Searching for "online learning"
Social Homework Platform Aims to Boost Student Engagement
http://campustechnology.com/articles/2015/02/25/social-homework-platform-aims-to-boost-student-engagement.aspx
Another step ahead/afar from CMS?
Koondis works in traditional large introductory lecture classrooms, blended classes and fully online courses that often are filled with students enrolled from various disciplines who are required to be there for their majors.
Described as a “social homework system,” a “discussion forum that puts students in small groups” and even a replacement for the campus learning management system, Koondis is showing great promise as a pill for student satisfaction.
The idea is that Koondis eliminates the need for teachers to read all of the posts. The program even counts posts for the instructor for grading purposes, and alerts the faculty member to do follow-up when a student isn’t participating.
Will students be wearing their tech in virtual classrooms in five years? Wearable devices, adaptive technologies, and the Internet of Things are just some of the new tech researchers say is shaping the near future of higher education.
In 1 Year or Less: BYOD and the flipped classroom.
“Employers and higher education institutions are finding that when given the opportunity to choose their device, users are saved from the effort and time needed to get accustomed to new devices and can therefore accomplish tasks with more ease and efficiency.”
“Flipped learning is seen as especially suited for higher education because the rearranging of class time gives students in large introductory lecture courses more opportunity to engage and interact with their peers.”
In 2-3 Years: Makerspaces and wearable devices.
Makerspaces have the “benefit of engaging learners in creative, higher-order problem solving through hands-on design, construction and iteration.”
“Wearable technology is poised to see significant growth in the coming years, spurring experimentation in higher education because the demand for wearables is seen to be coming in large part from college-aged students.”
In 4-5 Years: Adaptive technologies and the Internet of Things.
“Adaptive technology is seen as a means to break free of a “one-size-fits-all” approach to education and is suited well for online and hybrid learning environments, “where student activities are conducted virtually and can be monitored by software and tracking applications.”
The Internet of Things pushes information to learners from their surroundings. “For instance, a learner exploring a city with a rich historical past can explore their environment through an architectural, political, or biological lens, depending on how the surroundings are equipped.”
From the NMC Horizon Report 2015: Higher Education Edition
http://campustechnology.com/Articles/2015/02/11/The-6-Technologies-That-Will-Change-the-Face-of-Education.aspx?Page=1
https://www.libraryjuiceacademy.com/moodle/login/index.php
Eva Dodsworth
Since the emergence of easily accessible dynamic online mapping tools, there has been a drastic increase in geographic interest and awareness. Whether for personal, social, professional or academic uses, people are using Geographic Information System (GIS) technology to communicate information in a map format. Whether it’s using Google Earth to study urban change, or creating Google Map Mashups to deliver library resources, more and more members of society are turning to mapping programs for their visualization needs. With so many using GIS technology in their daily lives, library staff are now more than ever assisting library clients with their mapping queries.
This course will introduce students to a variety of mapping tools and GIS technologies such Google Earth and the creation of dynamic KML files; ArcGIS Online and webmap publishing; Google Fusion Tables and geocoding; and GIS fundamentals with geospatial data creation. Students will be able to apply their GIS skills in their reference work, in digitization projects, in webpages, in library instruction, and more. Through hands-on exercises, pre-recorded demonstrations and lectures, students will receive a thorough overview of mapping resources that will enhance and expose their library’s resources.
http://www.lib.uwaterloo.ca/locations/umd/WeekOne_2014.wmv
http://www.placingliterature.com/map?modal=1
http://www.lib.uwaterloo.ca/locations/umd/WeekTwo.wmv
http://www.lib.uwaterloo.ca/locations/umd/WeekThree_Part_One.mov
http://www.lib.uwaterloo.ca/locations/umd/WeekThree_Part2.mov
http://www.lib.uwaterloo.ca/locations/umd/WeekFour.mov
– How to enable offline maps in your Google Maps app – http://www.huffingtonpost.com/map-happy/how-to-enable-offline-maps_b_6525832.html
– Huge news – Google Earth Pro, which used to cost the public $400 is now free! What does that mean for you? Extra features! You can import GIS files, tables, and export animated movie files! http://google-latlong.blogspot.com.es/2015/01/google-earth-pro-is-now-free.html
– Don’t live in Canada? Too bad! Google Maps plots best tobagonning hills in Canada!http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/google-map-plots-canada-s-best-tobogganing-hills-1.2218207
– a map of 19 countries that were named after specific people – http://www.vox.com/2015/2/1/7954179/map-countries-pe
By Paul KerleyBBC News Magazine
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-30840318
Content for Week Two – February 9th – February 15th
Week Two:
Podcast includes:
- Citizen Mapping
- OpenStreetMap – crowdsourcing
more heads are better then one
NYPL geomapping volunteers.
