TWITTER AS A DIDACTIC TOOL

This paper will discuss the use of the online social networking service Twitter as a didactic tool both inside and outside the classroom. It will claim that Twitter can be used for several purposes and in several ways in a wide range of school subjects. As a social networking service Twitter is constructed as a tool for communication. In learning in general and in most subjects communication is a key component and a goal in itself. It would therefore be quite obvious that a tool created for communication could be useful.

The first part of the paper will shortly present what Twitter is, its main functions, possibilities and limitations, and in general how it works. As a consequence of common models of communication both the recipients of a message and the medium through which it is sent will influence the strategies and choices the sender makes and hence the message itself. Hence the possibilities and limitations of Twitter will partly be defined by the functions that the technology contains and who the users of it are.

Afterwards there will be suggested a number of settings and activities that will serve as examples of how Twitter can be a useful tool in a number of school subjects. In relation to these examples the paper will discuss some theoretical reasons for how and why Twitter can have a positive effect on learning in these subjects. The subjects that will be touched here will be such as language training, civics and science. This will of course not be an exhaustive list but hopefully it can give ideas and inspiration to develop other and better ways of using Twitter and similar technologies as didactic tools.