Twitter is one of the up and coming cool web based applications. It’s a bit of an odd site. You type in short phrases or “tweets” about what you’re doing (“On the phone.” “Doing laundry.” “Gotta mark exams.”) and then friends, family, acquaintances or even total strangers have the chance to read them and respond. It all feels a little nosey to me, and even a a bit voyeuristic. Despite this, it’s a great way to keep in touch with friends and other people on the Internet that might catch your interest.
Twitter could be useful in an educational setting, especially if you’re working in distance ed with students in multiple locations. The kids could keep in easy touch with each other, post questions, and get nearly immediate feedback from their classmates.
The big problem with Twitter from an educational point of view is that everything that happens is very public. When you’re dealing with students under 18 who sometimes (despite your best efforts as the teacher) post inappropriate or revealing details about themselves, public is something you can’t afford your class chatter to be.
WordPress, the world’s greatest blogging software comes charging in to the rescue. The folks at Automattic who developed Twitter have also developed a new theme for it. Prologue turns your regular blog into a remarkable imitation of Twitter. The difference is that you decide who can be a member of your own private Twitter and therefore who posts.
While you can decide who posts, your discussions are still public and you probably don’t want that either. There is still hope, because there’s a nifty little plug-in that can make your blog totally private so registered users only can see what’s posted on your blog.
If you get the Prologue theme and the privacy plug-in all set up (and it’s not too hard if you’re a tiny bit of a computer geek, or if you have one handy you can impose on), you then have your own, private version of Twitter for whatever nefarious ends you might have.