http://www.openstreetmap.org/
citizen crime reporting app for NYPD http://www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/html/crime_mapping/nyc_crime_map_introduction.shtml
when the jet disappeared, crowdsourcing for parts on the satellite maps of the ocean
potholes map
maps of the threes. emerald bug in Mnpls
http://www.fuf.net/
how does foursquare and checkins in FB and Google +fit it
Podcast and Powerpoint can be accessed from:http://www.lib.uwaterloo.ca/locations/umd/JuicyLibrarianMaterial.html
Tutorials: Google Earth
Assignments:
1. Discussion question:
Discover some citizen mapping projects that you are interested in OR
Contribute your local knowledge to Google Map Maker AND Share with the class online
2. Google Earth Map
Please complete the tutorial and then create a map in Google Earth with the following components:
- A title
- A written introduction to your project
- At least five placemarks, embedded with html tags, and images, if possible.
- Imported KML file(s) file format by GEarth, but other apps is using it. using notepad or MS Word, one can create KML file.
screen overlay, can be text, image, anything. legend. HTML code.
- A screen overlay (i.e. a legend)
areal photography.
history.
images from the library, Google is willing to buy them. citizen mapping. scanning and uploading.
geographical and societal awareness.
Gallery: 360Cities.
google street view – historical views
Google Earth Mapping
Submit online as a KML/KMZ file
I had the opportunity to experience a gizmo that can be used to display a variety of mapping projects, including citizen mapping: Science on a Sphere. It is a sphere on which you can project static maps or animations. The one I saw, in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s facility on Ford Island in Honolulu, displayed animations showing the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami and the 2011 tsunami in Japan, as well as airline flight paths, ocean currents, polar ice cap change over time, and many other types of geospatial data.
The Great Backyard Bird Count actually starts today and runs through Monday, February 16th. At a minimum, it only requires 15 minutes of observation on any or all the days: http://gbbc.birdcount.org/
Happy Cow is a site well-known to many vegetarians/vegans for finding restaurants which I’ve used when travelling. Users can submit reviews and/or restaurants that they’d like profiled (although the site reserves the right to approve or not the listing). http://www.happycow.net/search.html
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One of the impediments to citizen mapping is the line-of-sight cell tower limitations of mobile phones, or the wifi requirements for other mobile devices. Citizen mapping in urban and suburban environments is well-served by mobile devices, but what about natural areas, dense leaf cover, or extreme topography? Even if obtaining absolute mapping coordinates isn’t the issue, much crowdsourcing assumes an ability to connect back to a central data repository (e.g., a web database, ‘the cloud’). Equipment that can interact with GPS satellites and support data capture is typically expensive and generally requires proprietary software.
wq (https://wq.io/) is a framework that is ‘device first’ and ‘offline-enabled’. It attempts to leverage several open source technologies to build an entire mobile solution that can support citizen science data collection work, and then synchronize with a central repository once the device (and operator) return to an area served by cellular or wifi networks.
I’m stretching here, so if I get stuff wrong, please don’t yell. Still, I’ll take a pass at generally describing the framework and its related technology stack.
wq relies upon python, and a web framework called django for building offline-capable web apps that can run on iOS and Android devices. These web apps, then, rely very heavily upon javascript, particularly requirejs (http://requirejs.org/) and mustache (https://mustache.github.io/), for the templates that permit quick and (somewhat) painless web application development. Data visualization relies upon d3.js (http://d3js.org/), and geography makes heavy use of Leaflet (http://leafletjs.com/) — maybe the most pertinent layer of the stack for those of us in this course. If you’re not familiar withLeaflet.js, check it out!
Finally, wq extends several other open source technologies to enable synchronizing between a central data repository and multiple mobile devices in the hands of citizen mappers. Lastly, wq employs a set of tools to more easily build and distribute customized mapping apps that can be served from Apple’s app store, Google Play, etc.
What wq intends is to allow highly specialized citizen science/citizen mapping apps to be more easily and quickly built, based upon a solid collection of aligned F/OSS tools. Ideally, an app can spin up quickly to respond to a particular need (e.g., a pipeline spill), or a specialized audience (the run up to a public comment period for a development project), or even something like a high school field trip or higher ed service learning project.
