CPD Using Twitter for CPD
The explosion of social media has added a new dimension
to the hunt for decent CPD. Vice principal Paul Ainsworth looks at how you can use websites including Twitter to help keep up-to-date
global bank of ideas, activities and most importantly people”? finally: “It’s great for sharing good practice mostly
I
by pointers to external links, research or articles.” All these teachers are talking about Twitter, the
social networking site which millions of people use every day and which is gathering a large following among many teachers. Many people’s view of Twitter is that it allows
people to talk about the banalities of life or as a way of following the daily life of celebrities (Stephen fry was one of the first famous people to really be known for “tweeting”). Sports lovers may also think of slips on Twitter
such as when Kevin Pieterson reflected on being dropped from the England cricket team with a statement containing expletives, a “tweet” which was later deleted and replaced with an apology. Two questions that may in be in your mind are what
is the point of Twitter and is it worthwhile for a teacher? A third may be around safety or issues of safeguarding which a teacher needs to be aware of.
Social networking
There are many social networking sites in operation, our pupils may use Bebo and Xing is one from the corporate world. Heather Townsend (@efficiencycoach), a life- coach who actively uses Twitter suggested that in the business world the three most important social networking sites were LinkedIn, Twitter and facebook in descending order of importance.
A new method of networking
If you read management and coaching books; hints on networking may be based around sending your
contacts a piece of post. The advent of email has revolutionised networking in that it is quick, easy and free to keep up-to-date with your contacts. It can be also be relatively straightforward to make
new contacts by directly emailing people, introducing yourself and asking their opinion of a project you are working on. This is certainly a technique that I have used when researching a particular issue and have received the thoughts of leading educationalists as a result. Social networking sites take this a stage further as
they allow you to present your interests to the world and provide a method for either you to contact other teachers or for other teachers to contact you.
Tips on building your community 1 Write a short profile explaining who you are and what you do. Include some of your interests but remember this is public information so don’t write you are a naturist or a regular cannabis smoker!
2 It is unlikely that Brad Pitt or Kylie Minogue will follow you but fellow educationalists will. Search for individual people who you may know and follow them or you could also follow well known educational commentators and magazines such as SecEd (@SecEd_Education).
3 Look at who is following SecEd and read people’s profiles and follow those who share your interests.
4 Regularly write your own comments, forwarding other’s comments known as “retweeting” and answer people’s questions.
5 Read quoted articles and give your thoughts on them or retweet them. 6 Use “hashtags” to pull people together on a specific topic (basically marking a topic with a # such as #ukedchat, which is a forum which discusses educational topics on Thursday evenings). Finding a hashtag for a chosen specialisation will also find you more people to follow (and who can follow you, if you use it).
7 There is little point in following people that follow 10,000 people but only have a few followers themselves. These are likely to be automated message services.
8 To make best use of your 140 characters use a URL (website address) shortening service such as TinyURL and
Bit.ly. If you use a Twitter App on your mobile phone this may already be built in.
9 Why not ask people’s view on a certain issue such as a really good resource, assembly idea, or information on a certain issue? Put “please RT” at the end. I’ve received some really interesting comments!
The dangers
Teachers have to take care when they are using social networking sites. There are perhaps three main dangers to be aware. The first is that if you publicise your contact
information such as phone number or address, pupils may find the information and in some cases harass the teacher. The second is that any public pronouncements or
photographs you have on the site can be read by anyone. So perhaps take care as to whether your put up your beach holidays pictures or discuss a recent night out in too much detail unless you want your pupils to see it. The final danger is befriending pupils on such sites
and then allegations being made about the propriety of such relationships. Common sense and the use of privacy settings can avoid these dangers though. The same care needs to be taken when communicating with any student electronically, there can be a temptation to type something that we would not dream of saying in a classroom.
Facebook
facebook is probably the most famous social networking site and is used to keep up-to-date with contacts. However, it tends to be used more for social reasons than business ones. you can join certain groups of people to share ideas
or thoughts. As facebook is far more famous there are probably more known dangers in using the site such as teachers who have become too friendly with current pupils on facebook, teachers who have criticised their school or staff on the site, or personal information from facebook becoming widely known. If you are using facebook for personal reasons the
best advice is to set the privacy settings on high so people who are not your “friends” cannot read your information. Many schools and local authorities also suggest that
you should not accept “friend” requests from current pupils at the school. Caution is urged.
Twitter
The idea of Twitter is that you have 140 characters to answer the question, “what’s happening?”, which on the surface hardly seems an opening to such educational opportunities as were described above.
SecEd • June 9 2011 When I first used Twitter, like many people, I
followed a few famous people that I was interested in and a couple of friends. I hardly sent any tweets. As a result I used it more as another news service
rather than a method of networking. from that experience I would not have imagined using Twitter as a form of CPD. one commentator memorably described Twitter
as being a bit like a river with a flow of information in its current. you can either choose to sit on the bank and watch, which was how I started, or you can jump in and become involved with everything in the river. one question that you might ask is who reads your
140 characters of wisdom? In Twitter, as well as being able to follow people, other people can follow you. Every time you write a comment this is passed onto your followers. Key to getting the most out of Twitter is to build up
a group of people who follow you. If you want to build up a community of followers, you need to actively engage with Twitter (see box out, left, for some advice to get you started).
A final thought
Many teachers realise that education is cyclical with the comment there are no new ideas. Twitter can act as a virtual staffroom with teachers
full of sage wisdom sharing their thoughts with you. Just as in your own staffroom, if you never visit or join in the conversation, people are unlikely to help you if you ask. However, if you participate in the chatter every so
often it can be a real support in your working life. There is obviously the one caveat that unlike the famous sporting phrase, what happens on tour, stays on tour, what is said on Twitter is there for all to see!
SecEd
• Paul Ainsworth is vice principal at a Leicestershire secondary school and the author of Developing a Self-evaluating School (Continuum Books). He can be contacted at
paul.ainsworth@belvoirhigh.
leics.sch.uk or @pkainsworth on Twitter. Thanks to @fullonlearning, @anpa2001, @ronggordon, @janwebb21, @lucysweetman, @efficiencycoach, @clareconstant and @squaretweet among others for their help with this article.
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f you read “I have probably learnt more in the last six months on ______ than in the previous 20 years of teaching”, you would probably be interested to know what the hidden word is. How about “______ connects me, as an educator, with an unprecedented and
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