When I finally signed up for Twitter, after many friends were consistently encouraging me to, my initial response was that I can really see certain functions of Twitter providing me, as an educator, with quality professional development (PD). After spending a little time with Twitter my initial response to its use in the educational world still holds true. In fact, once my professional learning network (PLN) began to slightly grow I started valuing Twitter for more than its Twitter chats. Where Twitter chats certainly provide an amazing opportunity for professional development, the overall functionality of Twitter when used only for professional aspects provides a diverse, vast, and organized educational resource. A resource that allows educators and students to easily search for specific topics through the use of hashtags, ultimately allowing educators to partake in quality and convenient PD while students are introduced to a vast and quite organized resource.
Let me first start by saying that this is a truly unbiased discussion. Meaning if I found no value in Twitter in terms of providing me, as an educator, with assistance to my day-to-day tasks I would not waste my time sharing positive thoughts of such technology. With that said, the most useful function of Twitter to me, as of now, is its ability to provide me with quality conversations that fit into my schedule. These conversations, referred to as Twitter chats, are conversations that truly provide me with meaningful and relevant professional development. The best part of such PD is that it doesn't interrupt my daily schedule. I can literally be laying in bed at the end of a long day gaining more engaging and beneficial PD than if I attended a workshop in the evening. Don’t get me wrong, I have been involved with many workshops that I truly have found valuable to my professional career, but if I had to choose staying at work for another 3 hours, of course after waiting an hour or two after school for the workshop to start, or going home after a long day, I think it is obvious I would choose the latter. Through using resources such as Participate or Education Chat Calendar, one can easily locate Twitter chats to partake in. The most important and beneficial aspect of Twitter chats is that users can pick and choose exactly what conversations they want to be a part of. Feeling like you need a little pick-me-up in regard to education technology search #ATchat, or search #elmused if you want to focus on elementary art. If there are two chats you find intriguing that are scheduled for the same time on the same night, why not partake in them both at the same time? The flexibility, diversity, and overall quality that educators can receive from twitter chats are what makes it such a valuable resource for educators. 
Although Twitter chats offer quite a lot in terms of PD, the overall PLN that Twitter provides educators with is truly a meaningful function. By following other professionals, users are able to build a network with other educators that offer ideas, materials, resources…etc. which can be utilized with ease. As Scavitto (2015) states discussing her Twitter usage, “The people in my PLN share amazing materials about all aspects of education.” Not only are educators able to gain valuable resources, but the diversity of such material allows users to become exposed to new and innovative aspects. More importantly, discussing such vastness of resources Scavitto (2015) states, “Articles like this would have been buried in the vastness of the web for eternity-but I get to read them because they appeared in my feed.” With the utilization of hashtags users are able to have an organized system for storing and finding resources. As Pitler (2015) suggests, “The secret to getting the most out of Twitter as an educator lies in knowing how to use hashtags (#)- those things we used to call the number signs last century.” For example, if you are in need of a poster creator for students to use as a summative assessment tool but want to use a different tool than the typical Google Docs or Pages, a quick search using an appropriate hashtag such as #edtech can introduce you to the application Google Drawings. Even more impressive is that if you are following the “correct micro-bloggers” in relation to a given interest, as Scavitto points out, information regarding Google Drawings could have just simply been present in your feed. Thus, the importance of following the most beneficial micro-bloggers in regard to a given interest is extremely important. As Scavitto (2015) states, “If you’re going to use Twitter for things beyond curating a collection of educational resources, I suggest having multiple accounts.” Mixing interests outside of a professional focus will simply provide a user with additional content that can lead to an overall scattered and overloaded feed. Thus, defeating the purpose of using Twitter as professional development means.
Overall Twitter can provide educators and students with vast, diverse, and meaningful content. Educators can advocate and implement for their students to utilize Twitter in very similar ways that they would. However, being familiar with its functions and how to navigate the resource will help lead to a positive and beneficial experience for you and your students if you implement such features into your instruction. Twitter chats offer an incredible opportunity for educators and students to partake in active and relevant discussions surrounding basically any topic of interest. More importantly, through utilizing resources such as Participate and Education Chat Calendar, users have the ability to plan ahead as well as have the flexibility to attend Twitter chats through the comfort of their homes. It is common for Twitter chat users to follow the other professionals that were part of the chat, ultimately allowing for a meaningful PLN to continually grow. With the nurturing of a quality and relevant PLN, other professionals’ posts continually show on your home feed allowing easy access to resources, ideas, materials…etc. With the understanding and the use of hashtags, students and overall users are able to be easily organized with such a vast amount of materials. However, users must be mindful of only following other users that add to their repertoire of educational resources, ultimately creating a meaningful, relevant, and vast professional learning network. As Pitler (2015) states, “Once you get started you just might become an evangelist.” Of course, we can assume Pitler’s thoughts are to convert the non-Twitter users to simply Twitter users, not to turn such non-users into Christians!
References
Berger, R. (2015). Using twitter to supercharge your professional development. ConnectedEducators. Retrieved from http://www.connectededucators.org/using-twitter-to-supercharge-your-professional-development/.
Scavitto, D. (2015). Teachers: embrace twitter for professional development. Edudemic. Retrieved from http://www.edudemic.com/teachers-embrace-twitter-professional-development/.
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