How Students can use Twitter for Learning

Twitter has obviously taken the world by storm. It is highly popular with people to keep up to date with news, blogs, articles etc. but one of the lesser known tool Twitter possesses is the fantastic ability it has to help learn.

Twitter is a digital communication network that is formed around shared interests. This social hub in which experts share and curate content from their field of work creates a feed of information which students should use to form their own knowledge.

140 Characters – Cut to the Chase

Students are busy trying to educate themselves with relevant content. As Twitter uses only 140 character it enabled students to quickly filter out irrelevant information. By looking at a short and sweet title we can all instantly learn what a link contains without the need to click through.

#Hashtag – Group & Track Discussions

The hashtag enables students to follow subjects that they feel most interested in. 3 ways to do this is via:

• Classroom/seminar discussions – once a class or seminar is over it doesn’t mean that learning has to cease. Use the Twitter hashtag to carry on from the classroom. Create a unique hashtag for your class to follow up. #Year8History
• Conferences – many subjects have conferences that take place - for example, TED talks create incredible discussions on Twitter using #TED… hashtags. A science conference would be exciting to follow on Twitter for any science student.
• Subjects – most students have a specific subject that they are passionate about. Some students may find Shakespeare fascinating so why not create a Shakespeare hashtag to curate a discussion with other students that have the same passion.

Who Should I Follow?

To get started you need to find some people to follow but don’t sweat, this is an easy (and fun!) task.

First of all, find a couple of people who have similar interests to you – to do this use Twitter Search and input your interests. Follow this people and then look at whom they follow, tweet and retweet. Then follow the people who you think could be of interest. Begin to share content and engage with these people and you will find that they will start to follow you back!

Following these easy steps can ensure that you get the most out Twitter for learning. Do you have any more tips or any examples of how Twitter has helped you in the education world? Let us know below!