Brilliant or Insane?: Twitter

Thursday, April 10, 2014

5 Things I Think About Twitter After 25,000 Tweets

By Mark Barnes

via Twitter.com

It's fair to say I'm a bit obsessed with Twitter. I send dozens of tweets daily, participate in and moderate twitter chats, have multiple Twitter accounts, and I even teach a 3 semester hour course on using Twitter as a professional development tool.

Soon, I'll surpass 25,000 tweets. This got me thinking about Twitter. Here are 5 things I thought:

I Tweet a lot: The average number of tweets sent by a user on Twitter is 307 according to DMR. Considering more than 100 million people are active Twitter users each month, I was astonished by this statistic. It makes my 25K really cool, or it means I have far too much time on my hands.
6,000 people make for a lot of friends: For a couple of years now, I've been actively attempting to build my Twitter following. At roughly 6,000 followers, I used to feel sort of lonely. After all, I know educators who have more than 100,000, which is staggering, I think, for someone who is not a celebrity. Then, when I reviewed the stats on DMR, I realized that the average Twitter user has a paltry 208 followers. Suddenly, it seems like I'm standing in a very large crowd. Thanks PLN.
It's okay to seek out new friends: For a long time, my connection philosophy was: "If you tweet it, they will come." I shared lots of content and waited for followers. Sure, I gained a couple of thousand loyal friends, but then my connections stagnated. I realized not so long ago that seeking out interesting people and following them first is sort of like handing out a business card. You'll be surprised how many people follow back. This reciprocation is what puts the "social" in social media.
Cyber friends can be real friends: When I started using Twitter, it was nothing more than a promotional tool, and the people there were nothing more mythical figures, locked in my computer monitor. Now, I have made numerous friends from Twitter, whom I have met at conferences, dined with and collaborated with on various projects. This is the best part of Twitter.
Mixed in those 25,000 tweets is some compelling conversation: While there are plenty of times I tweet a link to something and there is little follow-up, sometimes a simple statement or link sparks a very interesting debate, like this one.

How often do you tweet, and what do you think about Twitter?

Mark Barnes is an education author and consultant and the publisher of Brilliant or Insane. Learn more about Mark on our Team page. Follow him on Twitter here.

Sunday, March 30, 2014

Cancel Colbert Campaign

By Anna Turner

via fireandreamitchell.com

People love being offended.

Never has this been more obvious than in the trending #CancelColbert campaign on Twitter, an uprising against the comedian's allegedly racist tweet against Asians.

Colbert has been pissing people off for years, and it's pretty much been hilarious. But for some reason, people seem to think the above tweet went too far.

The tweet was a satirical take on Washington Redskins' owner Dan Snyder's Original Americans Foundation, a group Colbert claims is an attempt at positive PR for the NFL, mitigating the supposed racism of the Redskins' mascot. I'm not saying that the tweet isn't racist, but I'm not saying it isn't awesome, either.

For starters, Stephen Colbert is a known satirist, humorist, and comic. He makes jokes for a living. Humor is supposed to be irreverent and offensive. Without the incongruent darkness of a twisted punchline, there would be no joke.

You cannot call for the downfall of a funnyman for being funny under the presumed banner of offensive humor. No shit, it's offensive. It's humor. It's satire. Let's just calm down, OK?

Colbert is giving the world the opportunity to see serious issues through a lighthearted lens. If anything, we should be thanking him for making us laugh, for continually delivering heavy content in a relatable manner, and for calling out the idiots running society into the ground.

But of course we can't thank him, as most of us revel in the outrage brought on by offensive comments. There's a self-deprecating joy people find in the scandal of being offended, and those people get high on things like #CancelColbert.

So for those of you posting and tweeting and blogging about how personally hurt you are by Colbert's joke, how about you save yourself all this pain and despair by electing not to follow or watch Colbert? I feel like that's a pretty easy solution to the problem. You're welcome.

Anna Turner is Brilliant or Insane's managing editor and pop culture diva. Learn more about Anna on our Team Page. Follow her on Twitter here.

Wednesday, March 26, 2014

Buy or sell Twitter as a teaching and learning tool?

Twitter is an absolute monster. It's scarier than Frankenstein, Dracula or any other horror film character you can think of.

What? You don't think Twitter is scary? Okay, maybe it isn't so terrifying to you, but if you've tried to get your students to use Twitter, you know what I mean.

Anytime I say I want to use Twitter, a chorus of students sings loudly, "My parents won't let me on Twitter." When I ask why, they say their parents are afraid of Twitter.

