I think Twitter is an amazing resource and tool for teachers; I encourage all teachers I work with to join up. It gives you a quick, simple way to interact with colleagues and subject experts from outside your school and across the world. You find out what new things they’re trying, what’s working in their classrooms and what issues they’re facing. You can get help, give help and join in the debate.
… but there’s something missing …
The voice of students.
Today I was introduced by @ssat to @SchoolReport a student tweeting about his/her education and school life.
But that’s just one voice, wouldn’t it add so much to your teaching and learning if you also heard from students what was working for them, what wasn’t, the troubles and successes in their classrooms across the world. Asking them why would be very powerful. We’re all aware of the benefits for learners and teachers of getting learners to reflect on how they’re learning, asking for that to be open and enabling students and teachers to enter into conversations with each other about it would be a huge win all round.
I guess student tweeters could go down one of two routes:
- Open tweeting (using your own name). If you’re confident in yourself, your school and your teachers to be mature about how feedback is given and taken.
- Secret tweeting (using a pseudonym). This may be more comfortable (and fun), but I think if you’re going to go down this route you need to make sure you also don’t reveal the identity of your school, your teachers or your classmates.
So I’m not sure exactly how, but I think we need a concerted campaign to encourage more student tweeters (or should that be ‘twitterers’).
The first little step on Twitter tends to be a #hashtag, so I’ll suggest #svtweet (student voice tweet). Students already using Twitter or anyone wishing to start could tag any tweets about education or school #svtweet.
Let’s hear the students.