Some examples of citizen mapping projects already built upon wq are here:
https://wq.io/examples/
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Creating a walking tour map with Google Earth_2014
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Week 3
Podcast includes:
- Geocoding
- Georeferencing
- Spatial Data Formats
- Geospatial Data Online
- Discussion Question
Podcast and Powerpoint available from: http://www.lib.uwaterloo.ca/locations/umd/JuicyLibrarianMaterial.html
Tutorials: BatchGeo (optional); Google Fusion (optional)
https://en.batchgeo.com/
enter Xcel data, and export KLM file ready for google map and/or google earth
https://support.google.com/fusiontables/answer/2571232
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Fusion_Tables
store maps online, no latitude needed.
visualize geospatial data by map
spatial analysis by mapping different layers together
showing data by map, graph or chart
e.g. how many cars cross specific point
crowdsourcing: spotting butterflies, using fusion tables to map the spices and sightings
http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2011/mar/31/deprivation-map-indices-multiple
students: journalism, history, geography.
Georeferencing (geocoding – data, geo referencing – image)
historical air maps or photos are much more useful when they are georeferenced.
Photos from different year is difficult to lay over one another without referencing. the only reference might be the river. usually reference the four corners, but sometimes river. Using GIS program to determine the longitute/latitude for each corner. sometimes only farmland and it is impossible
Games in the library
bibliography and research
http://scottnicholson.com/pubs/index.html
Playing in the Past: A History of Games, Toys, and Puzzles in North American Libraries
Author(s): Scott Nicholson
Source: The Library Quarterly, Vol. 83, No. 4 (October 2013), pp. 341-361
Published by: The University of Chicago Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/671913
demonstrate the different ways in which libraries have used games, toys, and puzzles over the last 150 years through bothcollections and services
p, 342 Defining games –
p. 348 Games as the Subject of Collections\
p. 350A significant shift in academic libraries is a focus on providing services to students. Since agrowing number of academic publications both current issues and back volumes
are ac-cessible online through library subscriptions, the physical space of academic libraries is notneeded for collections of periodicals. The concept of the “learning commons”has become
popular on US campuses in the past decade; it combines traditional library resources and
the availability of library staff members with group work spaces, computer access and assis-
tance, and writing assistance to provide one place where students can get assistance with
course work. In addition, many of these learning commons also include cafes, social spaces,
and other support of the social lives of students, and it is in this role that academic libraries
provide access to collections of games.
p. 357 Another upcoming area of gaming in libraries is gamification. Gamification is the application of game design elements to a nongame setting ðDeterding et al. 2011Þ.
————————————-
Nicholson, S. (2013, June). Exploring Gamification Techniques for Classroom Management. Paper Presented at Games+Learning+Society 9.0, Madison, WI
The concept of meaningful gamification is that the primary use of game layers is not to provide
external rewards, but rather to help participants find a deeper connection to the underyling topic
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More on games in education in this blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/?s=games
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/?s=gaming
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/?s=gamification
http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/access/white-paper-social-media.pdf
#tfsocialmedia
Social media objectives:
- promotion
- collection management tool
- Outreach
- teaching and learning
Opportunities and challenges
- opportunity to build a sense of community between the library and its users
- the variability of skills across library staff for using social media effectively, striking the right tone between professional and personal, coordinating activities across the institution to avoid duplication
- maintaining visibility for the library brand and copyright issues relating to hosting library resources on social media sites
Policies and management:
- Librarians are divided on the benefits of introducing formalized social media policies and plans. About a third of libraries responding to the Taylor & Francis survey had a policy in place, but over 40% had no plans to introduce one
- Some believe that representing the library as a professional function with a
consistent tone is the priority, while others believe that a more human approach is important, with individual staff free to bring their own ideas and personalities to social media activities.
