The pedagogical use of Twitter in the university classroom by Lynn Beth McCool

OIntroduction:

     Nowadays, educators are aware of the importance of technology in the classroom. But the main question they must ask themselves about is “What type of technology should be used during a lecture?”.

OThe aim of the Dissertation:

OIt aims to discover how Twitter might be used pedagogically to assist students in communication, collaboration, and participation within an ecology of practice.

OThe methodology:

OUsing a qualitative approach, data was gathered from personal interviews, academic Twitter feeds, course websites, instructors’ blogs, and published scholarly research.

OThe theoretical basis for exploring Twitter usage in the classroom rests heavily on Selfe’s and Vie’s admonishments that educators must pay attention to technology and specifically the technology that students are using in their everyday lives.

OThe author did the interview with an instructor who was using Twitter in his speech communications class. He met him in his office on campus for about 30 minutes. With his permission, the session was recorded for the purpose of transcription as part of my data collection.

OThe Findings:

     some of the frequently employed pedagogical applications of Twitter were to…

Oencourage class participation and provide feedback in both traditional and distance learning (Dunlap & Lowenthal; Eller; Jaworowski; Lane and Lewis; Mann; Pignetti; Rankin; Wolff)

Oconduct rhetorical research by aggregating news sources (Farwell and Waters; Fernheimer; Jaworowski)

Ocollaborate with peers and encourage classroom community (Dunlap & Lowenthal; Farwell and Waters; Fernheimer; Jaworowski; Mann; Pignetti)

Oincrease social presence through ambient awareness especially in distance learning (Dunlap & Lowenthal; Farwell & Waters; Jaworowski; Pignetti)

Oenhance literacy by providing opportunities to acquire technological skills (Farwell & Waters; Jaworowski; Silver; Wolff).

O develop a critical stance on New Media technologies (Silver; Wolff).

Conclusion:

      The writer has concluded some points:

OEducators differed on whether it was ethically acceptable to require students to use Twitter for class. Two approaches emerged from this discussion.

OThe first, more conservative approach was to offer Twitter as a voluntary means of communication.

OThe second, professors such as David Silver believe that students should be taught how to responsibly use public media, and one way to do that is to require them to publish using their real identities as part of the course syllabus.

OGenerally, the implementation of Twitter into classroom pedagogy was more successful when the professor had specific goals in mind for its use and created detailed instructions for students to follow in their integration of it as a part of their course work.The first, more conservative approach was to offer Twitter as a voluntary means of communication.

OIn the case of distance learning, instructors found Twitter to be a means to enhance ambient awareness and build classroom community.

My opinion:

     I think using Twitter to assist the educational process can be very helpful, but we should all remember the circumstances that might affect this use. We should lead the students to use Twitter positively instead of wasting their time and effort.

References:

OMccool, L. B. (2011). The pedagogical use of Twitter in the university classroom (Iowa State University). Available from Graduate Theses and Dissertations. (UMI No. 11947).

                                    By: Wejdan Ibrahim Shahrani