educator wants to know important events happening at a particular school he or she can twitter the hashtag followed by the school’s name and obtain instant access to the school’s events.