Effectiveness and assessment:
- difficult to prove return on effort and that the time required to do this was a major barrier to more comprehensive analysis of impact
- framework for evaluation, so it is likely that assessment against commonly agreed metrics will become an increasingly important part of social media activity within the library in the near future
Current Social Media Practices:
- In a study from the mid 2000s (Cantrell and Havens1 ), most library directors in the US when questioned about social media said they did not think that libraries had a role in social networking
- A more recent study from 2012 (Kai-Wah Chu and Du4) shows how use of social media by the library has now become mainstream. In this survey of libraries in Asia, North America and Europe, 71% were found to be using social media tools with a further 13% saying they planned to use them
Advantages of using social media
n Financially the costs of using social media are perceived to be low;
n It requires little training;
n It promotes library services and disseminates news quickly, delivering this information more directly to library users;
n It increases engagement and interactions with library users;
n It helps gather feedback to enhance user services;
n The promotion of library holdings via social media can help increase usage of content;
n It enhances communication both within the library and with other departments;
n It can be used for outreach activities through onward sharing, well beyond the institution itself, helping build connections and reputation more broadly
Social Media Objectives: graph on page 8 of the PDF document:
A To promote events
B To promote library services
C To promote resources/collections at the library
D To update on library refurbishments
E To promote new acquisitions
F To promote library guides, exhibition guides
G To connect with new students joining the university
H To engage with the academic community
I To connect with the wider community beyond the university e.g. the town in which the institution is based
J To connect with distance learners
K As a customer services tool- complaints, suggestions, enquiries, feedback
L To highlight subject specific information
M To connect with potential students
N As a teaching tool to promote information literacy, technology and writing tips (not library based)
O To promote courses
P As a research tool to locate official documents and studies
From UK-based focus group: “The library is a programme, not just a building.”
Channel preferences: Graph on page 10 of the PDF document
SOCIAL MEDIA USES Table on p 13 of the PDF document
Twitter n Distribute library news and information
n Provide customer service
n Build connections with researchers
n Build connections with other librarians and institutions
Facebook n Distribute library news and information
n More social and less formal than Twitter – share photographs and run competitions
n Arrange events including tracking RSVPs and sending event updates
n Engagement with students
Pinterest n Promote general library collections, digital and archive special collections and information literacy
n Set up of online repositories for students to pin researched references as part of
collaborative group work
n Display book titles to save time browsing and promote new titles
n Provide an arena for students and course leaders to pin reviewed and recommended reading
for a particular topic
n Develop communities with other online libraries
YouTube n Streaming film collections
n Instructional ‘how to’ videos teaching information literacy skills and how to use library
services and resources
There are also a number of other social media products that are being used by librarians that reflect regional
preferences and the need for the specific functions offered by niche applications.
Collection usage and discovery: Graph on p. 15
Teaching and learning
From US-based librarian interview: “The trend in education now is to create environments that foster collaborative learning. Faculty have ditched textbooks and course management systems in exchange for a Facebook page for their class, or a wiki, or a blog. These online environments are fun; students already know how to use them and are more motivated to comment, discuss and share in these environments than a dry CMS.”
Social media policies and management, p. 18
73% of respondents stating that they believed more roles dedicated to social media would appear in the library in the future.
Effectiveness of social media
From UK focus group: “We keep track of something particularly successful, then we redo the campaign 6 months later.”
From US focus group: “We have very few interactions with anyone on our Twitter feed.”
“Twitter is definitely the best platform, because we hashtag all of our posts with the keyword
of the publication, and so for the academic audience, once they click it’s going to pull up all
of the similar publications under that topic.
Promoting library social media channels
From UK focus group:
“We retweet each other to encourage new followers.” My note: Suggested by me regarding SCSU_Library for Twitter and Pinterest and SCSUTechinstruct but “considered” (in local lingo, slow death of the idea)
How Open Badges Could Really Work In Education
http://www.edudemic.com/open-badges-in-education/
Higher education institutions are abuzz with the concept of Open Badges. The concept was presented to SCSU CETL some two years ago, but it remained mute on the SCSU campus. Part of the presentation to the SCSU CETL included the assertion that “Some advocates have suggested that badges representing learning and skills acquired outside the classroom, or even in Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), will soon supplant diplomas and course credits.”
“For higher education institutions interested in keeping pace, establishing a digital ecosystem around badges to recognize college learning, skill development and achievement is less a threat and more an opportunity. Used properly, Open Badge systems help motivate, connect, articulate and make transparent the learning that happens inside and outside classrooms during a student’s college years.”
Educational programs that use learning design to attach badges to educational experiences according to defined outcomes can streamline credit recognition.
The badge ecosystem isn’t just a web-enabled transcript, CV, and work portfolio rolled together. It’s also a way to structure the process of education itself. Students will be able to customize learning goals within the larger curricular framework, integrate continuing peer and faculty feedback about their progress toward achieving those goals, and tailor the way badges and the metadata within them are displayed to the outside world.
http://cdn.nmc.org/media/2014-nmc-horizon-report-library-EN.pdf
p. 4 new and rapidly changing technologies, an abundance of digital information in myriad formats, an increased understanding of how students learn evolving research methods, and changing practices in how scholars communicate and disseminate their research and creative work.
Engagement requires an outward focus
A liaison who understands how scholars in a particular discipline communicate and share
information with one another can inform the design and development of new publishing services, such as
digital institutional repositories.
