Twitter Experiment
Monica Rankin, professor of History at UT Dallas, wanted to know how to reach more students and involve more people in class discussions both in and out of the classroom. She collaborated with the UT Dallas, Arts and Technology – Emerging Media and Communications (EMAC) faculty and graduate student Kim Smith to incorporate Twitter into the classroom. This video provides a glimpse into the experiment.
It would have been interesting to hear further reflections from Dr. Rankin on what perhaps didn’t go as well as she had hoped, if she’ll continue incorporating Twitter in the future, recommendations for other faculty, etc. Additional comments from Dr. Rankin on her experience are here. I’ve used Twitter for quite some time in online courses that I’ve taught but I’ve yet to try incorporating it into a f2f or hybrid context.
Why use Twitter instead of other discussion modes? What is so appealing for students? Is it simply the ability for students to participate on either mobile devices or computers? Is discussion in 140 characters or less sufficient for creating meaningful dialogue? Are students at all concerned with posting such discussions in a public venue as opposed to the more “traditional” walled-garden environments that learning management systems offer? Should future learning management systems incorporate microblogging features like Twitter? How do such discussions vary from other social networking collaborations? How does one balance the online “chatter” of twitter while also facilitating in-class discussions? These are all questions I hope to address in greater detail at some point down the road.
After viewing this video, what additional questions would you pose to Dr. Rankin concerning her experiment with Twitter?