Stay

CONNECTED

As you explored in TCH 401, one particularly effective tool for educators to connect and stay current on disciplinary approaches, pedagogies, materials, and technologies is Twitter. Teachers have used the affordance of the hashtag (#) to group around disciplines like #sschat, #mathchat, #engchat, and topically like #pblchat, #literacies, #musiceducation and #kinderchat. This challenge is designed to help you continue to build your PLN, particularly in terms of discipline-specific practices. Follow the steps below to complete the challenge.

To Annotate

In this blog post, Madalyn Sklar summarizes a Twitter Chat that explores Twitter's role in education. Read the post & create at least two annotations and reply to at least two of your colleagues' annotations using Hypothes.is. (Make sure when you make these annotations that you have chosen to post them in our class annotation group. You will have to toggle from Public to TCH 432 Summer 2021 at the top of Hypothes.is options. You can find instructions for Hypothes.is and how to create annotations in our class annotation group on the Start page.) If you are annotating prior to your colleagues' posts, make sure to come back in a couple of days to engage in the conversation.

To Explore

This challenge requires you to engage with others around your discipline and to expand your PLN. To do so, start exploring hashtags, people, & organizations to follow. Here is a list of many of the hashtags teachers have organized around educational topics and here is a calendar of upcoming synchronous Twitter chats teachers have organized using these hashtags. This list also includes educators who are active on Twitter and who may be on interest to you.
If you need a refresher on Twitter or are new to using Twitter in your own professional learning & connections, check out the resources & suggestions below to get started.
1. Short Kickstart Overviews: Twitter for Teachers or New to Twitter
2. Writing a Great Tweet for Education (The examples in this piece are linked to great educators to follow!)
3. 44 Educational Twitter Chats Worth Your Time

To Create

This is your only ongoing challenge that requires you to complete tasks EACH WEEK. You will have two parts each week.

Due: At least once a week. Use (or set up) a professional Twitter handle to engage with other connected educators via a disciplinary hashtag at least once a week. Engaging includes researching the group, reading, responding, retweeting, and tweeting with the hashtag. You can also participate in a scheduled synchronous chat with other disciplinary educators for the hashtag. Once you have engaged for the week, go to the Twitter topic in the Forum. The first time you go to the forum, start a discussion that shares your Twitter handle with the class. Then, in the comments, share what you did and what you learned for the week. You can summarize your learning, share details about the group, and/or copy/paste your Tweets or Retweets. This will also facilitate growing and supporting your PLN as discussed in TCH 401.
Due: Each Friday. Each Friday, we will take time to reflect on our learning that week, and share five "finds" from the week via Twitter. A "find" is any kind of connection or resource or idea that you think is interesting, important, fun, or even funny! You are sharing on Twitter, but your finds can be from readings, discussions, colleague’s posts, or Twitter. Include both #tch432 and #F5F in your tweet(s). If relevant, include a disciplinary hashtag as well. You can also create a post on our course blog with all five of your "finds" and then tweet out a single link to that post (remember to include the hashtags).
Check out your colleagues' tweets by searching for our course hashtag #tch432. You can <3, retweet, or reply to any of their tweets. Remember, to always include #tch432 in each and every tweet that is relevant to our course so that we know that our colleagues are tweeting!