Liaisons cannot be experts themselves in each new capability, but knowing when to call in a
colleague, or how to describe appropriate expert capabilities to faculty, will be key to the new liaison role.
an increasing focus on what users do (research, teaching, and learning) rather than on what librarians do (collections, reference, library instruction).
hybrid model, where liaisons pair their expertise with that of functional specialists, both within and outside of libraries
p. 6 Trend 1: Develop user-centered library services
Many libraries are challenged to brand such a service point, citing a “hub” or “center” to refer to services that can include circulation, reference, computer support, writing assistance, and more.
For liaisons, time at a reference desk has been replaced by anticipating recurrent needs and developing
easily accessible online materials (e.g., LibGuides, screencasts) available to anyone at any time, and
by providing more advanced one-on-one consultations with students, instructors, and researchers who
need expert help. Liaisons not only answer questions using library resources, but they also advise and
collaborate on issues of copyright, scholarly communication, data management, knowledge management,
and information literacy. The base level of knowledge that a liaison must possess is much broader than
familiarity with a reference collection or facility with online searching; instead, they must constantly keep up
with evolving pedagogies and research methods, rapidly developing tools, technologies, and ever-changing
policies that facilitate and inform teaching, learning, and research in their assigned disciplines.
Librarians at many institutions are now focusing on collaborating with faculty to develop thoughtful assignments
and provide online instructional materials that are built into key courses within a curriculum and provide
scaffolding to help students develop library research skills over the course of their academic careers
p. 7 Trend 2: A hybrid model of liaison and functional specialist is emerging.
Current specialist areas of expertise include copyright, geographic information systems (GIS), media production and integration, distributed education or e-learning, data management, emerging technologies,
user experience, instructional design, and bioinformatics.
At the University of Guelph, the liaison model was abandoned altogether in favor of a functional specialist
approach
p. 8 Trend 3: Organizational flexibility must meet changing user needs.
p. 9 provide education and consultation services for personal information management. Tools, workshops, websites, and individual consults are offered in areas such as citation management, productivity tools, managing alerts and feeds, personal archiving, and using social networking for teaching and professional development.
p. 11 data management, knowledge management and scholarly communication
digital scholarship
p. 12 Liaisons need to be able to provide a general level of knowledge about copyright, data management, the need for metadata and the ontologies available in their disciplines.
p. 13 Liaisons need to be able to provide a general level of knowledge about copyright, data management, the need for metadata and the ontologies available in their disciplines.
p. 16 replacing the traditional tripartite model of collections, reference, and instruction
Free Course – Copyright for Educators & Librarians
http://www.freetech4teachers.com/2014/06/free-course-copyright-for-educators.html?m=1
Copyright can be one heck of a confusing topic. There seems to be an endless number of nuances and exceptions to copyright rules. To help educators gain a better understanding of copyright as it relates to schools, instructors from Duke, Emory, and UNC Chapel Hill have created a Coursera course titled Copyright for Educators & Librarians.
Copyright for Educators & Librarians is a four week course beginning on July 21st. It is free to register and participate in this online professional development course. Attendees who desire a “verified certificate” can register for that option for a $49 fee.
The course will feature four units of study:
- A framework for thinking about copyright.
- Authorship and rights.
- Specific exceptions for teachers and librarians.
- Understanding and using fair use.
Some 30 years ago, there was only “literacy” – the ability to read and write. Then literacy proliferated into a multitude of literacies: e.g. – media (including “new media”), visual, information, computer, digital, technology, data. According to some, up to 20 literacies: http://listverse.com/2012/04/04/20-types-of-illiteracy/.
I often receive [mildly put] “unhappy” comments by students when their semester papers are turned with [a large amount of) corrections, involving their use of grammar and style. Students revolt against grammar and academic style NOT having place in a “technology” class. I counter with the fact that a technology class is still a college class and academic IS ABOUT learning how to speak and write and not only learning the “trade” (technology). There is a multitude of articles underlining the ability to write not only for English major but also computer major, e.g.:
Cilliers, C. B. (2012). Student Perception of Academic Writing Skills Activities in a Traditional Programming Course. Computers & Education, 58(4), 1028-1041.
Dankoski M, Palmer M, Gopen G, et al. Academic Writing: Supporting Faculty in a Critical Competency for Success. Journal Of Faculty Development [serial online]. May 1, 2012;26(2):47-54. Available from: ERIC, Ipswich, MA. Accessed June 1, 2014.
