Tweeting for Change

1. Tweeting for Change Beth Rajan Sockman Ph.D. Patricia Green John Scagnamiglio AECT - Jacksonville 2011

2. Questions • What is Twitter? • How is it used? Then… in Education? • How can it be used to connect researchers and practicing educators? • What is the preliminary experience of using Twitter to connect research to practicing educators? AECT - Jacksonville 2011

3. What is Twitter • Twitter is a social network, micro-blogging site, founded by Jack Dorsey, Biz Stone and Evan Williams in March 2006 (launched publicly in July 2006), that connects friends through sharing short messages about the latest information regarding what is interesting known as tweets. • Each Tweet is 140 characters in length. • Twitter is based in San Francisco, but it is used by people in nearly every country in the world. It now comes in the following: • English • French • German • Italian • Japanese • Spanish http://twitter.com/about AECT - Jacksonville 2011

4. Essentials of Twitter Use • Account - http://twitter.com/ • Follow people • Retweet • Subscribe to LISTS Hashtags - # • Hootsuite AECT - Jacksonville 2011

5. Twitter Overview - Use • Businesses: • Share information with people interested in products and services, gather real-time market intelligence and feedback, and build relationships with customers, partners and influential people. • Social Change: “The instruments of social media are well suited to making the existing social order more efficient” (Gladwell, 2010) .http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/10/04/101004fa_fact_gladwell?currentPage=1 • Education: In classrooms – high school & college for classroom & backchannel conversations – Large lecture • Education - PLN – Personal Learning Network for educators AECT - Jacksonville 2011

6. In Education: PLN – Personal Learning Network • Education – See Hashtag list • What you do not see – researchers • Myth in education: # hashtags change quickly Hashtags in education do NOT change very quickly. AECT - Jacksonville 2011

7. Teacher Twitter Info • Teachers Guide (K-3) • Teacher – How to & Why (Shawn Urban) • Blog – Advocating for Twitter – By Higher Ed- Tom Whitby AECT - Jacksonville 2011

8. Hashtag Tracking: Analytics http://www.hashtracking.com • #EDCHATHashTracking.com Report • 1,000 tweets generated 1,239,080 impressions, reaching an audience of 776,280 followers within the past 24 hours • COMPARE: #edchat #edresearch #edtech AECT - Jacksonville 2011

9. Problem • Educational researchers and teachers do not regularly communicate, especially outside of “class”. Educational Researcher Teacher The challenge many of us have faced is that researchers often communicate in a language for other researchers, and teachers don’t have the time or interest to read lengthy research reports that may not be immediately usable. Cathy Seeley (Using research to improve teaching.) AECT - Jacksonville 2011

10. Connect Researcher with Practitioners AECT - Jacksonville 2011

11. Question:What is the experience of the first researcher in using Twitter to connect research with practitioners? AECT - Jacksonville 2011

12. Method • Grounded in an action research scenario (Stringer, 2007). • First author has begun tweeting with the guidance of the other authors – Feb. 2011 • Recorded and analyzed experience • Desire: • Connect with practitioners so that they may find research valuable to inform practice. AECT - Jacksonville 2011

13. THEMES AECT - Jacksonville 2011

14. #1 Internal Resistance (Gleicher’s formula): Plumbing the depths of internal resistance allows for continual use and growth. • Felt very intimidated – new environment • Moving very fast & didn’t want to add another thing to my world (Twitter in Higher Education, 2010) • Stars of Tweeting: Fear! • Afraid I could never be as great as others… • Shell Terrell - http://twitter.com/#!/shellterrell AECT - Jacksonville 2011

15. Gleicher's Formula D x V x F > R D = Dissatisfaction with how things are nowV = Vision of what is possibleF = First, concrete steps that can be taken towards the vision If the product of these three factors is greater thanR = Resistance then change is possible. AECT - Jacksonville 2011

16. Culture AECT - Jacksonville 2011

17. #2 “How to Knowledge” (Rogers, 1995): Writing for the micro-blogging environment requires skill that needs to be cultivated. Looked at links from Tweets • WOW! Others tweeter were great because they were pumping out very practical ideas. • Not because they had professional looking materials: • http://teacherbootcamp.edublogs.org/blogs-i-recommend/ AECT - Jacksonville 2011

18. #3 Gaining “How to Knowledge”: Using hashtags and blogging to incorporate twitter allows for valuable qualitative information. • Most tweets actually referred to other websites – blogs, wikis or information • Employing other social networking tools into Twitter increases the tweeters’ voice. AECT - Jacksonville 2011

19. Creating a page with a purpose When setting up your twitter account use your real name and link company related websites to your page. Design your page with professionalism as your focus! • Include your Brand Name(s) and/or Your Given Name. • Pages must be well maintained and professional. • Contains a balance of conversational and individual Tweets. Twitter is about conversation. • Include Multi-Media • It is a good idea to put your Twitter page link in as many places as you can so as many people as possible can find you on Twitter. • Highly effective twitter pages have backgrounds that reflect a clean and professional image. Use an attractive background graphic • Be professional in your tweets. People follow you for a reason. • Include your telephone number and email address as part of your background AECT - Jacksonville 2011

20. #4 Defining success: Success and failure on Twitter differs from traditional academic environments. Beware: Many companies will follow you. AECT - Jacksonville 2011

21. Building Twitter PresenceBefore you begin… Large Twitter Followers Success The number of followers you have on Twitter does not mean you are popular or that people are interested in what you have to say. • What really counts is the number of conversations you are having. Are people listening to you? Are people responding to what you are saying? • Use Twitter to provide valuable information and buildpositive relationships http://www.communityspark.com/a-beginners-guide-to-building-a-presence-on-twitter/ AECT - Jacksonville 2011

22. #5 MY PLN -Undiscovered benefit: Benefit from the PLN aspect in terms of evolving technology • NOW - Twitter using Hootsuite AECT - Jacksonville 2011

23. Personal Conclusion • Maintain Desire: get research out to motivated practitioners • Reward: my PLN • Difficult: desirable followers • Action Step: integrate with BLOG – get out the work of graduate students on more research AECT - Jacksonville 2011

24. Read – Can we connect? • Dear Teacher Blog Post Teachers/Administrators are encouraging other teachers to be on twitter. Would it be beneficial to be in the same place? AECT - Jacksonville 2011

25. References Formula for change. (2011, November 4). Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formula_for_Change Gladwell, M. (2010, October 10). Small change: Why revolution will not be tweeted. The New Yorker. Retrieved from http://www.newyorker.com Greenhow, C. (2009). Tapping the Wealth of Social Networks for Professional Development. Learning & Leading with Technology, 36(8), 10-11. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.  Miller, S. (2010). Enhance Your Twitter Experience. Learning & Leading with Technology, 37(8), 14-17. Retrieved from EBSCOhost. Seeley, K. (n.d.). Using research to improve teaching. Retrieved from http://www.nctm.org/about/content.aspx?id=908  Stringer, E. (2007). Action research Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.  Twitter in Higher Education 2010: Usage Habits and Trends of Today’s College Faculty. (2010). Faculty Focus. http://www.facultyfocus.com/free-reports/twitter-in-higher-education-2010-usage-habits-and-trends-of-todays-college-faculty/  Young, J. R. (2010). Teaching with Twitter: Not for the Faint of Heart. Education Digest: Essential Readings Condensed for Quick Review, 75(7), 9-12. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.  Young, J. R. (2009). 10 High Fliers on Twitter. Chronicle of Higher Education, 55(31), A10. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.  AECT - Jacksonville 2011