Retro-Using Delicious

I have been doing a little puttering around in delicious -- an online social bookmarking tool, in case you are not familiar with it -- after neglecting it for some time. Just for fun, I did some searching under the plpresearch tag (for Powerful Learning Practice) with a further search refinement under Twitter. Here's what I learned:

There are two new tools for Twitter that I did not know about: GroupTweet and Nurph. The former transforms a Twitter account into a private group messaging system. The latter allows tweeters to create a chat. I can definitely think of some classroom applications for both.

Which brings me to the other stuff I learned: that early studies have found correlations between using social media such as twitter in the classroom and student engagement, and the School Library Journal reports that the conciseness required by tweeting in 140 characters or less can actually help students improve their writing skills.

I'm gratified to see the research bearing out what I have "felt" from my observations in the classroom in the past few years. Students are becoming better writers because they are writing more than ever! So why aren't we using these tools more in the classroom -- and I mean both delicious and Twitter?

I continue to be shocked at how few students use delicious, especially, when they are hopping from one computer to another all day long. I know that our students learn about delicious in their Tech classes in the 8th or 9th grade, so why don't they continue to do so when they continue with research projects later on?