Recently for some reason unknown to me I have found myself often amongst students and colleagues hating on Twitter. The thing is…they haven’t tried it.
Of course, people are allowed to have opinions, even when they are not based on any real knowledge or experience. But I have been a bit surprised by how quickly, and with what venom, people are ready to leap into attack mode when someone mentions Twitter.
Wow, some people must really think they are important – as if anyone cares about your sad life.
Don’t people have anything better to do?
Who could be bothered checking to see if someone posted some random note.
As if I want to hear about the boring details of someone else’s life!
It’s a place where sad-cases can find out what P. Diddy is doing every minute of everyday.
Narcissists!
Yesterday a penny dropped for me, and I realised a big reason why I find these comments so unsettling: Why are people so determined to express how much they DON’T care about anyone else’s world? Sure, meeting in person is a ‘nicer’ way to be closer to people you know, but these comments don’t smack of pro-embodied-socialising; they just reek of tall poppy syndrome and a bunch of I-don’t-care.
I’m hoping some teachers on our school technology committee will start dabbling in Twitter soon, so I can start making the rich professional connections in school that I currently need to seek out of school. I found this TED Talk on Twitter very interesting, and I’ll pass it on to my colleagues soon:
Kelli McGraw 
#1 by Omar on April 3, 2009 - 2:26 am
I like this post. I’m a big fan of Twitter but I don’t care what other people say, I do it because I like to be in contact with friends and family.
#2 by Libbie on April 3, 2009 - 10:43 am
It’s pretty interesting how different uses that you never imagined get discovered once you give it to the masses.
One of these days, I want to make a killer app like that…
#3 by Troy on April 3, 2009 - 4:58 pm
My fav: Narcissists!
Contact, interaction, connection between people is a fluid thing, something that has evolved. I value people, no matter what. Twitter is just a pinprick into someone’s world. I write letters too, I have the best of both worlds.
We can:
(a) ignore it,
(b) openly resist,
(b) embrace it…’professional connections in school that I currently need to seek out of school.’
Aside: A colleague of mine has this saying: give me a pen and poem and I can teach anyone anything. Well I can do that too! But I can also bring in webquests, digistories, reflective blogs, plus all kinds of ‘life skill’ ICT…Twitter and fb and myspace etc etc, are just another form of expression…
#4 by Skardalien on April 4, 2009 - 6:55 pm
There’s much to be gained from Twitter and I hope you don’t let the doubt of your coworkers discourage you from forming a meaningful and effective professional learning network.
#5 by mgiddins on April 19, 2009 - 10:39 pm
Great post, Kelli. I have just experimented with using twitter with my students – results of which are posted on my blog. Colleagues are a much better idea! I look forward to trialling the same thing with my faculty and will let you know how it goes. Good luck with your twitter experiment. I follow you on twitter so will be interested to see how it goes!
#6 by kellimcgraw on April 20, 2009 - 1:56 am
Thanks for the supportive words all 🙂
Lib: How about an online network that shows anyone in your area who is about to go down to the local KFC/Maccas/Hamburger shop and you can ask them to pick you up something and bring it over? Like carpool, ‘pay it forward’ and home delivery combined XD