Monday, September 15, 2014
Twitter Chat
Tonight was a first! I jumped in and participated in my first twitter chat. If you are not the tweeting type, you may not know what I am talking about. Basically, a group of people who have a particular interest in a subject join together for a "chat" on twitter by using a # (hashtag). Before I jumped into the world of twitter, the idea of using a # was very confusing. If you are using any type of social media, you have seen them used for sure. I often wondered why. Sometimes people list so many #s that the list is longer than the message being shared. The reason for that still escapes me. Tonight however, by using the #luthed, I was able to follow a chat with fellow Lutheran educators regarding our passion and need for professional development. The conversation was fast and furious and I have to admit a bit hard to follow. Of course part of that was because of family demands. In their defense, I hadn't really explained to them what I was trying to do. I tried to answer questions and respond to others, but I had a hard time remembering the proper way to answer and to use the #luthed. I did have a good laugh at myself; there was no learning curve for me. I made the same mistake every time I tried to respond. I didn't give up. I did get some positive feedback from my tweets; the ones that actually worked. I did think many times that perhaps I am too old for all of this. Will my mind and reflexes every be quick enough to follow this kind of chatter?
I realized something important tonight. If I want to be the creative innovative teacher I dream of being, it doesn't matter how old I am, I need to keep plugging along. I need to keep reaching out in order to energize my desire to learn new things. There are many others out there who indeed think as I do and I can learn from them. In just one night I was able to connect with several other Lutheran educators who have already done so much of this work in their classrooms. People who are as eager as I am to learn new ways to teach and who are willing to reach out and share what they have learned along the way. And surprisingly, I connected with educators who listened to what I had to say. This is empowering!
I am not sure how long it will take me to get the hang of these twitter chats, but I'll be there next Monday, ready to share!
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It was wonderful to "see" you there, Kristine! A key piece of your reflection is the empowerment. I, too, have found the chats to be empowering, if a bit fast-paced and frenetic at times. As educators that empowerment is critical! Thanks for joining in, and try to use tweetchat next time...it allows you to filter only #luthed (or other #s) into a stream, and adds #luthed to your tweets, so you don't forget. It's been immensely helpful to me!
ReplyDeleteJessica is tweetchat a website? I use tweetdeck and it helps to organize, but adding #luthed to my tweets would very helpful as that is what I continually forgot.
DeleteMistakes were made, but you learned. I wonder though if being so connected leaves us burned out. Actaully I can only answer that question for myself: not being connected leaves me feeling at times "tuned out" and overknowing leaves me "burned out" so the challenege (for me) is the moderation of it. Imagine if Jesus was alive today how he would use social media to minister!
ReplyDeleteGeorge you are absolutely right. As a newbie to all of this social media, it can be overwhelming and feeling a bit burned out, but I also feel fueled for what ever new comes along. I am actually leading worship this Sunday and I will be talking about just that. How do we stay focused in a society that moves at such a rapid pace. For me it is the chaos and discomfort I feel right before learning new things that actually brings me a lot of joy. Working in a Lutheran school has been a blessing as it helps keep me focused and grounded.
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