TWITTER | ALN Teaching

The last few weeks have been some of the most interesting of my time working out here in Spain. My classes and I have been having fun with Quadblogging http://www.stgeorgesschoolmalaga.wordpress.com and my school group have become interested in the ideas behind Teachmeets.

It’s the school’s interest in Teachmeets that has really got me buzzing and pondering what we can do. Some background to the story first as I think it shows the power of being a Twitter Teacher on developing our practice and ideas.

I have always been interested in using technology in my teaching; I have been making student films for years, but last year I started to explore the potential of the Web with my students. I started with a 12 week website design project http://www.ilearnatstgeorges.tumblr.com I lifted the idea from an ICT teacher (Soren Hawes @tallislab ) at Thomas Tallis school in London www.tallislab.com . His online tutorials allowed me to learn how to use programmes like http://www.Weebly.com and http://www.Tumblr.com He also introduced me to a fun animation website called Xtranormal. My students did some great work and I was hooked into the concept of Web based teaching.

One significant development from the project, was my desire to use Blogging as a teaching tool for me to organise my course. During the website project, I began to use Tumblr to publish lesson plans, attempt some flipped classroom ideas, show off student work etc… I saw potential.

Since the start of this academic year my use of Web based teaching tools has significantly expanded. Most significantly I started to use the Twitter account I set-up 2 years previous. I started to follow education blogs and to my surprise I found some interesting things. I felt inspired to link my blogging to Twitter and started to Tweet myself. I hooked into Hashtags like #ukedchat and #edchat and found the flow of teaching philosophy inspiring… addictive!

In December 2012 I attended an InSET in Malaga with Peter Ford @peterford (www.notosh.com) He led us through an really interesting and dynamic day of Design Based Thinking combined with the well reasoned ideas for the use of ICT in our teaching. I got his message and went into overdrive. Twitter became even more important. This InSET also brought me into contact with another teacher from our school group – Mike Henderson @hendersonm_ict (Sevilla) He seemed to get the message as well and we set off to start a minor revolution within our schools. Could two teachers inspire others to up their ante and begin to share their teaching ideas.

Mike and I starting Tweeting away. We got a few colleagues to join…but we couldn’t quite make the rapid progress we wanted… that was until mid February and another InSET in Malaga, where neither Mike or I attended, but a certain Darren Gibbs @mrgibbenglish from Madrid did!

Darren is an inspiring and super enthusiastic individual. He is passionate about his subject, English, and he is using Web based programmes with incredible success and imagination, in his classroom. He is also someone who had got into the Teachmeet scene in Britain before he relocated to Spain. I got wind of his presence from a colleague who had attended the InSET. She said the day wasn’t that good apart from the bit at the end where Darren took over and started showing everyone what he was doing with computers in his classroom!

From that InSET Darren decided that he wanted to act upon the energy he had inspired and told everyone that they could all start sharing ideas via a Wiki-page… he instantly set one up and invited everyone he had met. Once I heard of this move, I was onto him like a flash…

“Hi Darren,” read the email, “I am Dave Fletcher from Malaga. I am an SEN Teacher here. I hear you are setting up a Wikipage. Can I join? Also, can I introduce you to Mike in Sevilla…”

Thankfully Darren was a true gent and immediately engaged Mike and I. Us three then set off on building the Wiki-page with some resources. Mike added reams of web-links and ideas and it was going very well… but still interest wasn’t hotting up.

In April 2013 Phil Whitehead @PhilWhitehead5 came to Spain to give an InSET session. Phil is head of the CPD/InSET programme with our school group. Before he arrived I decided to tip him off about our little wiki-page and Twitter work #stgeorgescpd – Luckily, Mike was also attending the training and he worked his magic on Phil… by the end of the one day course, Mike had published all the CPD notes on the Wiki website… and suddenly, there was interest… suddenly, teachers wanted to know about the wiki because their was something they need to see.

In May 2013, Darren Gibb pulled another masterstroke… he suggested the idea of Teachmeets to our Director our here in Spain. I think, much to his surprise, the idea was welcomed with open arms… infact it has been welcomed, celebrated and totally given 100% support. Mike, Darren and I met face-2-face for the first time last week… and we developed some excellent ideas on how we could take the teachmeet ideas forward. Our proposals have been welcomed once again with enthusiasm and we are due to meet again in the next few weeks.

We have a real sense that something special is happening, something alternative, something fresh… and do you know what… Twitter has played a significant part in bringing energy and belief to my work. There is a sense of nothing should stop this revolution… if you can call it that! In addition to this, it is obvious to me that Twitter has fuelled many other teachers to be inspired by Teachmeets, web based teaching and a load more things!