TO TWEET OR NOT TO TWEET- THAT IS THE QUESTION
In week 3, we evaluated the usefulness of twitter as a PLN tool for a teachers professional development. Briggs (2015) suggests that twitter can be used as both a teaching and learning tool and found that students who have access to twitter often feel more engaged in activities occurring in university, essentially heightening their performance as pre-service teacher/students. Briggs (2015) discusses that twitter is beneficial for a students' personal and professional development and states, "twitter also provides students with opportunities to learn important skills, such as collaboration, responsiveness, and the ability to join different discourses." I learnt that twitter is a highly effective tool that should be used by all teachers, especially pre-service teachers in order to gain inspiration, support, motivation and to extend our ideas. As I have recently started to use twitter as a starting point in developing my PLN, I have discovered that twitter is useful in allowing me to have access to information from all over the world which I believe will help extend my own creativity as a future teacher as well as being able to collaborate and connect with other teachers who have great experience in the teaching field. Miller (2017) discusses the beneficial aspects of twitter as a collaborative working environment for teachers who share resources, ideas and tips, "The productivity and generosity of teachers on Twitter is inspiring." Establishing a PLN through twitter is highly effective as I may now seek advice and support in order to become the best teacher I can be as Rhingra (2012) mentions (see video below), "I firmly believe that technology can transform education...when you change the thinking, you can change the rules, you can change the solution..." Rhingra suggests that once teachers step out of their comfort zone, technology will indeed change education. Thus, using twitter to increase ones personal learning networks should be considered by all teachers in order to advance education. Davis (2015) suggests that twitter not only provides instant access to information for teachers but also states that 'social networking sites such as twitter provide a forum for teachers to feel professionally and emotionally supported by a larger learning community." I agree, twitter is a useful tool to gather effective and modern resources to implement in the future, along with my own original ideas that will inspire creativity, as well as encourage and engage student involvement. It not only provides easy access to resources which will enhance my pedagogy but it will also allow me to feel emotionally supported by other experienced teachers or students who may be able to provide advice, references or support. REFERENCES
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Re-written blog post:
My blog post below has been edited to address the comments provided by my peers, Jessica and Armani. They both said that I should include more images, why technology is important to me as well as specific examples of how I wish to use it as a teacher or how I have used it in the past for educational purposes. Digital technologies include any electronic tool or device which allows data to be processed or stored such as social media, online games, mobile phones, apps, etc. Communication technology refers to programs that are used to communicate information such as social media, email, interactive white boards, etc. Both communication and digital technologies have been used by myself in the past, particularly with the completion of my HSC where the “HSC discussion page” on Facebook was one of the ways in which access to resources and support from other students was extremely helpful for me. With that being said, Facebook as a communication technology has continued to be useful in terms of advancing my education. In week one of COMM140, we discussed that pre-service teachers, like myself, will be teaching students who have radically changed as “native speakers of the digital language”. (Prensky, M. 2001, p.g. 2) I learnt that as a pre-service teacher it is essential that I develop the necessary skills in digital and communication technologies in order to be able to effectively engage my students and to discover new, relevant and innovative ways to teach. (Tanti, M. 2017) Approaching my career with an open mind and a sense of creativity is essential to be able to encourage the success of my future students who have grown up with easy and instant access to these technologies. One specific example would be to incorporate social media in the classroom in order to engage the learning of digital natives (children who were born into the world of technology). I also wish to incorporate digital and communication technologies with the use of email, google classroom and various Facebook pages to keep in touch with my students and to ensure that their learning is progressing and developing in ways which foster their creativity as individuals. Digital and communication technologies are especially important to me as I feel empowered to use technology as a “pedagogic tool leading to better learning outcomes among students.” (Sarkar, S. 2017, p.g. ) Technology is particularly important to me as it has helped me extend my education past my comfort zone, allowing me access to a broad range of resources at my convenience as well as allowing me to communicate with peers and teachers who help me learn new things and obtain necessary information. Prensky suggests that today’s students represent the first generation who have grown up with new technology, spending their whole lives “surrounded by and using computers, videogames, digital music players, video cams, cell phones and all other toys and tools of the digital age.” (Prensky, M. 2001, p.g. 2) Prensky also includes a statistical approach to the digital native age, “todays average college grads have spent fewer than 5000 hours of their lives reading but over 20,000 hours watching TV.” (P.g. 2) Prensky’s comparison allows us to see that society has not only technologically advanced, but also highlights the need to recognise that education and teachers must revolutionise and become familiar with ways to engage their students through the use of digital and communication technologies. It is important to me as a student to develop the skills needed in digital and communication technologies to cater for students who consider computer games, social media, the internet and mobile phones an "integral part of their lives". (Prensky, M. 2001, p.g. 2) References
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