Melissa led us in freewriting after reading Terry Tempest Williams excerpt "Why I Write" from Creative Non-fiction. I write because I am meant for expression. I am meant to share, to talk, to write. Therefore...I tweet.
Today is the second day of the Summer Institute. Last night I went home at 5:00 p.m. This is the first year, in four years of facilitating, that I didn't feel like there was "something pressing to do for the next day." It felt good to go home to my porch, enjoy the outdoors of the Ozarks for a little bit. Take a walk with my dog, grab dinner with a friend, and then, once I got home, I felt inspired to read, to write, to look at our schedule and see what's ahead. Instead though, I tweeted.
This is the first summer institute with live tweeting for the OWP, and it's been fun to experience. Actually, it's my first SI with live tweeting anywhere. I've been tweeting since December of '08, but didn't actively follow my Twitter account until October of '09. This opened up a whole new world of professional learning for me. Twitter is my space, and I'm away from my students. I was a Facebook teacher for many years, and still am, but Twitter has become my place for learning, and reading, and getting a grasp on what's happening in the world around me. Twitter is a place where I can follow people with the same like-mind. I read what they are writing, I read what articles online they are sharing. They read about the weather in Colorado and what's for dinner in Kansas City. But, it's more than just that. The social network aspect isn't what keeps me tweeting. In fact, I find myself deleting tweeters who only update about their social lives. Mostly, it's because I can find those updates on Facebook. However, tweeting an online article about paperless classrooms, or writing instruction, or technology in the classroom, or grading without letter grades, those are the articles that keep me going back to twitter. I can search anything with the hashtags, but I admit my tags for the last few months have only been writing project related as this is my professional learning community and I have a deep trust and commitment to those who have participated in writing project events around the nation.
And...time's up...more to come tomorrow I'm sure.
