What is Twitter? Twitter is a website site where you have 140 characters to give your message. You follow people and they follow you.  So you can see each others messages. Messages are called Tweets! What is the purpose of Twitter? it allows you to connect instantaneously with people all around the globe to share ideas, resources, news and much more. Many educators have accounts on Twitter and a font of useful information, there are also news services such as the ABC that ‘tweet’ the latest news, celebrities that tell you what they are doing, airline companies, bands, cruise lines, churches, emergency services even Kevin Rudd. I have even seen a twitter account which tweets each earthquake in the world as they happen!

Twitter has also been an amazing resource for broadcasting the news before the news services get onto it. See my post here where I speak about the speed at which social media such as Twitter and Fazcebook had accurate news on the Korumburra Earthquakes!

So how do you use Twitter? Sue Waters has written an excellent post on a wiki which pretty much sums it up so I am not going to reinvent the wheel. So click here to go to the wiki post

My Twitter account is: ldumicich

Some interesting people to follow to get you started…

Kevin Rudd

David Hughes

Lifechurch.tv

ABC News

Getting started, follow some people that you know and some famous people/organisations. Start slowly or else you will be overwhelmed with info!

Some useful links for how it can be used in an educational setting….

Interesting ways to use Twitter int he classroom

New Tools Workshop – Twitter

Twitter for Learning

Twitter handbook for Teachers

History Teachers on Twitter

50 Ideas for using Twitter in Education

Twitter Transforms Teaching

Twitter Twitter Tweet Tweet

Welcome to Newsletter 8. It has been a long time since i have sent out an ICT newsletter for school so my apologies and I hope you enjoy the resources and ideas included here!

Library Links

• 14 Ways K-12 Librarians Can Teach Social Media – NeverEndingSearch – Blog on School Library Journal

  “This is the best time in history to be a teacher-librarian. Major shifts in our information and communication landscapes present new opportunities for librarians to teach and lead in areas that were always considered part of their role, helping learners of all ages effectively use, manage, evaluate, organize and communicate information, and to love reading in its glorious new variety.”

• Teaching Info.LiteracyTeaching Information Literacy Resources

Art Links

• Sumo Paint :: Online Image Editor :: HomeOnline paint tool!

• Art Activities and Lesson PlansLots of ideas and lesson plans for art

• Pointilism Practice Page!“Here’s a place to point and paint. Georges Seurat invented the technique known as Pointilism, which uses tiny dots instead of broad strokes to put the paint on the canvas. The individual dots of red, yellow and blue are sucked in through your eyes and mixed up in your head to create a variety of shimmering shades. “

English Links

• Comics LabComic generator

• A Kinesthetic Reading Adventure « Mr Robbo – The P.E GeekUsing QR codes to create a choose your own adventure novel

• Teacher Professional Development Sourcebook: The World’s Largest English Department“Ning group for English teachers reveals the potential of online social networking to break the culture of professional isolation.”

• 25 Free Sites to Teach Writing – The Writing Teacher – Tips, Techniques, and Advice on Teaching Writing“The web is a great resource for writing teachers who need lesson plans, writing prompts, interactive activities, high-tech tools, and other free teaching materials. Here are 25 sites that would be particularly useful to educators who teach writing.”

Junior School Links

• Kids Games – Play Educational and Fun Kids Games Online! Play Kids Games.“Play Kids Games provides free online kids games that are both fun and educational. Aimed at ages pre-K through middle school, Play Kids Games offers kids a safe environment to discover their abilities and learn new skills with interactive and fun computer games. Our games build skills in math, logic, memory, vocabulary, alphabet, spelling, geography, computer skills, color identification, shape identification and other various problem solving. Our commitment to parents, teachers, and kids, is to connect learning and skill building with a sense of challenge, fun, and self esteem. From the fun of “Alphabet Whack-a-Mole” to the skill building “Math Fact Practice”, our hope is that PlayKidsGames.com will be a part of our future generation’s ongoing experience and development. “

Maths Links

• Welcome to Absurd Math“Absurd Math is an interactive mathematical problem solving game series. The player proceeds on missions in a strange world where the ultimate power consists of mathematical skill and knowledge. Many of the pages have hidden clues and areas. Anytime a player needs help, they may email our staff for assistance.”

General E-Learning Links for everyone!!

• AuthenticICT – Web Based Tools

  “here is an absolutely exhaustive list digital tools available online. In fact it can actually get quite overwhelming at times. The trick is to find the few that suit you and best meet the learning needs of your class. My other suggestion is that you start out by focusing on just one tool at a time when you’re just starting out. It can be really easy to get carried away and try out everything! The ideas for use suggested below are really only a taster. There are so many possibilities out there and I’m sure you can think of many of your own. By playing with the tools and exploring the links, I hope you will begin to build your own list of ideas. “

• teachingwithted / FrontPage

  “TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design. It started out (in 1984) as a conference bringing together people from those three worlds. Since then its scope has become ever broader and it has begun releasing its talks online under a Creative Commons license so that they can be downloaded for free for non-commercial use. Their applications for education are endless. The purpose of this wiki is to share ideas how these talks can turn into broader discussions, projects, and actions. The intent of this project wiki is to address: How can the TED talks be used as springboards for further discourse, exploration, reflection, and action?”

• Thousands of FREE Presentations in PowerPoint format

  Stacks of Powerpoints for all different subjects!

• Posterous – The place to post everything. Just email us. Dead simple blog by email.

  A another blogging site, very simple to use, email based

• Australian Newspapers OnLine – index.html

  A list of all Australian newspapaers that are online.

• The Best Tools for Visualization

  “Visualization is a technique to graphically represent sets of data. When data is large or abstract, visualization can help make the data easier to read or understand. There are visualization tools for search, music, networks, online communities, and almost anything else you can think of. Whether you want a desktop application or a web-based tool, there are many specific tools are available on the web that let you visualize all kinds of data. Here are some of the best: “

• iPhone/iPod touch Apps for K-12

  “These pages include free or almost free apps for K-12 teachers and students. The list is by no means definitive, but I will add new content as it becomes available. “

• Flips&DigitalCams | Teaching and Learning in the Digital Age

  Lots of tips about using Flips!

For those of you that have blogs and Nings!!

• Best Embeds for Educational Wikis and Blogs | Making Teachers Nerdy

  “Now that you and/or your students are using wikis and blogs, are you curious what could be added to them? From animated slideshows to collaborative documents to interactive review games, many great (and free) tools are available. As a follow up to my previous post “What Teachers Should and Should Not Be Posting on their Classroom Webpages”, I’ve pulled a master list of embedding options that will hopefully spark your imagination. “