My first Ignite presentation (that is presenting 20 slides, 15 secs a slide, auto advance, 5 minutes in total) to share my passion with my audience about Twitter. I'm glad it wasn't recorded because I messed up around slide 6, but I added the script here so you can see that a lot can be said in 5 minutes. It was a fun challenge as it took me out of my comfort zone... much to be said about that :)

1. That old
familiar
tweet…
tuit
twiittini
Tweetjeim
Твитт
I’m Enza, twitterize me & you get iVenus. My pointless babble, conversations and news are about technology and books, based on
circumstantial evidence of course. I share this information cheerfully, with my geeky grin. Ah, that old familiar tweet…

2. We are what we tweet… The top 5 moments in the US indicate we tweet a lot when we watch TV. What does that say about us
culturally…think about it. If we are what we tweet, are Americans couch potatoes?

3. According to Twitter’s privacy info tip What you say on Twitter may be viewed all around the world instantly. You
share it publically to your following. Hmmm, Tell me who you follow…

4. So who do we follow…not surprisingly celebrities. Is celebrity stalking, via their self-obsessive sound bites, is as important to stars
as the Milton Berle show was to Elvis’, or the Ed Sullivan show to the Beatles? We can get info in real time nonstop. As my 10yo
daughter says…don’t let your children on Twitter (PS they must be 13 yo to have an account)

5. We’ve seen the top 5 tweeting moments (what) and top 5 tweeps (who). Is that newsworthy…yes and no! The medium
becomes the message…. Traditional news sources reporting about what happens on Twitter! Ah, if only the mild-
mannered Marshall McLuhen could tweet ;)

6. Twitter’s 2012 numbers are staggering! People from around the globe tweet night & day, always on, always connected.
we have access to global Twitter moments in over 61 languages. As language teachers, how do we harness this?

7. I have been using Twitter to learn Spanish. What a resource! There are 2.5 M hispanic americans who prefer to tweet
in spanish!. But I can also learn from Beatriz in Mexico City, Luis in Honduras, Yoani in Cuba, Pam in Argentina, eraser
in Seville & Pedro in the Canary Islands

8. Daily this 3rd party app, I have my Spanish tweets nicely laid out for me in a traditional looking e-paper, so I can
read, learn, explore and share. My content is organized so I can easily “study” Culture sections in textbooks can’t
compete!

9. Using Twitter for Spanish is too predictable, you say? Let’s look at the other languages, in all major writing systems.
Remember what Ferdinand deSaussure’s said about the arbitrary nature of language … doesn’t matter how you spell it a tweet
is a tuit, is a twittini, tweetjaim, twitt

10. My tweeting students or my STWudents, if you will, could theoretically follow experts (native Italian speakers)
-they can share whatever: themselves, what they know about Italy, Italians, ItaloAmericans;
- they can chat and learn from whomever they choose

11. Twitterers can:
Micro-blog about what they
are doing (learner written
output)
Read what others are doing
(learner’s comprehensible
input)
Communicate directly with
someone they are following
(negotiation of meaning)
Chapelle (1998)’s theory of good interaction underlies my research. Twitter maximizes opportunities to create tasks
for good interaction with a communicative objective: content is in authentic context, and the tasks generate
communication and require meaning to be negotiated.

12. Twitterers
interpret input
produce output
engage in
conversations Tweets are
self-perpetuating
generative
authentic
It’s organic… those who enjoy tweeting don’t need prompts or encouragement from the teacher

13. Teacher/Res Italians
earcher 25% 14%
Students in
other
sections 15%
Classmates
46%
My students tweeted with whom? In the two classes that participated in the study, mostly they chatted with
their classmates. But they didn’t stop there…initially I encouraged conversations

14. To rank students perceptions of learning Italian with Twitter
-Helped build their confidence in writing italian/ -Made the course more interesting, raising motivation / -Increased their
knowledge of grammar & vocabulary / -Increased their cultural awareness

15. I <3 overachievers!
Posted 324 tweets from Sept. to
Dec. 2008 (required to post only
60!)
Was is really such a positive experience? This student isn’t an italian major but is a bilingual twitterer, even now
almost 4 years later. She was introduced to twitter in my class and took flight to be a twegend, exceeding expectations
by 400%!!

16. Since twitter is real-time updates, we should allow our students to take advantage of tweeting wherever and whenever. I love
it when students tweets from trains/buses, the gym and other classes (eeps!)…Don’t limit foreign language tweeting to the
classroom!

17. Have them Have them tweet
brainstorm ideas without prompts
and post them for Have them
feedback investigate/search
Use polls and topics related to
hashtags to get syllabi
instant feedback Have them investigate
Have them ask language use to build
questions and get vocabulary
feedback from a Have them post a
larger community photo and describe it
of experts
Suggestions for using twitter in and out of the classroom. Contact time has a different dynamic (Reynol Junco’s 2011
study). Going beyond the classroom helps learning occurs intersticially, during pauses in the daily routine

18. Twitter does have a place in education, with analogous concepts of input, output, negotiation presented here
according to degree of difficulty. This spectrum is just a sampling of possibilities for Twitter for teaching and learning.

19. In my 5 minutes, about 1500 new twitter accounts were opened and approximately ½ million tweets were posted.
See, I’m not the only one passionate about twitter!

20. Enza Antenos-Conforti
a.k.a. iVenus
a.k.a. the “mother” of foreign language twitterers*
Professor of Italian
Chair, Academic Technology Committee
Montclair State University
Twitter:@iVenus
Slideshare: slideshare.net/iVenus
Mail: antenosconfe@mail.montclair.edu

21. Sources
Twitterize Me [INFOGRAPHIC] created at http://visual.ly/twitter
Just How Big Is Twitter In 2012? [INFOGRAPHIC]
http://www.mediabistro.com/alltwitter/twitter-statistics-2012_b18914
Twitter Bird Logo (png) http://www.publicatufoto.com/img2350.htm
Twitter Bird on Books (image credit) http://www.distance-
education.org/Articles/Top-75-College-Education-Tweets-133.html
How Many US Hispanics on Twitter
http://socialmediaspanish.com/blog/how-many-us-hispanics-on-
twitter/
I’m Learning Spanish Daily http://paper.li/iVenus/learning-Spanish
Are We Wired For Mobile Learning? [INFOGRAPHIC]
http://voxy.com/blog/index.php/2011/02/are-we-wired-for-mobile-
learning/
10 Ways That Mobile Learning Will Revolutionize Education
http://www.fastcodesign.com/1669896/10-ways-that-mobile-learning-
will-revolutionize-education
25 Ways To Use Twitter In The Classroom, By Degree Of Difficulty
http://edudemic.com/2012/03/25-ways-to-use-twitter-in-the-
classroom-by-degree-of-difficulty/
60 Seconds - Things That Happen On Internet Every Sixty Seconds
[Infographic] http://www.go-gulf.com/blog/60-seconds
Antenos-Conforti, Enza. 2009. “Microblogging on Twitter: Social
Networking in Intermediate Italian Classes” in The Next Generation:
Social Networking and Online Collaboration in Foreign Language
Learning. Calico Monograph Series, No. 9 Edited by Lara Lomicka and
Gillian Lord. pp. 59-90.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2202963/mytwitter.pdf