RED HOT Twitter-verse

          Being new to Twitter, I had no idea what to expect.  You know when you’re faced with something new and you don’t quite know what to feel about it?  Should I be excited?  Should I be scared?  Am I going to like it?  Questions, questions, questions.  However, I found the most important question I was asking myself was, am I going to know what to do?  The truth is, I don’t know what to do and I’m slowly navigating this new form of social media.  I have to admit that I’m an avid Facebook user and this “Twitter” people speak of, is a mystery. 

          As I navigated my way through Twitter, I used the search box to locate the names of the people I was supposed to follow.  At this point, I assumed I was following their feed and not them literally.  I found the names and clicked the obligatory “Follow” button and was immediately receiving their recent posts.  The posts varied and some made complete sense to me while others were a bit strange, to say the least.

1.                  I noticed that Kathy Schrock @kathyschrock was enthusiastic about starting a new school year and posted a video of teachers breaking into a rendition of Les Miserables with a variation of lyrics.  Kathy mentioned that every school district should do this type of orientation at the beginning of the school year.  I liked that idea, but please no one ask me to sing. 

What every teacher opening day faculty meeting should be like! https://youtu.be/cGMlPDlY094  You set the bar high, @WDMCS!

            Linda Braun @lbraun2000 believes that there are educational purposes to games such as Minecraft.  It’s an interesting point to explore.  Tony Vincent @tonyvincent is an enthusiastic Twitter user that often incorporates “Tip Tuesday” to help his followers use different types of technology and tries to make things clearer for those of us that may not be as tech savvy.  Tony often tweets about apps that may be free on certain days and this allows followers to jump at the chance to try something new without having to pay for it.

          Buffy Hamilton @buffyjhamilton is a very outspoken Twitter user that often times does not mind posting that she is battling some ticks and I’m hoping they came from her dogs.  She often speaks out about the lack of funding, mistreatment of women, and sometimes tends to wander into tangents that have to do with weather or travel.  It was a refreshing page of funny quips, whether they were meant to be funny or not. 

          The Daring Librarian, love this name, @GwynethJones is a colorful page filled with loads of information for school teachers.  On the plus side, Gwyneth Jones has red hair just like me!  What I found most interesting is her retweet about park rangers being able to Skype with students.  I truly love this idea since we cannot travel to Yellowstone, but let’s bring Yellowstone to the classroom.  Completely awesome!

Did you know that @YellowstoneNPS Rangers can #Skype with classrooms? Find out more: http://msft.it/6013BHLwc  @SkypeClassroom #MSFTEDU

 

            Lastly, Jim Lerman @jimlerman posted a tweet that is near and dear to my heart.  He posted a tweet that shows how technology can help improve nature. 

Injured tortoise gets new face thanks to 3D printing store ^ ABC7 News ^ by Lindsay Watts http://sco.lt/7LDk8H 

Sometimes it’s hard to keep things in perspective when it comes to technology, but when some good can come out of it, I’m all for it. 

          I have to admit that I felt somewhat like a lurker, just lurking around these pages and hoping to find something I may have in common with these leaders.  I found that it’s impossible to say I like this person or that person when in reality, I don’t know them.  I’m learning about them, but how much can we truly learn from someone’s page or tweets?  I enjoyed reading their posts and I enjoyed finding out that some pages offered contests for free signed books.  It’s something that will definitely keep me interested.  Happy Tweeting!