I’ve been working on using Twitter in my classroom this year, and one spontaneous benefit was helping to build a sense of community. One of our students had been gone for a while, while two other students were absent. One of my students said something about missing the absent students, so we decided to use the class hashtag (#MT4P) and let them know we missed them.
Below are some of the tweets (shared with student permission). I definitely like the vibe of inclusion present here. And it happened again today, with a few students gone. We sent them “missing you” tweets.
@IlincaUrziceanu @NicoleBostan #MT4P WE'RE HAVING A BLAST IN CHEMISTRY. WE MISS YOU. 😀 🙂
— Antonio Salameh (@AntonioSalameh1) February 26, 2014
#MT4P
In chemistry today we "accidentally" blew up the lab, you should have been here @NicoleBostan and @IlincaUrziceanu !
— Henry Parsons (@HenryParsons5) February 26, 2014
#MT4P @IlincaUrziceanu and @NicoleBostan feel better you guyss!((:
and welcome back Ejiroo! woopwoop
— Rhea (@rheaasthana) February 26, 2014
And one of the absent students responded with some thanks for the inclusion.
#MT4P So sorry that I missed the chem explosion. I'll hopefully 
return healthy by next week. Waiting for another blast by then 😀
— Nicole Bostan (@NicoleBostan) February 26, 2014
#MT4P class, so sweet of you to write those 'miss you' messages 🙂 Made me feel better!
— Nicole Bostan (@NicoleBostan) February 26, 2014
Do you use Twitter in your classroom? If so, what strategies do you implement to build community?
ThomsonScience 