There has been much research in the use of social media to support learning and teaching. In many instances it is argued that it enables a decentralization of learning moving towards a distributed model which has many benefits including supporting a stronger foundation for lifelong learning. Twitter is one service that has been widely used within this context. The introduction of hashtags as a mechanism to allow communities to form and contribute to a topic is now a well established model within both formal and informal education as well as in society in general. The use of Twitter in this way removes boundaries extending the opportunities for co-learning, in particular, discussions can become less siloed, every contribution to a hashtag community is potentially another opportunity for someone else to join the conversation. The thinning of the walls in this way is not without it implications and the vulnerability of being a learner should never be underestimated. Another consideration is that Twitter has been adopted as a tool to support learning in this way rather than being designed for this purpose. As a result exploring and finding understanding within hashtag communities can be problematic and with many open learning contexts individuals can end up feeling lost. This conversation will explore approaches to help learners and educators gain more insight and a feeling of place within hashtag communities. As part of this we will look at TAGS and TAGSExplorer tools (https://tags.hawksey.info) which have been developed with educators and learners in mind to help support the collection, analysis and exploration of Twitter hashtag communities. These free tools provide a means to collect data from Twitter searches and analysis the results either in Google Sheets, where the data is collected, or visualized in the companion TAGSExplorer web interface. As part of this conversation we will touch upon the limitation of data collection from Twitter and issues around data protection and privacy. We will also provide some examples of where TAGS/TAGSExplorer has been used within an educational context.

1. Twitter in Education: Interactively exploring the
conversation with TAGS and TAGSExplorer
Martin Hawksey
@mhawksey
#TLCWebinar
Slides go.alt.ac.uk/TLCWebinarTAGS This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons
Attribution 4.0. CC-BY
mhawksey

2. alt.ac.uk
Outcomes
◊ Able to perform basic Twitter analysis techniques;
◊ understanding of the limitations and opportunities
of data from Twitter;
◊ *Inspire* you to do more
2@mhawksey

3. Why?
3
Image: CC-BY-NC-ND Tintin44
https://flic.kr/p/7oLZc5

4. alt.ac.uk@mhawksey 4

5. Education is changinging
@mhawksey 5
Image: CC-BY-ND Bryan Mathers
https://flic.kr/p/p2UJ5d

6. Connected now…
©EDUCAUSE
http://vimeo.com/76178422

7. @mhawksey Image credit: http://edtechreview.in/images/Daily/E-Learning/twitter_learning_tool.jpg

8. What’s happening …
@mhawksey 8
ActivePassive
Dialogic
Transmission

9. In-class Backchannel
Uses: ad hoc class discussion,
real-time commenting, recording
divergent viewpoints
Benefits: engages less vocal students,
archives otherwise ephemeral
comments
Outside of Class Discussions
Uses: extend class discussions,
exchange comments about readings
or questions about assignments
Benefits: community building,
continuity between class sessions
In-class Directed Discussion
Uses: Open or guided questions with
student responses collected for later
analysis
Benefits: engages all students in
discussions in large lecture classes
Tracking Activities
Uses: find and follow instructor
experts in the field, or key topics
Benefits: exposure to the lager
cultural conversation about the class
material
Lightly Structured Activities
Uses: solicit course feedback, offer
ambient office hours, poll class,
language or writing practice
Benefits: flexibility, availability,
scalability
Metacognitive/Reflective Activities
Uses: students report on self
learning, articulate their difficulties,
recap the most valuable lesson of the
day
Benefits: fosters critical thinking
Institutional communication
Uses: community outreach, alerts,
announcements
Instructor Communication
Uses: announcements, syllabus
changes, reminders
Pedagogical Communication
Uses: sharing timely links and
resources
Student Activity
DialogicTransmission
Passive Active
Mark Sample’s Twitter Adoption Matrix
@mhawksey 9

10. vulnerability
©Alec Couros
https://flic.kr/p/64ZQkd

11. Patterns are
…left behind
Courtesy Marc Smith
http://www.slideshare.net/Marc_A_Smith/2013-nodexl-social-media-network-analysis11

12. alt.ac.uk
Twitter Search
12@mhawksey

13. alt.ac.uk13@mhawksey

14. @mhawksey 14

15. Lets interface … {API}Image credit: CC-BY-NC nikki
https://flic.kr/p/5d59EW

16. alt.ac.uk
Twitter Search API – Single tweet
16@mhawksey

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Twitter Search API Limits
◊ Data from last ~7-9 days
◊ Last 18,000 tweets for search term
◊ Developer ‘Rules of the Road’ on storage
17@mhawksey

18. alt.ac.uk@mhawksey 18
Twitter Archiving Google Sheet

19. alt.ac.uk19

20. alt.ac.uk20@mhawksey

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Google Sheet benefits
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Going further… TAGSExplorer
22@mhawksey

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Breaking the cell
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Activity
Worksheet - go.alt.ac.uk/TAGSSetup
Note: Links are case sensitive
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25. alt.ac.uk
SocioViz
@mhawksey 25

26. alt.ac.uk@mhawksey
nodexl.codeplex.com
26

27. alt.ac.uk
Summary
◊ Able to perform basic Twitter analysis techniques;
◊ Understanding of the limitations and
opportunities of data from Twitter;
◊ *Inspire* you to do more
27@mhawksey

28. alt.ac.uk28
https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/social-media-analytics
@mhawksey
STARTS 20 AUGUST

29. alt.ac.uk
Worksheet - go.alt.ac.uk/TAGSSetup
Slides - go.alt.ac.uk/TLCWebinarTAGS
Note: Links are case sensitive
Thank you!
@mhawksey+MartinHawksey
29@mhawksey

30. Association for Learning Technology
Registered charity number: 1063519
www.alt.ac.uk @A_L_T