There seem to be a few blog posts popping up about the use of Twitter as a professional development tool so I thought I would join in on the trend.
In 2012 I was feeling unsatisfied with my teaching and frustrated with my lack of access to PD outside of what my school provided for me. I felt that there was more out there and that the way I was teaching wasn't keeping pace with the changes in the world and the future my students were going to have.
So I took a big step - broke out of the bubble I had been in for the last 5 years (my classroom) and self-funded myself to ULearn 2012 (which had an awesome themed dinner!)
That was the beginning of a complete change in my professional thinking. At Ulearn I was surrounded by a raft of teachers all with the same views as me - that getting out of your classroom bubble is important to a teachers learning. If we always do things the way we have done them - then what are we doing for our students? Are we thinking about our practise and if it is serving out students? What is challenging our thinking?
The biggest thing to happen at ULearn was that I was encouraged to sign up to Twitter. Why on earth would I do that? It's all celeb gossip and people making comments on their daily life. Wrong... well right.. up to a point.
Twitter is full of teachers, educational professionals, people from all sectors of education. In fact I read recently that educational professionals make up one of the biggest user groups on Twitter.
And all of these teachers are sharing, supporting, questioning, chatting. For free.
In the last year and a half Twitter has become my biggest source of PD and has made the biggest difference to my teaching practise.
It has connected me to other teachers and my PLN (personal learning network) has expanded greatly and includes a host of people that I respect and consider role models in education. Their willingness to share their practise and ideas has been inspirational and has lead me to so many other ideas.
My only difficulty now is saying no to some and yes to others - trying to work out which awesome idea or resource to use and which to file away for when I need it. Because like all teachers time is not my friend!
Twitter keeps me up-to-date with what is happening in education around the world, it connects me to other educators, gives me the opportunity to share my students work with a wider audience.
When we were working on a Kiwiana topic the children wanted to know what other cultures had to identify themselves - I tweeted out a blogpost from the class - and then watched the comments from around the country and the world rolled in.
My students have benefitted from comments on their work and we have also inspired other classes to write a similar piece of writing. Likewise I have found examples of writing from other classes that have inspired my class with their writing.
The best part is finding a group of people that I have now met face to face - I have increased the number of teachers I know outside of the school I am working in more in the last year than I have in the previous 8 years. I have been into their classrooms both virtually and physically and now I feel less isolated in my teaching - no longer stuck in my little classroom bubble.
So how would I suggest someone starts? Twitter can be quite intimidating with the speed that tweets go and trying to make connections - in my first few months I barely looked at it and it took over 6 months to get to my first 100 tweets. Now another year later I have reached 2000 tweets and follow nearly 400 educators. In return I am followed by another nearly 400 educators - not necessarily the same as the previous group. I have an audience for my ideas and a place to find ideas.
To start - sign up, check out the #edchatnz tag, read this e-book, and follow a few key people - for suggestions start with me - @jackbillie35 and look at who I follow. Then download Tweetdeck - will blog about that later.
In 2012 I was feeling unsatisfied with my teaching and frustrated with my lack of access to PD outside of what my school provided for me. I felt that there was more out there and that the way I was teaching wasn't keeping pace with the changes in the world and the future my students were going to have.
So I took a big step - broke out of the bubble I had been in for the last 5 years (my classroom) and self-funded myself to ULearn 2012 (which had an awesome themed dinner!)
That was the beginning of a complete change in my professional thinking. At Ulearn I was surrounded by a raft of teachers all with the same views as me - that getting out of your classroom bubble is important to a teachers learning. If we always do things the way we have done them - then what are we doing for our students? Are we thinking about our practise and if it is serving out students? What is challenging our thinking?
The biggest thing to happen at ULearn was that I was encouraged to sign up to Twitter. Why on earth would I do that? It's all celeb gossip and people making comments on their daily life. Wrong... well right.. up to a point.
Twitter is full of teachers, educational professionals, people from all sectors of education. In fact I read recently that educational professionals make up one of the biggest user groups on Twitter.
And all of these teachers are sharing, supporting, questioning, chatting. For free.
In the last year and a half Twitter has become my biggest source of PD and has made the biggest difference to my teaching practise.
It has connected me to other teachers and my PLN (personal learning network) has expanded greatly and includes a host of people that I respect and consider role models in education. Their willingness to share their practise and ideas has been inspirational and has lead me to so many other ideas.
My only difficulty now is saying no to some and yes to others - trying to work out which awesome idea or resource to use and which to file away for when I need it. Because like all teachers time is not my friend!
Twitter keeps me up-to-date with what is happening in education around the world, it connects me to other educators, gives me the opportunity to share my students work with a wider audience.
When we were working on a Kiwiana topic the children wanted to know what other cultures had to identify themselves - I tweeted out a blogpost from the class - and then watched the comments from around the country and the world rolled in.
My students have benefitted from comments on their work and we have also inspired other classes to write a similar piece of writing. Likewise I have found examples of writing from other classes that have inspired my class with their writing.
The best part is finding a group of people that I have now met face to face - I have increased the number of teachers I know outside of the school I am working in more in the last year than I have in the previous 8 years. I have been into their classrooms both virtually and physically and now I feel less isolated in my teaching - no longer stuck in my little classroom bubble.
So how would I suggest someone starts? Twitter can be quite intimidating with the speed that tweets go and trying to make connections - in my first few months I barely looked at it and it took over 6 months to get to my first 100 tweets. Now another year later I have reached 2000 tweets and follow nearly 400 educators. In return I am followed by another nearly 400 educators - not necessarily the same as the previous group. I have an audience for my ideas and a place to find ideas.
To start - sign up, check out the #edchatnz tag, read this e-book, and follow a few key people - for suggestions start with me - @jackbillie35 and look at who I follow. Then download Tweetdeck - will blog about that later.
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