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EDUCATOR COMMUNITIES of PRACTICE on TWITTER by JOHN

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EDUCATOR COMMUNITIES of PRACTICE on TWITTER by JOHN EDUCATOR COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE ON TWITTER by JOHN MARK COLEMAN MARGARET L. RICE, COMMITTEE CHAIR BECKY ATKINSON ANGELA BENSON ALAN WEBB VIVIAN H. WRIGHT A DISSERTATION Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Educational Leadership, Policy and Technology Studies in the Graduate School of The University of Alabama TUSCALOOSA, ALABAMA 2018 Copyright John Mark Coleman 2018 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ABSTRACT As Twitter became a popular platform for social networking, educators began to utilize the platform for professional networking. Educators began to utilize the hashtag #edchat to denote their ongoing and growing conversations on education subjects. Educational institutions began to require teachers to participate in the platform or granted continuing education credits for their participation. To determine if such sanction is merited, a qualitative exploration of the network of educators on the Twitter platform was performed. Three primary theories were used as a lens for exploration of the community. The first was social capital, where benefits are accrued by social interactions. Mark Granovetter’s strength of weak ties, where a community becomes linked by tangential relations of its members was the second lens for exploration. Finally, Etienne Wenger’s concept of the Community of Practice, where a body of collective knowledge and best practices emerge from a community gathered around a specific topic, was used to explore the network. Posts to Twitter containing the #edchat hashtag were collected and a survey instrument was disseminated with the #edchat hashtag. Collected posts and their linked content were coded according to their content. Demographic qualities of the participants in the #edchat community were addressed as well as questions arising from coding, such as the nature of retweeting and the role of commercial entities in the community. From these codes a set of distinct categories of #edchat Twitter posts were analyzed and discussed. The themes of these posts were determined and related to the literature. The survey instrument allowed exploration of motives and perceived ii impact of #edchat participation, and how these perceptions related to the themes of the collected posts. Participants in the #edchat conversations were found to be generating social capital and binding a community together through the weak ties of brief interactions. A Community of Practice was found to exist in the collected #edchat posts and survey respondents. Further research on methods to cultivate this community as platforms evolve, as well as the demonstrable effect on teaching and learning is recommended. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The completion of this dissertation would not have been possible without the continued love and support of my wife, Heather, and my two sons, Liam and Simon, who have been most understanding of the time I have spent buried behind the laptop since starting my Ph.D. work. My late father urged and encouraged me to begin this journey and I would not be where I am today without him. My professors at The University of Alabama have been a profound influence on me over the last half decade. The Instructional Technology program they have created exceeded my expectations. Dr. Margaret Rice, my dissertation committee chair, and Dr. Angela Benson, also on my committee, have taught a bulk of my graduate coursework and never ceased to make it interesting, compelling, and challenging. Dr. Vivian Wright has inspired me with both her amazing intellect and attention to detail and always given advice, suggestions, and notes that pushed me to make things better. The final two members of my committee, Dr. Becky Atkinson and Dr. Alan Webb, both inspired a love of qualitative research within me and this dissertation would have been much different without them. Finally, I would like to thank my friends, extended family, and friends who seem like family for their ongoing encouragement every single day of this process. iv CONTENTS ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................................... ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ............................................................................................................. iv LIST OF TABLES ....................................................................................................................... viii LIST OF FIGURES ....................................................................................................................... ix CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................................1 Statement of the Problem .....................................................................................................4 Statement of Purpose ...........................................................................................................5 Significance of the Problem .................................................................................................5 Theoretical Frameworks ......................................................................................................6 Research Question ...............................................................................................................7 Methods................................................................................................................................7 Assumptions .........................................................................................................................7 Limitations ...........................................................................................................................8 Operational Definitions of Terms ........................................................................................9 Summary ............................................................................................................................10 CHAPTER II REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE ..............................................................11 Strong and Weak Ties ........................................................................................................13 Social Capital .....................................................................................................................15 Communities of Practice ....................................................................................................18 Twitter as a Community of Practice ..................................................................................23 v #edchat ...............................................................................................................................26 Summary ............................................................................................................................28 CHAPTER III METHODOLOGY ................................................................................................29 Setting ................................................................................................................................29 Participants .........................................................................................................................30 Instrumentation ..................................................................................................................30 Data Collection ..................................................................................................................32 Data Analysis—Collected Tweets .....................................................................................33 Coding ................................................................................................................................34 Data Analysis—Surveys ....................................................................................................55 CHAPTER IV RESEARCH FINDINGS ......................................................................................58 Captured Tweets ................................................................................................................58 Status Posts ........................................................................................................................63 Memes ................................................................................................................................65 Questions and Assistance ...................................................................................................70 Chat Promotion and Follow Friday....................................................................................73 Offline Content Sharing .....................................................................................................77 Online Content Sharing......................................................................................................78 Online Content Sharing: Reflection ...................................................................................80 Online Content Sharing: Philosophy .................................................................................81 Online Content Sharing: News ..........................................................................................83 Online Content Sharing: Tools and Practices ....................................................................85 Online Content Sharing: Student Work .............................................................................91
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