Abstract
This article contributes to an emerging field of ‘small data’ research on Twitter by presenting a case study of how teachers and students at a sixth-form college in the north of England used this social media platform to help construct a ‘community of practice’ that enabled micro-processes of recognition and mutual learning. Conducted as part of a broader action research project that focused on the ‘digital story circle’ as a site of, and for, narrative exchange and knowledge production, this study takes the form of a detailed analysis of a departmental Twitter account, combining basic quantitative metrics, close reading of selected Twitter data and qualitative interviews with teachers and students. Working with (and sometimes against) Twitter's platform architecture, teachers and students constructed, through distinct patterns of use, a shared space for dialogue that facilitated community building within the department. On the whole, they were able to overcome justified anxieties about professionalism and privacy; this was achieved by building on high levels of pre-existing trust among staff and by performing that mutual trust online through personal modes of communication. Through micro-processes of recognition and a breaking down of conventional hierarchies that affirmed students' agency as knowledge producers, the departmental Twitter account enabled mutual learning beyond curriculum and classroom. The significance of such micro-processes could only have been uncovered through the detailed scrutiny that a ‘small data’ approach to Twitter, in supplement to some obvious virtues of Big Data approaches, is particularly well placed to provide.
Highlights
Unlike other social network sites, such as Facebook or LinkedIn, Twitter was not originally intended primarily as a platform for community building, but as a tool for information dissemination (Gruzd, Wellman, & Takhteyev, 2011)
Conducted as part of a broader action research project that focused on the ‘digital story circle’ as a site of, and for, narrative exchange and knowledge production, this study takes the form of a detailed analysis of a departmental Twitter account, combining basic quantitative metrics, close reading of selected Twitter data and qualitative interviews with teachers and students
This emerged from a broader action research project that focused on the ‘digital story circle’ as a site of, and for, narrative exchange and knowledge production (Couldry et al, in press)
Summary
Unlike other social network sites, such as Facebook or LinkedIn, Twitter was not originally intended primarily as a platform for community building, but as a tool for information dissemination (Gruzd, Wellman, & Takhteyev, 2011). This article contributes to this emerging field of research on ‘social life on Twitter’ by presenting a detailed case study of how teachers and students at a sixth-form college in the north of England used Twitter to help construct a ‘community of practice’ (Wenger, 1998) It takes the form of a detailed analysis of a departmental Twitter account, drawing on Twitter data and interviews. Loureiro-Koechler and Butcher (2013) develop a three-layered conceptual model for community formation and convergence on Twitter according to which users gradually move from following others based on shared interest to friendship groups with close ties developed through offline and online interactions While such studies focus primarily on the form that communities take on Twitter, others have been more concerned with the construction of shared values and meanings, looking at how social bonds are achieved through users’ imaginative adaptation of platform-specific communicative conventions. The socially embedded use of Twitter (a medium with its own peculiar conversational properties) provides a rich testing ground for exploring the conditions for, and character of, a digital story circle as well as its potential to support mutual learning
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