The Information Professional

"Twitteracy: Tweeting Improves Learning And Engagement
Education Professor Christine Greenhow, Michigan State University, conducted a study on Twitter as a new form of literacy (http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00131725.2012.709032).

Her results showed that adults who tweet during a class and as part of the instruction:

are more engaged with the course content
are more engaged with the instructor
are more egaged with other students
and have higher grades than the other students.
“Tweeting can be thought of as a new form of literacy,” Greenhow said. “The students get more engaged because they feel it is connected to something real, that it’s not just learning for the sake of learning. It feels authentic to them.”