I'm buying Twitter as a powerful classroom tool

Parents -- the adults, on whom we rely to make informed decisions -- think Twitter is unsafe. It's some sort of social media monster, waiting to devour children the second they click "follow."

The problem is parents don't believe a social network like Twitter can be private. It's a stigma that social media applications are cursed with.

If you'd like to use Twitter or another social network in your classroom, enlist your students to help. Teach them privacy and appropriate use and have them share the power of Twitter with parents.

I've always encouraged students to ask their parents to join Twitter and follow our classroom Twitter stream. With parents following both our classroom and their own children on Twitter, what could be safer? Once all stakeholders join the conversation, Twitter becomes one of the best discussion tools a teacher can have at her disposal.

This is why I'm buying Twitter as an amazing teaching and learning tool. Let us know why you're buying or selling.

Mark Barnes is an education author and consultant and the publisher of Brilliant or Insane. Learn more about Mark on our Team page. Follow him on Twitter here.

Friday, January 10, 2014

Who says Twitter isn't for elementary students?

Many teachers are reluctant to use social media tools, like Twitter, in the classroom. Some elementary teachers might love the idea but believe their students are simply too young for social media.

Check out this video and witness the power of Twitter in a first-grade classroom.

If this looks like something you'd love to have your youngsters try, don't worry about getting them accounts. Just set up a class Twitter handle, like Mrs. Cassidy did. Have students log into that account and add their names to their tweets.

So, what do you think? Is this strategy brilliant or insane?

Thursday, January 9, 2014

Sales and teaching are remarkably similar

In an article posted to the Digital Marketing Ramblings blog, Elliot Martinez identifies "6 Ways to Improve Your Customer Service and Increase Sales." As I read each strategy, it struck me how remarkably similar sales is to teaching.

Check out a few of Martinez' ideas about increasing sales and see how easily they can be used in your classroom to engage students in learning.

Arm yourself with technology, so you can connect in an instant. Not only do your students want to be connected to engaging material, they will love using social media and mobile learning tools to learn.
Respond quickly. Martinez says that consumers are turning to social media to share their experiences. What if you allowed your students to use Twitter to share learning? They might love it.
Go the extra mile. Martinez suggests that successful companies are doing more to satisfy customers, even responding to virtually every Twitter request. Don't you go the extra mile by spending extra time with students, leaving narrative feedback and communicating with parents?

Teachers are, indeed, a lot like salesmen. Who knew?

Sunday, March 31, 2013

Twitter friends are like movie stars

Have you ever had the chance to meet your favorite celebrity? To shake his or her hand and even have a casual chat over lunch? I have. . . well, sort of.

I recently attended the ASCD Annual Conference in Chicago. This was a tremendous weekend, filled with fun and learning opportunities. As an ASCD author and presenter, I spent time with luminaries at the education publishing and professional development giant, including the publisher, editors, department heads, publicists and other authors. These people are solid professionals and smart educators. I presented on results-only learning, signed copies of my book, Role Reversal, and I even participated in a videotaped interview for the ASCD website. All of these were thrilling experiences.

The most amazing part of the weekend, though, was meeting people I interact with often on Twitter, people I hadn't met in person until the conference. I have communicated on Twitter and via email with some of my favorite authors and thought leaders -- people like Daniel Pink, Alfie Kohn and Donalyn Miller. Meeting any of these remarkable people would be thrilling, for sure, but I felt no less awed, when I met some key educators I follow on Twitter.

At the ASCD author press luncheon, which I was honored to be part of as a new book writer, I sat down with @TomWhitby, Steven Anderson (@web20classroom), Josh Stumpenhorst (@stumpteacher), @KristenSwanson and @PaulaWhite, among others. These people may not be as recognizable as Pink or Kohn, but they are clebrities in education to me, and meeting them in person was sort of like talking to movie stars.

They may not be seen walking the red carpet at the Oscars -- though some might mistake Swanson for Kate Beckinsale and Stumpenhorst for Brad Pitt -- but these intelligent teachers, bloggers and speakers are true celebrities in their field.

So, when you get the chance to meet the fantastic educators you follow on Twitter, enjoy the experience, and be careful not to be starstruck.

Cross-posted at ASCDEDge

Don't miss Mark's book ROLE Reversal: Achieving Uncommonly Excellent Results in the Student-Centered Classroom, now available in the ASCD store, Barnes & Noble and at Amazon.com