Today we had to do a search for hashtags, handles, and blogs in class. Making us aware of how Twitter has impacted their social lives were Dr. Christine Younghusband @christineyh and Ian Landy @technolandy.

After they talked to us about how Twitter and Twitter chats are being used to drive their professional network and their professional learning we broke out into groups to increase our Twitter Footprint. To do this we were tasked with finding some Twitter hashtags, handles, and blogs to follow.

I found this fairly overwhelming. Too much information can be daunting. There seems to be a lot of interesting sites out there, but sorting the interesting sites out from the noise is pretty overwhelming. An then, when you do sort out the sites, their posts seem to get buried in my Twitterfeed. I am going to setup either Tweetdeck or Hootsuite soon to help me manage the content of my Twitter account

What did I find in the short time…..a lot, but not a lot. The ones we listed are:

Hashtags:

  • #blendedlearning – seems like an interesting feed about blended tech and strategies.
  • #blendtech – this is actually just about blenders
  • #mathchat – seems interesting and focused more on specific math teaching and educator
  • #scichat – seems interesting and focused on science teaching and students
  • #whatitaughttoday – literally teacher samples of what they taught today. Think pintrest for Twitter.
  • #asechat – association for science education. Seems fairly interesting.

Most of these hashtags came from https://www.teachthought.com/twitter-hashtags-for-teacher/

Twitter Handles

  • @cecelia_reekie – Member of the Haisla Nation; Former Trustee for SD#35; now a Cultural Presenter with SD#35; willing to present to Organizations, Schools etc on Reconciliation!
  • @indspire – Indigenous registered charity that invests in the education of Indigenous people. This page is monitored Monday to Friday, 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m./ EST
  • @solangelalonde – inquisitive, reflective, and especially passionate about the transformative power of education. Senior Project Manager, Curriculum and Learning @Moodle

We did not manage to find any blogs in the time. Although following through some of the threads, I was able to come across blogs, just none that I am interested in at this point.

I could see myself going down this rabbit hole and it sucking too much of my time. A large part of my personal PL, outside of my night time reading, comes from listening to podcasts while I run. I am not sure where I can fit a complex network like Twitter into my life. I see the benefits, and will give it a try, but I can really see it being a consumption of my time.