A couple of months ago, I saw this interesting-looking bird outside my window. I took the picture and then tried to find out what it was by typing the following description into Google image search:
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Unfortunately, the resulting images didn’t help much and I was unable to make a positive identification.
The bird kept coming back to the same spot on the grass. I kept getting distracted from work, thinking how I could find out what it was. It occurred to me that Twitter might do the trick. I tweeted my snap shot and asked if anyone could help.
I got the following two responses:
Result: A positive identification (see here).
Twitter is perfect for this type of thing. If I had shown my picture to one or two people, they probably wouldn’t have been able to help. But if I stand up in a room of 150 people - some friends and some strangers - and draw their attention to the unidentified bird, you can see what happens.
Here are three other instances when I have turned to the microblogging site (or rather, the people I follow) for help:
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Lesson planning
Recently, I was asked to give a workshop in Spanish, for teachers of Spanish. I thought about adapting one of the activities in my book but needed examples of words such as paraguas (umbrella), abrebotellas (bottle opener), lavavajillas (dish washer), etc. Here’s what I got:
Thanks to my fellow Tweeters, I now had enough material to plan my workshop.
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Teacher support and resource recommendations
Throughout the summer, I have been working with teachers from Europe who are going to be teaching their own subjects (science, art, PE, history, music, etc) in English. This is an incredibly scary prospect for many of them. One of the recurring questions that came up on the courses was:
“How can I find the content words and phrases in English that are relevant to my subject? They are not in the dictionary.”
José, a maths teacher from Spain, asked this question just after I had demonstrated Twitter to the class. Here is what we did:
The link that Adir included went to this site - perfect for what José was looking for.
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Technical help
Last month I bought a new MacBook. I started to panic when I realised that I couldn’t write blog posts on Wordpress, the platform that I use to write this blog. All sorts of techy weird things were going on and I needed help.
This is exactly what I was I needed to know.
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The power to ask questions
Many people who don’t use Twitter will roll their eyes at the mention of it. I heard a presenter at a conference last March saying, “If you use Twitter, just remember what the first 4 letters of the word spell.” (See here)
I thought that this was funny at the time. But I wonder now if the presenter would be so quick to rubbish Twitter if he knew its potential.
Different people have different reasons for using Twitter. Similarly, different people adhere to different Twitter-etiquette. My thoughts now are that I have to start putting as much in as I take out - to reach a balance between giving and receiving. I have to keep a close eye on the people that I follow so that I can support them when they need help. It’s a karma thing, I suppose.
12 responses so far ↓
1 The Chicken Man // Sep 28, 2009 at 6:54 pm
This is a great post buddy! I loved the angle tweet tweet on the identity of the Jay. Some great examples of why twitter is useful. Do many other teachers within your own school use this too? We are struggling to get more into it! What about twitter in the classroom? Have a look at my blog a while ago on this:
http://chickensaltash.edublogs.org/2009/06/04/to-tweet-or-not-to-tweet-that-is-the-question/
2 Özge // Sep 28, 2009 at 7:27 pm
Jamie,
It’s a great post to read about Twitter. You’ve caught great examples to show us how Twitter really works and rocks!!
For me, it’s the best networking site I’ve ever been online!! Great people, great friends… You, they have changed my life forever!!
3 admin // Sep 28, 2009 at 8:08 pm
Thanks Chicken Man
Yes - a few of the teachers I work with use Twitter but I would say that most of them don’t. As far as I can see, there are a couple of problems for anyone that is new to the site:
1. In order to understand and appreciate the potential of Twitter, you need to be following/followed by a certain number of people (50 for example?).
2. It takes quite a lot of dedication to get to this stage.
I wrote this post for the teachers I worked with over the summer - the ones who are going to start teaching their own subjects in English. I really feel that they could benefit from the support that Twitter can offer. The above post aims to give them a bit of insight into the potential - a reason for sticking with it through the initial stages in an attempt to establish a personal community.
Enjoyed your post. I haven’t tried anything like that myself but with a bit of perseverance, I’m sure it could work well.
Thanks again
Jamie
4 admin // Sep 28, 2009 at 8:15 pm
Hello Özge
Thanks very much for you comment. It’s a strange phenomenon, Twitter, isn’t it? For me, it was an acquired taste - a bit like olives and beer. At the beginning, I didn’t really know why I was using it. I probably thought it was a bit silly (like the guy I mentioned in the post). But then - bam! You suddenly get an insight into the potential.
I enjoy following you. I have absolutely no idea how you find so many links to post. Incredible stuff. Thank you
Jamie
5 gita assefi // Sep 29, 2009 at 2:13 am
Great post !Thanks …I try to follow your posts and links as much as I find time and I am very new to twitter ,but I already started enjoying it a lot ….still dont know a lot and trying to discover how to use it properly ….thanks again!
6 admin // Sep 29, 2009 at 1:06 pm
Thanks Gita
Let me know when you are Twittering and I will follow you
Jamie
7 Russell Cross // Oct 4, 2009 at 1:13 am
Twitter is still an application looking for… well, applications! However, as you point out, there are some cool ways to use it. I started a companion Twitter feed to my “The Word Guy” blog as a challenge to myself: A word-a-day that gives an etymology in 140 characters or less. 243 tweets later it’s still going strong - and I’m still challenged!
8 Sonja // Oct 28, 2009 at 2:20 pm
After all you have me convinced twitter is very useful….will get it as well ( already have a profil..just were is it?) ….by the way this page(especially the report about the webinar which didn´t happen for you) is really, really inspiring for me…oh! it is me! I wrote you before: I am using your book a lot! I am very glad that Carl pointed at you-you are very, very funny!
9 Anita Kwiatkowska // Oct 31, 2009 at 12:21 pm
Hi Jamie!
Your creativity is simply amazing
Although I can’t use most of your ideas with my students as they are too young, let me just say that I really appreciate what you are doing
I’m still trying to get used to Twitter. The only things is that in order to make the most of it, you must have a number of followers, not 11 like me
Greetings from Istanbul,
Anita
10 admin // Nov 1, 2009 at 2:45 pm
Hello Russell
I enjoy following you on Twitter
http://twitter.com/thewordguy
It’s a simple yet effective idea - a word a day
Keep it up
Jamie
11 admin // Nov 1, 2009 at 2:48 pm
Thanks for the feedback Sonja
I haven’t seen you on Twitter. Let me know when you have an account
J
12 admin // Nov 1, 2009 at 2:49 pm
Anita - you now have 11+1
=)
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