Digital Dates: Making the most of Twitter

Michelle Schneider,

Academic Skills Development Officer, Skills@Library.

Today’s session

Twitter & You

• Being a savvy Tweeter from the start

Twitter in Learning & Teaching

• From a staff perspective

• From a student perspective

Twitter and employability

• Get a career

• In a career

What is it?

Twitter is a Web 2.0 social networking tool that allows users to send and receive short messages known as tweets.

Each Tweet is140 characters & can include videos, photos and links

Twitter is a conversation!

Some interesting stats…

Over

140 million

active Twitter accounts

Over

175 million

Tweets a day

About

1 million

accounts added daily!

Statistics from 2012, All Twitter: http://www.mediabistro.com/alltwitter/twitter-stats-2012_b30967

What’s the point?

By following other people and sources you are able to build

up an instant, personalized Twitter feed that meets your full range of interests, both academic and personal.

(LSE Public Policy Group 2011)

It's also a way to engage, connect, collaborate and network with others that share your personal, professional and academic interests

(Me 2013)

“”

“ ”

Twitter & YouBe a savvy Tweeter from the

start!

1. Add a bio…but not just any bio!

What does it say about you?

Why should someone follow you?

2. Follow and get followed by the right people!

Follow people you are interested in and you want to be followed by!

See who the people you follow,

follow!

Talk to people! (even if they’re not

following you). Retweet & reply!

3.Be interesting and be yourself…to a point

SMITH, E. 2013. Be good at social media without trying: A guide for people who don’t have all day to post stuff . [online]. [Accessed 14 March 2013]. Available from: http://edudemic.com/2013/02/the-busy-persons-guide-to-social-media/

Consider balancing the types of Tweets with a ratio of posts

addressing: (1) What you do; (2) What you love; and (3) Who you

are. (Smith, E. 2013).

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4. Use the power of the hashtag #• A great way to start or engage in conversation- you don’t have to follow or be followed by

people in the conversation• Opens you up to a much wider audience

Summarise discussions into a report if you want a permanent record…

Summarised into a report: http://www.tweetcategory.com/

Track a hashtag….

5. Think about how you are presenting yourself

• Consider whether you want two separate accounts• Do you want to make your personal account private?

Personal and Professional

• Think about how you could be perceived by employers, they check social media accounts!

• Don’t criticise/abuse lecturers, students, employers, the University

Online persona and reputation

• Your Tweets could potentially be seen by millions of people if you use hashtags/are Retweeted

• Consider the implications of a private account

Privacy settings

• Who are you aiming your Tweets at?• Think about tone as well as content

Know your audience

Making the most of Twitter in learning & teaching

Learning and teaching

Staff

Student

BothSet up a module account e.g. SOEE2212

Set weekly discussion topics #usehashtags

Ask students to sum up a short article or chapter

Follow your modules

Ask questions and share ideas with other students

Use in student projects and set up a project hashtag

Tweet links to your content-articles etc/ Tweet links to other peoples’ content.

Develop skills: quick evaluation and selection skills; succinct writing skills

Share thoughts/ideas/ask questions

Follow relevant organisations and keep up-to-date in your field

1h

2h

3h

4h

5h

Follow your Uni/School/ Service e.g. @UniversityLeeds

4hFollow academic journals for new articles

2hTrack or Tweet from conferences (using hashtags)Use backchannel communication

in lectures

Ideas and inspiration

Academic Excellence in 140 Characters: http://bit.ly/aF4VLq

Using Twitter in university research, teaching and impact activities (LSE):http://bit.ly/n07Wvb (also covers setting up an account & terminology)

Spotlight on Social Media (SDDU): http://bit.ly/Yyclfs

7 things you should know about backchannel communication:http://bit.ly/ceGz1z

Study skills connected (book for students about using technology to support Your studies, includes a section on Twitter): EBL Level 8, Skills B-5 COT

Making the most of Twitter for employability

Some advice from Jess Henderson, University of Leeds Careers Adviser...

Careers workshops for students: http://careerweb.leeds.ac.uk/

Policies and guidance

University policies

Communications: http://comms.leeds.ac.uk/

Social media code of practice and guides coming soon! Including:• General social media guidance• Context guides: student

education, research • Platform guides (including

Twitter)

Help and guidance

Twitter help centre:https://support.twitter.com/

Skills@Library: http://library.leeds.ac.uk/skills-learning-in-a-digital-age

Careers centre:http://careerweb.leeds.ac.uk/

SDDU: http://www.sddu.leeds.ac.uk/

There’s an app for that!

Photo by DavidMartynHunt: http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidchief/7081464339/