Let's Tweet

This is my first time to use Twitter and it really surprised me by those functions that a teacher can use in the class. According to the article, 28 Creative Ways Teachers Are Using Twitter, this new social microblogging seems really can help both teachers' teaching and students' learning. Through this article, I think I may let my students to "follow conferences" from some professionals' views or reflection and then require them to write down their thoughts on the twitter. Since Twitter has "TwitLit," students need to consider which part is the most important goal that in those paragraphs and make the specific points in 140-character. In this way, students not only can learn how to grab the main point of the certain articles, but also can decrease the job for teachers that looking at the long essay papers without main point. Also, based on the other article, Free Techonology for Teachers: Educational Twitter Chats Calendar, I can create some Twitter chats monthly for the students. With the Twitter Chats calendar, it can remind both I and my students to pay attention on this workshop. After I looked at these articles, I found out there are really a lot of educators using Twitter as a teaching tool and I hope I would use it in my future career, too.



EFL Classroom 2.0

           EFL classroom 2.0 is a website that can let people learn from each other by sharing their experiences on it or their own blogs. The function of it is just like the motto on the top of its own page "when one teaches, two learn." It has a lot of gadgets on both sides of the websites, includes links to related websites,members' facebook, quick announcement, twitter, etc. You can also find some interesting videos, lesson plans, stories, or even karaoke via this website.This is really attractive social networking website.

connect

Teachers' goals may be variety, however, most of them have the same general targets when they teach their students. For example, giving them directs, taking care of them, teaching them the knowledge, showing them the good manners,etc, and that's why when I think of "a teacher," I think of the whipping top. Teachers' loves, knowledge,experiences are just like the filament surrounds us. Nevertheless, learning is not an easy job and so does teaching. These two activities should interact with each other. "Learning is a process that occurs within nebulous environments of shifting core elements - not entirely under the control of the individual" said by George Siemens' Connectivism: A Learning Theoryfor the Digital Age. If we want to play good whipping tops, we need to practice a lot. We need to combine different styles of throwing, the materials of the floor or the stuff of its own self. It’s just like continuing learning and learning and in this period, students not only learn from the teachers but also students and so do teachers. After that, teachers throw the tops safely on the floor and tops can learn from themselves individually.

According to the video of The Impact of SocialSoftware on Learning, he said that social software is a broad umbrella term, and includes everything from the blog to wiki, to social bookmarking, to tagging......it would able to share and connecting to each other. Thanks to the technology, students now can learn independently through more effective, challenge, cultural way. It is just like the analogy I said above. At the beginning, teachers would teach students how to use the tools, how to get the knowledge you want and once they learn the methods, they can enjoy the benefits the technology bring to them  and have intellectual hunger on what they interests.