To make things worse (for both students and instructors), instructors are inconsistent, whereas some do evaluate students on their “technology” skills only and some (like me) insist on a “complete” academic package.
What is your take? Do you think at least two of the aforementioned literacies: technology literacy and old fashioned literacy need to co-exist in class?
The Teacher’s Guide To Twitter
http://www.edudemic.com/guides/guide-to-twitter/
Create, Don’t Just Consume
Connect and Network
Share Your Resources
Guide To Education-Oriented Twitter Hashtags
http://edudemic.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/education-twitter-hashtags-730×1805.jpg
Getting Connected
With these tips and tools, you’ll be able to get connected with the people that matter most to you on Twitter.
- Follow experts: Get useful information from other experts in your field.
- Twitterholic: With Twitterholic, you’ll be able to find the most popular users on Twitter.
- Make friends with your competition: It may seem counterintuitive, but connecting with your competition can help keep you in the know and well networked.
- Twitter Fan Wiki: Find a directory and more in this wiki.
- Don’t follow too many new people at once: Follow too many people without reciprocation, and you’ll come off as a spammer.
- TwitterPacks: Check out this tool to locate people according to their interest group.
- WeFollow: Find people by industry or hobby using WeFollow.
- Follow back: When you discover new followers, be sure to follow them back if they are interesting or offer value to you.
- Keep your follow ratio balanced: Follow too many people without being followed back, and you will seem spammy, but if you have lots of followers that you don’t follow back, you’ll come off as snobby.
- Localtweeps: You can use this tool to filter tweets by zip code.
- Participate in Twitter events: Be a part of #followfriday, #musicmonday, and similar events to be a part of the community.
- Geofollow: Search for others in your location with this site.
- Twitterel: With Twitterel, you can find users with common interests.
- Twinfluence: Use Twinfluence to discover users with good reach, velocity, and social capital.
- Twellow: Use Twellow to find Twitter users based on category.
- Twitter Snipe: Twitter Snipe will auto follow users based on your niche.
- Talk to people about their interests: Show that you’re human by discussing things that are important to others.
- Follow your followers’ followers: Check out the follow lists of people you find interesting and connect with them.
- Be patient: Amassing Twitter followers doesn’t happen overnight. Be patient, and you’ll build a group of valuable followers.
Search
Put Twitter’s massive amounts of information to work by using these search tips and tools.
- Twitority: This search engine offers results based on Twitter users with authority.
- TwitterLocal: Search for tweets around a specific area with the help of this tool.
- Use keyword tricks: Take advantage of the advanced search option on Twitter.
- Use quotation marks: If you’re looking for a specific term, put it in quotation marks to get better results.
- Twithority: With Twithority, you’ll find Twitter search results with authority.
- Use hashtags: If you come across a useful hashtag, click on it to see what else you’ll find.
- Subscribe: Keep up with useful keywords and hashtags by setting up an RSS subscription for them.
- Pay attention to trends: Stay on top of the latest in your field by seeking out and participating in trending topics. For instance, students enrolled in political science degree programs may want to follow trending topics related to upcoming local and state elections.
- Retweetist: Retweetist shares popular trends, topics, and people using retweets on Twitter.
- Tweet Volume: With this tool, you can find out if your keywords are popular on Twitter or not.
- Tweetmeme: Check out Tweetmeme to learn about retweeting stats for articles on Twitter.
- Twitt(url)y: Find out about hot news with this tool that sorts URLs by how frequently they are mentioned in tweets.
- Twackle: With this aggregator, you’ll be able to find news and more in a single destination.
- Twitter Sniffer for Brands: Twitter Sniffer makes it easy for you to keep track of conversations about you on Twitter.
- Twuoted: Find popular quotes with this site that follows the #quote hashtag.
- Tweet Scan: Follow Twitter conversations by keyword and category using Tweet Scan.
- Monitter: Stay on top of 3 keywords at once with this keyword search tool.
- Pay attention to timing: Monitor the most popular hours for your Twitter followers, then concentrate your most important messages in those hours for more effective tweeting.
Organization
With these tips and tools, you can keep all of your information on Twitter well organized.
- Use a tool to manage Twitter: Don’t let your research get lost-use a tool to organize everything.
- Tweetdeck: Make use of this tool to organize tweets from various groups into easy to manage categories.
- Don’t try to read everything: You will be on Twitter all day and all night if you try to read every single tweet from your followers-just drop in when you can.
- My Tweeple: This tool will help you organize the people you’re following.
- Tweetree: See your Twitter stream in a tree with organized conversations using Tweetree.
