As I dive into this blogging endeavor (and Twitter, Diigo, etc…), I’m still trying to figure out how to make it all work for my classroom. With so many social media outlets, how do I make it all connect? How do I make it all meaningful? What impact is all of this really going to have on my classroom?
We live in a world where people are connected ALL THE TIME! My students are no different. They are probably much more connected than I am! That’s pretty scary considering my students are elementary-aged! My students are on Twitter, Facebook, SnapChat, and so many more. All the time! Since my students aren’t technically old enough (according to many social media policies that state you must be at least 13 years old to use their services), I can’t really use those things with my students in my classroom. Here’s an interesting article on why age restrictions exist on social media sites but how poorly they are policed.
So how does social media affect the elementary classroom? We can connect with the parents! I love taking videos of the activities we do in class and sending the links out to the parents. We made a ton of video clips last year and put them together into a presentation video for our school board to share our new curriculum.
We use facebook to keep our parents informed. Everybody knows the students that NEVER manage to get a note home. This gives parents another avenue to find out the information they might not have otherwise seen. It’s also a great way to send out reminders as events get closer or post links for parents to sign up as volunteers.
I’ll use my blog to keep all of the amazing resources I find in one place. GoNoodle was a lifesaver yesterday. Anyone in teaching (or healthcare) can tell you that a full moon definitely has an impact! My kids needed that extra movement!
So how do you use social media either in your classroom (if you’re an educator) or to connect with your child’s school/teacher (if you’re a parent)??
Many of the people that fill my timeline on facebook are in the education world. They are past teachers, old friends, family members, or people that finished college before me. A lot of my timeline is filled with pictures of kids in a classroom doing hands on activities, my Aunt my a seperate facebook page just so her student's parents could be involved. I think that is so important because not only do our kids want to be connected but our parents do too.
ReplyDeleteI don't actually even understand why they have age restrictions on social media if they aren't going to be enforced. Since the kiddos obviously figure out how to be on it anyway I think talking about ways to stay safe and the students seeing their parents use social media for keeping up with them could be a great positive influence!
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