Richard Craig – EngD Systems Thinking in Cyberdefence

Twitter, the social networking and microblogging service, has been the forum for teachers to discuss issues and topics within their profession and help with Continous Professional Development (CPD). While twitter is a 24×7 service, teachers meet online at a certain day and time and discuss a set topic with others. By including the hashtag #UKEdchat all twitter posts can be grouped to give an overview of the current discussion.

Lucy Tobin’s (@lucytobin) article ‘Twittering classes for teachers‘ provides a great introduction to the #UKEdchat group. It began when Colin Hill (@colport), a year 2 teacher at Birkdale primary school in Southport, saw US teachers tweeting about their work at a particular time every week. The UK group has formed due to the time differences between the UK and the original US group, #edchat. “The time difference made it tough to actively participate, but I was keen to attract UK educators to a similar chat session, discussing subjects and policies more related to our side of the Atlantic.” says Colin Hill.

Colin conducted an online poll to gage the best time to catch uk teachers and suggested the #ukedchat group meet online every Thursday between 8-9pm, with an overview of discussions being posted on a UKedchat blog (http://ukedchat.wordpress.com). “The impact has been amazing,” says Hill. “It’s surprising how colleagues from primary, secondary and beyond share similar issues or problems. “Each week  a volunteer moderator picks five questions for a poll on the UKEdChat website. Then over the course of an hour, teachers talk around the question, sharing best practice as they go, in what has been described by one participant as “Formula 1 CPD”.

“In addition to providing advice and examples of good practice, #ukedchat can also serve as a rapid introduction to some of the most interesting education twitterers around. An hour spent in the company of these practitioners will give the novice a great many ideas as to whom they might follow for regular suggestions and advice.” says Alastair Horne.

Online Collaboration

Alastair Horne writes about his trip to a BECTA (#BectaX) conference where the discussion focused on how technology might be used to create an environment in which teachers were encouraged and rewarded for continuous learning. The discussions lead to two key positives that already existed in the teaching community;

• Teachmeets, those informal but organised meetings in which teachers share good practice, particularly with regard to using technology. Alastair states that the consensus around them, at least in the group, seemed to be that they were exceptionally useful, but that they’d be far more effective if better attended, since it was often those who would benefit most from ideas and assistance who were notable by their absence.
• The other key positive was Twitter, and the way in which it too facilitated the sharing of best practice between teachers, by allowing them to swap ideas and links to useful tools quickly and publicly. Even more than teachmeets, though, Twitter tends to be the preserve of those already at least reasonably comfortable with new technologies.

#UKedchat helps teachers keen on CPD share best practice, http://ukedchat.wordpress.com

This led to probably the most realistic suggestion:  each newly-qualified teacher should be taught how to use Twitter, and given a list of tweeting teachers they might follow for advice and examples of best practice. New teachers would thus find themselves connected to good practitioners from the very start, while innovative teachers would have the opportunity to circulate their ideas beyond a sometimes small and already well-informed audience, in a kind of virtual teachmeet.

“I still get people wondering why I take part in CPD outside of normal hours, but you know what? #ukedchat and Twitter make me think a lot harder about my teaching than any course I’ve ever attended.” Ian Addison, http://ianaddison.net

“Twitter is a brilliant way of bringing innovative and inventive teachers together,” says Jackie Schneider (@jackieschneider), a primary teacher in Merton, south London. “Most schools have a really dull, top-down culture in which the senior management try to ‘manage’ learning. But on Twitter there’s a huge generosity of spirit where teachers help out complete strangers with lesson resources purely for the love of learning.” Jackie Schneider -  http://poplarday.blogspot.com

Glen Gilchrist, head of science at Newport high school, says he “instantly fell in love” with UKEdChat because “schools hold their cards close to their chest and LEAs [local education authorities] are inefficient at spreading good practice“. He explains: “I have Twitter running on my laptop all the time. When faced with a question about pedagogy during an ‘out of specialism lesson’, like maths, I tweet the question and within minutes have the answer. Whether you need inspirational classroom management techniques or want to discuss Bloom’s Taxonomy, there’s always an audience at UKEdChat.”

I tweet the question and within minutes have the answer

Just because this new technology is called ‘Social Networking’ and was initally used within the public domain, doesn’t mean that it is off limits during our working environment. Through the wider positive recognition of groups such as #UKedchat and of the teachers that participate in out of hours CPD, social media can move from a technology that is restricted or alien to teachers, to a dynamic tool for learning, development and support in real time. The use of technology should not be restricted by ‘Old ways of thinking’ and institutions need to be able to adapt to future trends to fully realise the possibilities. Educators need to lead by example and learn together to create the collective, and dynamic education system of the future..

A simple network such as Twitter could transform all aspects of education as staff turnover is reduced due to real time online support, staff recruitment and team integration times are reduced as teachers may already know each other from social networks and discussion forums, improved quality of education as ideas and best practice are disseminated from a number of international sources and available in real time, the list is endless. Why treat each school as a lone education citadel when it could be part of a dynamic (international) education community?