- Make good use of alert tools: Make sure you’re not missing good conversations by setting up alerts that will tell you when friends and other Twitter users discuss keywords you’re interested in.
- Tweet Clouds: Analyze your keyword usage with this tool.
- Twitterator: Monitor groups of people while staying organized with the help of this script.
Authority Building
Follow these tips and use these tools in order to establish yourself as an authority in your field.
- Own your brand: Even if you don’t want to use your real name on Twitter, at least claim it so that no one else can use it against you.
- Be retweetable: Share tweets that others will want to retweet.
- Use popular tweets as blog posts: If you share a site or bit of information that turns out to be very popular, use it as a jumping off point for a blog post.
- Use your real name as your Twitter name: Be more personal and authoritative by using your real name.
- Respond: Don’t just sit in your ivory tower-talk back to the people who want to engage with you.
- Share your credentials: Let people know why you’re an expert in your field.
- Shake things up: Offer a good variety in your stream of links, blog posts, retweets, responses, and questions.
- Just don’t spam: Don’t do it-no one likes it, and it won’t be tolerated.
- Share information: Gain a reputation as an expert by sharing helpful links, resources, and more.
- Be sincere: Be honest and considerate in your tweets and replies.
- Find out authoritative keywords: See which keywords the authorities in your niche are using.
- Discuss what’s hot: Share your opinions and resources on what’s currently moving on Twitter.
- Don’t go crazy with links: Avoid using your Twitter account just to post links to your blog.
- Point out interesting information: Don’t just talk about yourself, discuss what’s happening in your field.
- Follow authorative accounts: Populate your Twitter neighborhood with people who have authority.
- Promote your Twitter URL: Share your Twitter name on your email, blog, Facebook, and other locations online so people can find you.
- Slow down: Don’t clog up your followers’ Twitter screens-keep your Tweets relevant and interesting, not inane and constant.
- Don’t always talk about yourself: Talk about more than just your own agenda.
- Be helpful: Spread goodwill by answering questions, introducing others, and offering recommendations.
- Reply to others: Get involved with the people you follow and engage in the Twitter conversation with replies.
- Show your personality: Show off the person behind the brand on Twitter.
- Use keywords: Use keywords that are important to your field to attract followers.
Getting Value
Follow these tips to make sure you’re getting value out of your Twitter experience.
- Networking: Meet offline with others in your field to get great value out of Twitter.
- Be useful: Give advice, resources, and more.
- Fill out your bio: Make sure people know where to go to find more information about you.
- Use Twitter on your blog: Keep your blog updated up to the minute with Twitter.
- Stop abuse in its tracks: Use Twitter to find out who is badmouthing you, and use action to stop it.
- Connect with complementary businesses: Find value in Twitter by getting connected with others that can support your business or niche.
- Enjoy ambient knowledge: With Twitter, you’ll be able to stay on top of news in your field around the clock.
- Listen: Just listen, and you’ll find interesting and useful information.
- Promote events: Use Twitter to promote live and virtual events like seminars, sales, and more.
- Ask for help: Get instant feedback by asking for help on Twitter.
- Meet your customers: Use Twitter as a way to interact with your customers, whether through the service or in real life.
- Listen to your critics: Find out what people are saying about you, then respond to it and act on it.
How To Connect With Students On Twitter
- Don’t require that students follow your account.
- Commit to posting at regular intervals.
- Vary the time of day of the posts.
- Post links to content that is user friendly.
- Know your audience’s interests.
- Don’t just retweet, generate original links.
- Suggest people, organizations or magazines to follow.
- Be personal.
- … yet avoid the overly personal comments.
Twitter Rules Every Teacher Should Know
Rule #3
If you’re adding the Twitter logo to some marketing materials, here’s how to properly format it all. Same goes if you’re just adding in the Twitter Bird to other materials. Useful to know.
Rule #4
Always capitalize the T in Twitter and Tweet. Seriously. That’s a little-known rule that basically everyone doesn’t follow but it’s worth trying to remember!
A Useful Twitter Cheat Sheet
Twitter Tips For Students and Teachers
See Also: A Visual Guide To Twitter For Beginners
- Actually complete your bio. You’ll get more mileage out of your Twitter account if you actually create a profile that says something about you, offering potential followers information about your interests, professional or otherwise.
- Learn the basics. Learn the basic terminology for Twitter and the major functions it can perform by doing a little reading on helpful social media blogs beforehand. You’ll thank yourself later.
