November 20, 2014

3D Printing and Twitter in the Classroom

The Saramifasess is hanging out on our keyboard.

The Saramifasess is hanging out on our keyboard.

Twitter can be a really good learning tool. I’ve known that for awhile, and I have learned much from my own Twitter account. I have even used it as a learning tool in some college classes that I have taught, but I have avoided it in my fourth grade class. That has changed this year.

I’m aware that there can be risks as to what content my students can come across and how Twitter is a platform where other people can send messages to my students. These concerns are usually why I don’t use certain technologies, and why I haven’t introduced it before now. As our insect unit began to wind down one student completed her project before anyone else. I decided to create a Twitter account from her bugs perspective. I thought that would give her a good challenge tweeting from a bugs point-of-view.

My idea is that I will control the password and log in so that the account can only be used under my supervision. She is allowed to go on during the day and tweet facts about insects and other interesting things going on in our classroom from the bug’s perspective. With her mother’s permission and the account on my phone I feel pretty safe doing this project, but am keeping a very close eye on the feed.

So far our insect, the Sarahmifasess, has identified an insect that scared Mrs. Barnett, shared the documentary made about herself, and has shared the smallest bug in the world, the largest bug, and the most poisonous. You can follow along too if you would like to learn more about insects and what is happening in room 30. Just log into Twitter and follow @sarahmifasess.

 

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