Tweeting Your Way to Improved #Writing, #Reflection, and #Community

Abstract

Economics appears to be lagging behind other fields in the adoption of Web 2.0 technologies in the classroom. Twitter is an online microblogging utility, permitting posts of up to 140 characters called tweets. The utility is rapidly making its way into secondary and post-secondary classrooms as a complement to traditional instruction and an active learning tool. This paper describes how Twitter was employed as a complement to traditional lecture in a small macroeconomics principles course; the instrument is applicable to courses at any level. The brevity of the tweets forces students to express their thoughts concisely and is believed to develop reflection and writing skills while expanding the class community.