- Get some style. Before you send out your first tweet, decide what kind of tweeter you want to be. The London School of Economics and Political Science offers up three major styles here so you can learn more about the subject.
- Learn from others. One of the best ways to learn how to use Twitter is to spend some time seeing how others have set up and been using their accounts. Luckily, there are tons of other academics on Twitter to learn from.
- Don’t be mean. The Internet is full of people who are all too happy to say some pretty harsh things, but just because they’re incredibly tactless doesn’t mean you have to be. Never say anything on Twitter you wouldn’t want people to find out about, or wouldn’t say in any other situation. If people are hassling you, ignore them and move on.
- Announce that you’ll be joining a hashtag chat or conference. If you’re going to be tweeting more than usual, let your followers know in advance so they can choose to tune out if they’re not interested in your live tweeting or chatting.
- Actually respond in a reasonable amount of time. If someone asks you a question or directs a tweet your way, respond as soon as you can, just like with email or any other digital communication, especially if you’re using Twitter in your courses.
- Be gracious and say thank you. A little bit of gratitude goes a long way on Twitter. If someone helps you out or shares your research, don’t forget to say thanks.
- Make mistakes. No one is perfect, and if you’re new to Twitter you’re probably going to have a few gaffes along the way as you learn the ropes. That’s OK! Don’t let it slow your enthusiasm for using the social site.
- Start your own hashtag chat. Twitter chats have exploded in popularity in recent months, so get in on the trend while the getting’s good. Start your own chat on an academic topic, or chime in on other bigger existing chats for a chance to network.
- Find and use some hashtags. You’ll make it easier for others to find your tweets if you add a few relevant hashtags here and there.
- Do ‘Follow Friday’. Every Friday, Twitter explodes with suggestions on who to follow. Offer up your own and you may just end up in someone else’s suggestions.
- Share the stuff you’re reading. Reading a story on a site like Edudemic? Found an amazing article in pop-science about your research field? Share it! If it’s interesting, it’ll probably get retweeted and passed around, and you might just interest a student or two to boot.
- Reach out and connect with someone. Not everyone you connect with on Twitter has to be in your field or even in academia. In fact, you might enrich your research and your professional life by reaching out to other fields and professions.
- Do some backchannel talks. Whether you have students post to Twitter during class or ask them to share comments during a presentation, these backchannel talks can help facilitate conversation and provide a record of a shared learning experience.
- Create your own classroom hashtag. One way to keep classroom tweets organized is by having a shared hashtag that all students use. Just make sure no one else is using it!
- Connect Twitter to Moodle or Blackboard. You can help push students to interact using Twitter by adding a Twitter widget to your Blackboard or Moodle site for the class. Follow the instructions here to get started.
- Don’t mandate your students follow you on Twitter. Don’t force students to follow you on Twitter unless it’s part of the course. Let them decide to follow or not.
- Be happy (see #5 above). You don’t have to be super serious on Twitter to earn students’ respect. In fact, loosening up could just help improve your rapport with your students.
- Live-tweet a conference or event (see #6). Share your conference-going experience by tweeting updates about it throughout the day to your followers.
- Share some of your lesson plans. Educators and academics can come together to share and collaborate on lesson plans quite easily using Twitter.
- Collaborate with other teachers / parents / students. If you find you have similar interests with another academic, use Twitter to work together on research ideas, classroom solutions, and other topics.
- Collaborate with other classrooms in your school, district, or another country.Why work alone when you can connect with other college classrooms? That’s just what many college classes are doing these days.
- Host reading discussions. Holding a reading discussion over Twitter gives everyone a chance to chime in, even shy students who might not otherwise speak up.
- Actually use Twitter for writing assignments. Want to teach your students the art of brevity? Assign them poetry or prose to be written on Twitter.
The Teacher’s Guide To Twitter Hashtags
Are you looking to figure out exactly which Twitter hashtag is the right one to follow? There’s no shortage of options and it can feel overwhelming. Sure, there’s the popular #edchat and #edtech hashtags most of us follow. But what about the more focused tags that you’re missing out on?
| #elearn |
I’d suggest using this rather than the longer #elearning |
| #flipchat |
chat platform for flipped classroom educators. See here. |
| #flipclass |
platform for those interested in the flipped classroom. |
| #flippedclassroom |
Obsolete. Use the shorter #flipclass. All about the flipped classroom |
| #gbl |
game-based learning |
| #globalclassroom |
Good for finding global collaboration / connections, sharing #globaled practice. Official chats run monthly over 3 days. Click here for schedule |
| #ipadchat |
name speaks for itself. See here. |
