How teacher Twitter opened doors, created friends and made me a better teacher!

I’m sat in my garden on a sunny Spring evening, after a long drive back from Manchester after attending the wonderful Teach Meet History Icons conference, followed by a fantastic night out in Manchester with some amazing, inspiring teachers and also now wonderful friends. I’ve been wanting to start blogging for a while, and driving back today down the M6 and M5 towards Somerset with a banging hangover I had one of those ‘Eureka’ moments in-between songs on Radio X!! “Gareth, now is the time to do your blog!”

Let’s rewind to Early 2020, the news was talking of this virus, silly old me was pretty sure it wouldn’t cause too many problems, even telling my y13’s and y11’s that exams would DEFINITELY go ahead as usual that summer. One evening scrolling through Twitter i came across something called the History Teacher Book Club (HTBC), and thought that “that looks interesting”, I was a few months into a marriage breakdown and my wife and child leaving so I had a lot more time on my hands to read books and i knew that getting into a good book would definitely be something good for the old well-being through some pretty tough personal ‘stuff’. Normally I wouldn’t be interested in something like the HTBC seeing it as a bit of a ‘Busman’s Holiday’ but this time the book choice spoke to me. I love the Cold War, I grew up in West Germany as an Army Brat so ‘Stasiland’ seemed to be right down my street! So I followed them on Twitter, joined the club, ordered the book and within days started reading it! I absolutely loved the book and when it came time to discuss the book on-line I found myself gaining and following some new History Teachers on Twitter.

Fast forward a few months (I can’t be sure of when exactly because like many if us COVID lockdowns seemed to create a strange time frame!!) and the UK is in full lockdown, school’s are closed and being a household of one, it meant life was ‘interesting’ and ‘challenging’. During this strange time Teacher Twitter opened two doors for me, one was the Teach Meet History Icons (TMHI) on-line conference where I saw so many inspiring teachers present some amazing ideas! I’d never heard of TMHI before and it was through the HTBC that I came across this TMHI and discovered some wonderful inspiring teachers! The second door opened as a result of something I’d put on Twitter about doing a FaceTime bedtime stories for my little one who due to lockdowns I wasn’t seeing Face to Face. A twitter friend and fellow HTBC member saw it and sent me a direct message asking how I found them because they were hoping to encourage the father of their little one to do the same. That simple message led to quite a bit of direct messaging about various things, and as a fellow HTBC member they revealed that there were these WhatsApp groups alongside the HTBC – so within a few days I was now a member of these groups.

As the pandemic went on and lockdowns eased, school’s reopened, then shut down again these WhatsApp groups became so important for various different reasons. They offered support, laughter, morale, teaching tips and the members became friends – even if I still hadn’t met them in real life!! Last year I needed to change schools, I needed to leave Kent and move to the South West to be closer to my daughter! It’s difficult co-parenting, it’s even harder when there is 200 miles between you. Lockdowns showed me that I could cope not seeing my friends or family, and still be close to them through the virtual world but it was difficult coping with not seeing my daughter. I knew that being closer geographically would make such a difference so I went through the stress of looking for and applying for jobs! The WhatsApp gave so many offers of help from proofreading applications, interview tips, critiques and feedback on interview tasks and so much more! In April last year I finally got a job in Yeovil. I was going to be returning to middle leadership as a History HOD again (I’d stood down at my previous school when my daughter was born) but more importantly I was now going to be less than 30 miles from my daughter and not 200!!! Things were looking up!!! When I got the news I had loads of people sending me congratulations on these WhatsApp groups and even some people phone me up, which at first was strange because although I felt like I’d know them for ages by this point I still didn’t really know what they sounded like!!! There were many reasons I was successful but I know the support from these WhatsApp groups played an important part! Moving to a new town, with no friends or family anywhere near is a big step and again the WhatsApp groups came to the rescue with one member living nearby meeting me not long after I moved, a lovely gesture and something we’ve done a few times now!

So time went on and I grew closer to the people within these groups – even though I still hadn’t actually met any of them in real!!! There were some meet ups over the summer but there were always when I couldn’t make it! Then in late 2021 it was announced that an in person TMHI conference was going to be held! I was so excited because they are great events but I knew it would be an opportunity to actually meet some of these ‘virtual’ friends in real life! Like teenage me and Oasis’ gig at Knebworth I missed out on the tickets, as I was too late during the first ticket drop! However in December I was successful in the the second ticket drop! I was going, and more importantly I was going to be able to meet these friends and share a beer with them and actually thank them for inspiring me and helping me to become a better teacher and leader!

So fast forward to this weekend, and a wonderful TMHI conference – I have finally been able to meet people for real, giving a lift up to one of them, sharing an apartment in Manchester for the weekend with 3 others and having a fantastic and drunken night out with so many more! The conference was great with so many great new ideas, but also reassuringly knowing some of the changes I am making and doing in my department is what so many other inspiring teachers are also doing! It was so nice to put faces and voices to people who before were just a Twitter handle, or a WhatsApp profile picture. It was so nice to meet people who have inspired me and who I see as the ‘big dogs’ of the History teaching community! Finally and most importantly it was so nice to hang out with people who I know feel fortunate and lucky enough to call friends!

Twitter can be the most wonderful place at times, and thanks to teacher Twitter it opened doors for me and gave me some wonderful friends who I look forward to seeing again! As we went our separate ways last night or this morning it definitely wasn’t ‘Goodbye’, more ‘See you later’!