Twitter

A Twitter discussion compared to a BlackBoard discussion does not allow students to fully express their thoughts to each other. Since Twitter only allows a limit of 280 characters, there might be things left unsaid and a student may have to tweet multiple times to get their point across. While it does keep all replies under one tweet and keeps it concise, it can be very messy if an incomplete thought gets interrupted by another student. A blackboard discussion seems more uniform to me as there is one place set for a certain discussion. For Twitter You can possibly just have all your tweets under one hashtag but without a title for each discussion, it makes the whole discussion seem messy. The former allows individuals to portray their thoughts for as long or as little as they want all in one thread. However, I do like how Twitter gives notifications on whether or not someone replied to your tweet which blackboard may be a little harder to navigate in terms of this feature. These two platforms however, in my opinion, inferior to in-class discussions. You can get responses and feedback immediately and in real time. In case you want clarification on a topic or to elaborate on it, you don't have to wait minutes, hours, or days for another person to respond to you. Usually talking face to face creates the most valuable discussion as you can look at a person and respond to their body language. There are possibilities to getting sidetracked in an in-class discussion compared to a Twitter or Blackboard discussion however the content in person may be more helpful and valuable to a class.