I spent hours last week refreshing Twitter to read the latest posts from Austin American-Statesman reporter Steven Kreytak.

Kreytak was covering an awful but intriguing case here in Austin about the murder of Jennifer Cave and subsequent convictions of Laura Hall and Colton Pitonyak. It’s been a long, drawn-out saga that spawned my all-time favorite line, supposedly spoken by Hall to a friend about why she would help Pitonyak chop up a body: “That’s just how I roll.”

I told you it was fascinating.

Anyway, last week was Hall’s second sentencing trial, and Kreytak updated Twitter every minute or so with dialogue and details from the trial (best to read from bottom to top):

Twitter feed of Hall's sentencing trial

Many of those quotes and details made it into the web and print versions of the stories that came out of the trial, so Twitter acted almost like a reporter’s notebook.

High school students won’t often be covering trials, but there’s plenty to live-tweet during prom (the PG version), major games and graduation. Each one of those has the potential for interesting dialogue and tension.

Want an example that doesn’t include chopping off body parts? Here’s adviser Matt Rasgorshek’s take on his students’ experiences with live-tweeting games. Students at Westside High School in Omaha, Neb., found Twitter helped one reporter keep better notes during the game, which meant better details for the web and print stories.

Live tweets from Westside High School basketball game

Here are some more cool ways to use Twitter in newsrooms that could easily translate to the classroom.

After several weeks of reviewing high school news websites, I am even more excited about the future of journalism. There are some high school sites out there that rival the professional news sites in their respective towns, and some that could stand up against the best metro newspaper and news start-up sites. These high school journalists really get the importance of design, fresh content, interactivity and multimedia.

My attention was focused on sites in one state, but recently, winners and finalists in national contests were announced by the Columbia Scholastic Press Association and the National Scholastic Press Association. Would-be online student (and even professional) journalists could learn a lot from perusing the winning sites.

I learned even more from looking at  sites-in-progress that were almost there but had a little bit of work to do in some key areas.

Here are seven ways to improve a high school site:

1. Captions, captions, captions.

Every photo needs a caption. Even those in galleries and slideshows. Need a free gallery editor that allows captions? The Online Journalism Review has you covered with a review of several free apps. While we’re on the subject of photos, post more, and allow readers to upload their own, too.

2. Write headlines for online.

Writing good newspaper headlines is a unique and important skill, but unlike in print, the online reader doesn’t have the  subhead, photo and lead of the story in view to give the necessary context to decide whether to read further. Be specific. Learn more here and here.

3. Break up text.

Please, please, please don’t subject readers to an intimidating screen of text. Break up stories with subheads, photos, graphics, maps, video. I’m not sure if this interesting model of storytelling will catch on, but if we want readers to read the stories writers work so hard on, shouldn’t the text be as easy to read as possible?

4. Keep readers coming back with frequent updates.

Putting out a scholastic newspaper is tough. And adding a website on top of that? Needless to say, journalism advisers’ salaries would be on par with football coaches if paid by the hour. But if you’re going to do a website, really do the website. None of this uploading the print newspaper stories every six weeks. To have a working, relevant site, there’s got to be fresh content. (But don’t get rid of the print edition if you don’t have to.)

5. Add more multimedia features.

Become an expert in multimedia by reading this free guide then practicing consitantly. Online journalism guru Mindy McAdams keeps more stellar tips on the Journalists’ Toolkit site, and a recent Twitter chat about multimedia tools brought up some great points and introduced some cool tools.

6. Be more social.

Live chats, tweets, Facebook pages and other social media tools are excellent tools to bring readers to the site, find sources and facilitate a community conversation. Can’t do much better than reading these 32 posts about social media from JEA Digital Media.

7. Move beyond my.hsj.org.

This might be controversial. I think ASNE’s free web service for scholastic journalism is so necessary and awesome, but once staffers get the hang of posting content regularly to the newspaper’s my.hsj.org site,  it wouldn’t hurt to experiment with content-management systems and build a site through WordPress or Joomla. It’s becoming more and more important for journalists to have experience with content-management systems and web design, and building a site gives students a head-start developing these skills. Here’s a great resource on building a site, and a story sharing one school’s experience evaluating online options.

Educators and industry leaders are calling for journalists to understand and use social networking, and to do so while adhering to journalism ethics and best practices. I can’t stress enough that their education should start in high school at a time when most students already use sites like Facebook.

Not just for socializing

Most high school students I know look at Facebook and the like as social sites with no place in school. There’s a disconnect between Facebook and legitimate online use, which is backed up by the fact that most school districts block these sites from school computers.

This is a foolish, fearful response to sites that are (free) potential learning tools. I’m not saying Facebook isn’t a massive time-waster for many people, but this is precisely the reason that students should be taught how to efficiently use these sites.

Even outside the journalism classroom, teachers could create private groups on Facebook where students engage in meaningful discussions and double-check homework assignments. What better way to remind students of a quiz or share a relevant news article than on Facebook, where they are most likely spending time anyway, rather than on a school’s website.

Potential for j-classrooms

Journalism classrooms have even more to gain from using Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites. As a reporter, I was required to have a Twitter account, which I used to find story ideas, track down sources and let readers know what was going on, as well as advertise my stories and blog posts. Every journalist, educator and industry expert I have asked to list the most important skills a journalist needs has included social networking in the top five.

It’s going to be tough for high schools to keep up. I don’t think many schools have blocked Twitter, but Youtube and Facebook are almost certainly on most schools’ “bad” lists. Although there are ways around the blocks (just ask any student to explain), not only would I feel uncomfortable helping students navigate to blocked sites, but it’s also a clunky way to visit these sites. Best to get administrators on board.

Convincing everyone else

I’m no expert in dealing with administrators, but two pieces of advice I have heard from those more experienced: Better to beg for forgiveness than ask for permission, and perhaps more constructive: Even if you can’t access the sites at school, teach social media use and ethics in an academic way and continually follow up with administrators to show them what students are learning. If they themselves become more educated in how these sites can be educational tools, they’ll be more likely to unblock the sites at least in the journalism classroom.

If any advisers have been successful in removing the blocks, I’d love to hear from you. Without further ado, here are some great resources for using Twitter, Facebook and other social media in journalism classrooms.

Resources for social media in j-classrooms

A recent Pew Internet study reported that teens aren’t taking to Twitter, but high school journalism programs across the country are joining Twitter and doing impressive things there from live-tweeting events to engaging in philosophical discussions about the future of journalism. JEA Digital Media Chair and journalism adviser Aaron Manfull keeps a running list of the Twitter and Facebook pages of high school media.

The Radio Television Digital News Association hosted a free webinar Friday on social networking in the classroom that included a rundown of popular sites and tips on using them with students and convincing administrators to unblock them.

The organization also recently published timely social media and blogging guidelines for journalists.

JEA Digital Media provides a wealth of information to get started, including an explanation on Twitter and how to use it and a handout on using Twitter for live event coverage.

Finally, read more about this issue in an article from the Student Press Law Center, which quotes students who articulate their concerns in a thoughtful way.