Sometimes I feel like I have pressured all my friends into using social media for their science communication. Today I was talking to Kristin, who was apologetic about not having tweeted in a while and tried to excuse that by saying that she didn’t have anything interesting to tweet about right now because she is currently teaching a block course.

Of course I came up with a dozen interesting things she could tweet about if she wanted to, that I would actually love to read and respond to! Here is the blog post that sums up what she could tweet, sorted by for what purpose she might actually want to do it (other than getting me off her back, of course ;-)).

I am posting example tweets below, but for readability imagine that, wherever possible, she’s pointing out that she’s currently teaching a block course (and she’s doing that for the second time, so clearly she’s doing well enough that people wanted her back! Doesn’t hurt to broadcast that), on what topic (because that’s where she is a renowned expert, establishing her expertise online by providing insights that are helpful to others), the university that the course is happening at (tagging it on Twitter so they can retweet and give her more visibility).

1) Tweeting to get input to improve teaching or save prep time

Tweeting can actually be a great time saver when prepping teaching. Need a good graphic to illustrate a phenomenon, interesting reading assignments for your students, an intriguing application of some dry theory? Yes, all this stuff is perfectly fine to ask for on Twitter! Chances are that someone in your network has taught a similar course and has suggestions that might be really helpful

“Calling all your sea level specialists. How do you visualize that melting sea ice doesn’t contribute to sea level rise?” (Of course, she does have an experiment in her repertoire, this is just an example)

“Is there any graphic out there that does give a good representation of the upwelling part of the Great Conveyor Belt?” (This I am seriously considering Tweeting right now because I am wondering myself)

2) Tweeting to get advice or answers

Struggling with a student question or need advice on a teaching method? Ask on Twitter!

“Today, someone in my class on x asked y. Do you have any ideas where to even start finding answers to that question?”

“I would like to get some feedback on my class while I can still change things. Does anyone have any ideas how to do that?” (Yes — Continue, Start, Stop!)

“My students are having a hard time coming to terms with concept x. Any ideas how I can support their learning here?”

3) Tweeting to spark interesting discussions on a topic

When prepping a course, you usually come across interesting articles related to the field that you feel everybody should know about. Why not share interesting finds on Twitter? Other people might be grateful, and it might lead to discussions with people interested in the same topics as you are

“How did I not know about the article x by y at al.? They show how z is influencing sea level rise! [link to article]”

“I read up on topic x for my class and the article by y et al. is super fascinating!”

4) Tweeting to establish yourself as authority on your field, spreading interesting information

Sometimes, some of the interesting literature on your topic might actually be your own work. No harm in sharing how it relates to the topic you are teaching right now and how you integrate it!

“Today students read my article x on y as assignment during class and they prepared these summary posters! [Pictures of posters]”

“The project students worked on during my class today directly relates to my Research: they plotted x and discussed y! Here are some results [pictures]”

5) Tweeting to establish yourself as authority on teaching your topic, spreading interesting ideas

Surely she has come up with new and interesting teaching ideas specific to her topic, or maybe some that are transferrable to other topics. Share them on Twitter helps others and builds her credibility as a teacher!

“To help students understand x, I asked them to do y in class today, and here is a picture of their result!”

“Using method x, we investigated y in class and it went super well! Next time, I would only change z”

Or, an example that Kristin posted herself (see? It’s working! :-))

6) Tweeting to let people know you are around

If you are visiting a place to teach your topic, there are probably other people somewhere close by who might be interested in catching up with you. You might not even know they are around until you tweet that you are, they read it and respond!

“Bremen people — I will be teaching a class on sea level rise in May! Who’s around and wants to grab a coffee?”

 

So here you have it. Tons of interesting tweets related to her teaching, all of them actually contributing to interesting exchanges of knowledge and ideas on Twitter, none of them “just bragging”. Do you have more ideas what Kristin should be tweeting about that you would be interested in reading? Let us know in the comments below!