A month ago I submitted a blog post to http://www.teachersgoinggradeless.com, and was thrilled to have it accepted for publication.  (https://teachersgoinggradeless.com/2018/10/13/sesame-portfolios/)

In addition to this honour, I was also invited to co-host a Twitter chat, on the Sunday following its release date.  Although I had participated in Twitter chats, both slow and fast, I had never had the opportunity to plan and execute.

It was entirely enjoyable, mostly due to the guidance of my co-host, Aaron Blackwelder (       @AaronSBlackwel1). He introduced me to Tweetdeck, and shared a planning document that included all the steps we needed to take to prepare in the week beforehand.

We used Google docs to collaborate, and we worked through the week to brainstorm questions, put them in sequence, and confirm the flow of the hour. Aaron then placed each “tweet” in an image, so that both the image and text could be tweeted.

As co-host, I then “pre-wrote” a series of tweets, beginning with introductions, followed by six questions, and ending with a “thank you”.  With Tweetdeck, I was able to time each of them to appear according to plan.  I was also able to create my personal responses to each question as we’ll, and set them to be released during the conversation.  By using Tweetdeck, and I was then free to moderate:  respond, encourage, and keep the conversation going.

When the evening came, it was, as Aaron promised, a “whirlwind”.  As long as everyone included the #tg2chat hashtag, I could monitor all tweets using a search in Tweetdeck, and connect with everyone online.

I learned so much, both from the participants and from the process.  There were also some participants who were busy at the designated hour, and who joined in the next day by responding to each tweet with the #tg2chat hashtag.

Would you like to see how it happened?  Just search for #tg2chat, and scroll back to October 15, 2018.  All of our questions, and the responses from our chat participants, can be enjoyed now, a month later!

And if you like what you see, join #tg2chat this Sunday, and let’s get talking about “feedback”!