"Its a Conversation, Not a Lecture..."

In his article, How Twitter will Revolutionize Academic Research and Teaching , Ernesto Priego discusses how Twitter is playing a profound role in the new ways of sharing and receiving information from both the teacher and student. Priego discusses teaching, learning and social networks as "conversations, not lectures." This for me stuck out especially as a language teacher because I am able to understand learning and communicating in another language as a "2-way street", making it necessary for two parties to be involved. He continues his example by making the comparison saying it is not meant to be a "auditorium, but a seminar room." I think that by using hashtags, both teachers and students are able to share various things such as homework assignments for students who have missed class, questions that students may have, or even thoughts, concerns or reminders. One of the best features of a network such as Twitter is that it works in "realtime," constantly updating.
As I read the article, Losing Interest in Social Media , I couldnt help but wonder how I was going to talk about implementing Twitter and other social media sites in my classroom instruction. Afterall, the author uses an entirely sarcastic tone to rip apart the highly praised sites that glorify "friending" and "hashtags". He talks about removal of personalization and authentication of thought and education when we are all reduced to following "tweets" of 140 characters or less. In conclusion, I can see the use of Twitter for minor thoughts, sharing of useful websites, assignments, links to additional activities, or other places of interest, but leaving of more profound and substantial personal information to blogs and individual classroom websites.