My Year 9/10 health class are continuing to use Twitter to share and discuss their term 4 topic drugs and alcohol. We have been focusing on the legalisation of medical marijuana over the last few weeks.
For those interested in reading what my students have been tweeting I have embedded the #910DA Twitter feed into the blog (scroll down its on the left hand side).
Students are on a steep learning curve about how to tweet effectively and not all tweets have been accurate! One student account misread an article and their tweet reflected this. They had also not supplied the link to the study they were quoting. When asked they did provide the link and I was able to help them understand what the article actually said. I’ve inserted the conversation below.
It is this type of conversation that has led to face to face conversations in the classroom about being accurate with what we post. For example some of the statements in the image below are flat out lies that falsely promoted a positive view of marijuana i.e. marijuana cures cancer. As a class we were able to view the graphic and talk about what we thought was accurate and what we thought was inaccurate and why. We also discussed how posting something in this way says we agree with the content and if the content is inaccurate it reflects on us.
A benefit to using this method of communication was realised when I was absent from school and missed my weekly 9/10 health class. The lesson I set for the relief teacher involved students responding to links I had sent them via Twitter. I was able to sit at home and see who was engaging in the activity and respond to student tweets, all in real time. I was there without physically being there. Below are some examples of my interactions during this lesson.
I think we should ID some of these technologies and all agree to embed them next year. Granted I am leaving, but kids wont monitor and curate their feeds if it is just for health, but they will if they engage with it for each learning area.
In my opinion the single biggest issue PBAS students present with is their inability to contextualize information with a global perspective. This is very easily solved through technology but it needs to be systematic and whole school, not just Nick. Didn’t we just have a digital revolution?
I had two goals for using Twitter 1. To create a collection of information that will support student learning, instigate discussion and have students contribute to that collection and 2. To try and show students that social media can be used as a tool for learning and connecting with others that can help with that learning. By using Twitter the sharing and viewing of information has been more easily accessible than had I handed out a list of websites and told students to, “view these” and then discussed as a class. The #910DA allows the class to put all of our information, links, conversations in one place for all to see rather than these things being spread out amongst the class and not accessed by all.
As for spreading the use of ‘social media’ technologies within the school this is not a easy thing to do. Teachers need to see a purpose. Does this work? Is it going to improve my students learning? Is it worth my time commitment to set up? Will it work smoothly (I still need to unblock every student in every health lesson to access Twitter)? I have no doubt that social media is powerful tool for student learning but we all teach differently and use different tools. I don’t agree that all other teachers have to use something like Twitter for me to use it effectively in my classroom.