Twitter alter-ego idea...


If you've been following this blog you'll know that you can follow me on TWITTER.
There are also updates of the latest GA NEWS also on TWITTER.

It's easy to set up an account on TWITTER: choose a name, provide an e-mail and off you go...

In the last issue of GA Magazine, I mentioned a game on the issues in Northern Uganda on the Red Cross 'Traces of Hope' website. (Noticed earlier that this has a 15 year old and above age rating)

How about setting up a TWITTER account and then fictionalising a geographical situation, which the students could 'follow' over a period of weeks...

Here are a few possibilities:
a) a Mexican migrant travelling from her home town to the border, then taking on a 'coyote' to guide her across the border into the USA
b) a storm-chaser tracking a Hurricane as it makes landfall in the USA and trying to make their way into the eye-wall (do this live in Hurricane season perhaps with an actual hurricane)
c) a resident of Dharavi in Mumbai
d) a pensioner living in a house by the Holderness coast keeping an eye on the progress of coastal erosion moving towards the house they thought they would spend the rest of their life in
e) a farmer documenting the changing agricultural landscape in the area around their farm on the rural-urban fringe
f) a resident of a large city in the North of England who is worried about the effects of the 'credit crunch' on various aspects of their life
g) an economic migrant to a European country documenting the change in their life, and the contradictions they face daily
h) a climate change scientist going through their daily routines on the Greenland ice cap coring ice and noticing changes
i) YOUR IDEAS HERE...

Each character could be developed using a series of 140 character tweets...

Students could be asked to research and provide the next tweet in the sequence...

Could also suggest some alternative roles and scenarios...

Extra bonus points for evidence of research and character developments....

Comments

Kenny O'Donnell said…
Great idea, Alan, one to try out!
Alan Parkinson said…
Tony C and I were discussing this last week, and I think Tony's going to be trying it - I think I'll start one now, so as to have a nice run up to an event later in the year...
Alan Parkinson said…
I think it will work better if you have a reasonable amount of 'set up', so that the sudden change when the 'event' or scenario that you have chosen starts to unfold will be more dramatic...
Alan Parkinson said…
First 2 'twalter-egos' are now out there...
About to start a third...