Some general comments on the "Twitter Experiment"
by Monica Rankin (UT Dallas)
There has been a lot of interest in the "Twitter Experiment" video posted by Kim Smith chronicling my U.S. History class at U.T. Dallas and our use of twitter in the classroom. I have fielded a number of inquiries from educators across the United States and even overseas who are interested in finding ways to use social networking in an educational setting. This write-up is intended as an informal summary of my use of twitter in the classroom. I hope it will help to clarify my experience and I welcome additional questions and commentary, particularly suggestions for how to improve this type of classroom interaction.
The History Engine is an educational tool that gives students the opportunity to learn history by doing the work-researching, writing, and publishing-of a historian. The result is an ever-growing collection of historical articles or "episodes" that paints a wide-ranging portrait of life in the United States throughout its history and that is available to scholars, teachers, and the general public in our online database.
I hope this site helps you place today's current events into a greater historical context. Each map is well-researched and based in fact, and none of the work is meant to be biased or political. No spin or opinion, just fact-based conclusions about the history of war.
Maps-of-War is created by a Flash-Designer hobbyist and professional history- buff. Enjoy your visit and feel free to save or share our work for your own use!
Kids find the religion map absolutely fascinating. We used this map in our Islam unit, and kids were blown away at how quickly Islam had spread. The map also helped contexualize the history of Judaism.