Wondering who to follow on Twitter

The DPI has gotten into the Twitter arena:

• DPI's main Twitter feed shares major news as well as DPI-ConnectEd stories and retweets from other DPI feeds
• State Superintendent Tony Evers
• Social Studies
• Personal Financial Literacy
• BadgerLink

You can also follow DPI on Facebook.

Social Media and Wisconsin Politics

As we talk about the use of social media in class, there are real world examples of its use in Wisconsin politics today. The Daily PAge (from the Isthmus weekly paper) offers a guide to social media campaigns against the governor's current agenda (http://www.thedailypage.com/daily/article.php?article=32233). This is just one side of the issue. I'm sure there are resources presenting the opposing viewpoint, too. Channel 3000 also provides an overview of social media on the protests.  Think about how resources like this could be used to analyze the current situation and different viewpoints with students. As an example of the traffic, check out the Social Meteor tracking of tweets for the first week.

You may also find the PBS lesson plan on Social Media and Non-Violent Protest useful this week.

Blogger and other communication tools

Have you noticed that some of the templates in Blogger have a short panel of icons for other social networking tools like Twitter and Facebook as well as email and Blogger itself? This allows you to tie together different methods of communication and collaborating. Try sharing a particularly interesting post to Facebook (or Twitter when we get to it a little later). Do you think this would be useful in a school setting?

Have you also noticed that some blogs appear to elicit more comments than others? What makes you want to read and contribute to a blog (your classmates' or others')? Have you commented on the blog of someone you don't know? How woud you feel if you got comments from non-classmates? How do you think your students would feel if they got comments from someone outside the school?

Twitter to Keep Parents Updated

I found this example last year of Twitter used in an elementary classroom. The kids share with their parents.

Engaging People via Twitter

Do you want more followers on Twitter? Do you want to engage in real conversations? Read Cindy King's 12 Tips to Engage People on Twitter.