First Teachablemoment Shoutout…Thoughts

As of this afternoon we are 127 members strong @teachablemoment. Everyone is trying to figure out how to use, make time for @teachablemoment and how to access from school, since Twitter is blocked in some school districts.

We had the first shoutout from @reuw from Israel. Unfortunately there were few responses at the time that he sent the request. The shout-backs started to /are still are trickling in after a few hours.

Here are thoughts some of us are struggling with:

1. Need/want to receive instant notification of tweet containing@teachablemoment
2. Don’t want to weed through all other Twitters, might miss shoutout or read hours later (too late to respond)
3. Will we need to send a shoutout to the network and give them a few minutes/hour time to read the twitter, prepare for skype talk, etc ?
4. Will we run the risk of not getting responses if we send no pre-warning? But isn’t that the idea of @teachablemoment? Being able to get a response at a moment’s notice. Right there and right then when a teachable moment is happening in your class???? That moment might be long gone, if we have to send a Twitter “Hey will someone be available in one hour…?”
5. How can we make sure that we have everyone in the group “covered” when there are giving a shoutout?

How can we make the concept of Quick-in/Quick-out teachable moments and demonstration of the power of the PLN workable.

Please let me know your thoughts.�

TeachableMoment on Twitter

It has been some amazing 2 days. On Saturday evening, I created the @teachablemoment twitter account. I let my network know about it through a blog post and through Twitter.

Then the followers started rolling in…

Then coolcatteacher announced it through a twitter…

That put us to almost 100. This morning� the 100th member to @teachablemomentstarted following.

Not that the arbitrarily chosen number of 100 means anything, but it should give us a good start of having a wide network around the world available committed to jump in at a moments notice to create teachable moments in our classroom and demonstrate the power of a Personal Learning Network (PLN)

Metaphors Continued

Another definition for Metaphor comes from the Compact Oxford English Dictionary

A figure of speech in which a word or phrase is applied to something to which it is not literally applicable

Metaphors help explain the world around us. I always have been fascinated by them. Maybe it helps me “feel” language better.

Caught on Twitter

“Seems like wet cement”
Meaning “Our steps aren’t washed away” (cburell) or “Use your time wisely and leave an imprint” (langwitches)

Some tech metaphors:

“Her face lit up like a light on a DSL modem”
The joy when your Internet connection works.

“You need to defragment”
when trying to clear you mind and think