I chose to revise my individual post #4 as “Twitter as a tool for open learning and education” as this topic interests me the most. Throughout the experience in EDCI 339, it has changed my view on open and distributed learning. It is interesting to explore ways in which social media like Twitter can facilitate learning in education for all learners, thus, I would like to do more research on this topic. 

In my original post I shared my experience and thoughts on how Twitter can be used by learners and educators as an open source. I observed that there are both benefits and drawbacks of using Twitter as a tool for education. On one hand, it allows people to easily network with people around the world, only with the hashtag, you can join a discussion that you feel interested in. I gave an example of what we have done this week, with the hashtag #EDCI 339, we connected to the course with the instructors and other learners. It is a great tool for people who often gives speech and self-expression. On the other hand, I raised the problem that there is a limitation of characters that we can post for every tweet. Moreover, it is important for all learners and educators to stay up to dates as technologies nowadays are very constantly changing and updating. In the following, I will discuss more on how Twitter can hold significant potential as a learning tool through two articles; “Social media and medical education: Exploring the potential of Twitter as a learning tool” and “Twitter: A Professional Development and Community of Practice tool for Teachers”.

 

Recently social media use as a learning tool in medicine has been growing at an exponential rate. It can build on e-learning in ways that are more learner-generated, collaborative, and engaging (Batt-Rawden et al., 2014). As we all know, Twitter is a microblogging tool that allows users to post messages, links, videos, photos or even polls and live video streaming. According to Rosell-Aguilar. F, it is estimated that 500 million tweets are sent every day and 80% of users access Twitter via their mobile device and over 4.2 million daily tweets are reported to be from educators, who share their work, ideas and thoughts through Twitter (Rosell-Aguilar. F, 2018). It shows the popularity of Twitter, users can have conversations on different topics and also as an educational tool to share their ideas and knowledge. It is also stated that teachers appreciate the flexibility, lack of cost, accessibility and relevance of such professional development despite some disadvantages that it brought (Rosell-Aguilar. F, 2018). I believe that social media does provide complex systems of interactions including, people, resources and digital tools that support users for a better open learning environment. With the hashtag, we can often discuss on a topic in a group, receiving and expressing ideas are very important in the process of learning. In classroom, our conversations are usually limited by the duration of class, however, in social media, conversations are often on-going, at this point, I do see the effectiveness of hashtag. 

 

Nevertheless, there are also some drawbacks mentioned in the article include the possibility of Twitter use being too distracting, time-consuming and addictive, as well as issues around privacy (Rosell-Aguilar. F, 2018). I also mentioned these problems in my original post, however, through the experience of this course, I’ve learnt to set up a better schedule and to be more self-discipline. As a learner in University, I think students should develop the ability to navigate their study schedule and time management, it is a good way for us to step out of our comfort zones and to be more independent. Even though Twitter may limit oneself to express itself, I think it somehow also encourages more precise thinking and editing of the language used. 

 

Anyway, there are surely both drawbacks and benefits of social media like Twitter, yet, after exploring through the articles as well as experiencing from this course, I do believe that the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. Twitter is likely to become a useful tool for more personalized teaching and learning in education. 

 

Reference: 

Rosell-Aguilar, F. (2018). Twitter: A Professional Development and Community of Practice Tool for Teachers. Journal of Interactive Media in Education, 2018(1), 6. DOI: http://doi.org/10.5334/jime.452

Jalali, A., Sherbino, J., Frank, J., & Sutherland, S. (2015). Social media and medical education: Exploring the potential of Twitter as a learning tool. International Review of Psychiatry (Abingdon, England), 27(2), 140–146. https://doi-org.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/10.3109/09540261.2015.1015502