1. Wordle and Twitter Mary Rose Bernas English Teacher/Media Specialist

3. What is a "Word Cloud"? Word clouds are colorful, attractive, visual representations of the content of a text. Words that appear most often in a text are largest in the cloud.

4. Why use word clouds with students and staff? Help visual learners Add variety to literacy strategies, and improve comprehension and critical thinking in accessible, engaging ways pre- and post reading activities revision activities vocabulary introduction and review test review character analysis prediction activity Finished products are engaging to the learner

5. Last -Minute Tips Tildes (~) can be used to surround multiple words so that the word cloud treats them as a single entity. Heavy, sans-serif fonts work best for readability of posters. Practice time~handout

6. Twitter

7. Twitter Terminology Tweet: an individual post RT (Retweet): re-telling a tweet @username: open message to a specific person (@ = address) Message: message to a follower #Hashtag: Use to group and track discussions (conference, seminar, class activity, etc.) The hashtag is helpful when you are at a conference-people will be posting about sessions, freebies, resources, etc.

8. Reasons to Use Twitter Professional: Networking, Personal learning Network (PLN), Teaching, Research, Collaborating, News, etc. Personal: Consumer tool, Hobby, Charity, Family, Friends, etc.

9. Who do I follow? Find one or two people who have similar interests Follow them Look at who they follow Follow the ones who look interesting to you. Some will instantly follow you.

10. Useful Resources 1) Tweet Deck: www.tweetdeck.com Desktop application to run and manage followers, tweets, and searches. 2) Apps for iPhone/Smartphone, iPads, and netbooks 3) Twitter Search: search for names, news, people, etc. 4) Bitly: www.bitly.com (Shorten websites to save room for your tweets)

11. Possibilities in the Classroom 1) Ask for recommended books, lesson ideas, or teaching tools. 2) Tweet about a useful web resource, a particular blog post, video, website, book, or product teachers would find useful. 3) Share new ideas or new studies with teachers. 4) Share your favorite teaching resource. 5) Follow an author, scientist, celebrity--pay attention to tweets.

12. Getting Started 1) Go to Twitter.com 2) Create a profile (add a pic later-people want to see you) 3) Search for people 4) Decide if you want to focus on a PLN 5) Follow people/organizations of interest 6) Send your first tweet 6) Enjoy! Questions? email: mbernas@bhsd228.com or msbernas145@gmail.com