The Starter Guide to Twitter Hashtags in Education

A blog from Osiris Educational

The Best Educational hashtags to follow

The Starter Guide to Twitter Hashtags in Education

Osiris Educational's Top Educational hashtags to follow

 

 

 

According to data released by Twitter there are now 200 million active Twitter accounts, and 17% of these active users are from the UK!  At a “guestimate”, as Twitter users do not have to state their nationality, there are roughly 35 million UK active Twitter users, and growing.

The education industry is an exciting place to be on Twitter – and the size of teachers, leaders and educators active on the social media platform continues to grow.  With Teachmeets becoming more popular across the UK and this year’s London Festival of Education trending worldwide on Twitter, we have to ask ourselves ‘is it really just the generation Z that are going to lead the way as digital communication experts?’

Whether you are a #tweacher (teacher who tweets) or new to the world of Twitter all together, over the next few weeks, here at Osiris Educational, we will be guiding you through this ever evolving world of social media.  We’ll show you how you can get the most out of social media as an educator, by adapting policies for safety, how to create social media policies for schools, set up education blogs and ensure online privacy.

To get you started we have created a list of some of the most useful and interesting education conversations happening online with a list of the top education hash tags.

Firstly I hear you ask, ‘What is a Hashtag?’

The simple answer is, a hashtag is a word or a phrase preceded by a “#”

What’s it used for?

With millions of Tweeters in the digital world it can become a very noisy place and hard to find a topic, and person, that you are interested in following. But by using the “#” directly before a word you create a searchable term which will automatically reach anyone who monitors that term.
For example, Andy Griffith and Mark Burns, experts in Outstanding Teaching, have recently created the #OutstandingTeaching hashtag, and use this when tweeting about anything relating to it.  If I wanted to see what had been tweeted about Outstanding Teaching I would simply search #outstandingteaching and if I wanted to tweet something about it, and wanted it to be seen by others interested in Outstanding Teaching, I would include the hashtag in my tweet.  

 

Top 10 Twitter Education Hashtags to Get Started

#ukedchat – UK Education- Join #ukedchat every Thursday between 8-9pm for educators’ Twitter chat. Vote which topic you would like to be discussed prior to a session at http://ukedchat.com.

#TeachMeet– A TeachMeet is an informal gathering of like-minded teachers coming together to present to, and learn from, one and other’s classroom practice; including practical innovations and personal insights in teaching. Follow this hashtag to find out about upcoming events. (To find individual Teachmeet hashtags being used for individual events see the Teachmeet directory)

#edchat– This is used by educators across the world and is really useful if you are interested in tweeting to the international educational community.  This is used regularly by teachers in the USA.

#ukedtech – UK technology in education.  This is a hashtag to follow for all general education technology related subjects; from iPads in the class room to Apps for marking.

#SLTchat – Senior Leadership Team Chat (Mainly in the UK) forum for ALL Teachers & Business Managers interested in UK school leadership. To follow the conversation be online Sundays at 8-8.30pm, to see future topics go to  http://teachertoolkit.me/sltchat-forum

#visiblelearning– Professor John Hattie and Visible learning updates and information.

#Education – All things education, but useful to monitor general education news and updates.

#Teaching Generally used for information and conversations directed at teachers, also used when posting teaching jobs – if you’re looking for your next move this is one to watch.

#addcym – Welsh language for Education chat on Twitter

#TTTeacher Tuesday; where educators suggest to others new people, groups or organisations to follow on Twitter, this may be the first step to finding fellow teachers online…

This is a snap shot of some general education hashtags being used on twitter, if you’d  like to add your favourite hashtags please comment below and we’ll make sure we add them to the list or contact us @osirisedu


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