Instagram, Facebook "Pages", and Twitter
Instagram
I have found a great way to share videos, pictures, and messages to reach out to families, parents, students, faculty, and the community! It is so easy to add pictures and videos to share socially and get the word out about what you are doing in the library. Capturing images, showcasing work, introducing new books, sharing via videos, and connecting with stakeholders will enhance your library program instantly! I love it!!
Of course pictures of students would need to have permission, but I think students would gravitate to this platform as a way of being introduced to more reading opportunities. With so many social network platforms, which ones do most parents and other stakeholders follow. An individual would have to place all of these in one location and make sure all of the information shared is consistently.
My handle if you are interested :) . As I find more activities to share from this past year, I will add them.
Facebook
Pages
Libraries are using Facebook to get messages out fast and share on their "pages". School library media specialists use Facebook for announcing job descriptions or opportunities, attracting thousands of members to pages of interest, getting advice for challenges as a librarian, varied grade level support offered, advocacy for school librarians, and even pages for earning money. Lots of positive ways to use Facebook for libraries.
Since Facebook began, I have seen changes to the platform with better picture options, video opportunities to embed, and if others are interested in your information they will easily connect with you and your cause. The only disadvantage with Facebook is the personal connections or "friends" you only want to keep strictly on a personal Facebook page. I created on just for school, but within the system, my close contacts readily showed up and I don't want to add them to a work Facebook platform. How does one keep those separate?? I'm doing a little experiment to see how long I can only keep it strictly focused on my campus and our local initiatives with a focus on offering ways to improve academic achievement in a multidisciplinary way. I have only used my personal Facebook page once or twice this year and mainly check it on my birthday. I do think the use of Facebook has decreased, but since I'm not on there much, my assumption could be totally wrong.
If you have a library display, lesson plans, or suggestions for new librarians, feel free to share with me on my Facebook account. I am not a practicing librarian yet, but please share more pages you feel are beneficial to the position.
Twitter
Twitter has been fun and definitely exploded in our school district. I tweet about once a week and have connected with not only our Superintendent, Assistant Superintendent, but several other administrators, colleagues, and families across the district as well. Many of our students are on Twitter and use it regularly among administration and staff in a positive way.
I investigated a few Tech Ed Leaders and professional organizations. I appreciated the professional development opportunities available and shared via Twitter. I also saw several authentic reading activities highlighted, technology apps shared, and presentation conferences others found valuable. I have retweeted a few research articles and like to look at the analytics to see how many interactions the tweets receive.
I am glad that Twitter expanded the word count, bu would like them to increase the pictures to more than just 4 at a time. This is probably because I would put more in. They probably did that just for me :)
Here are a few I found that I retweeted recently:
My handle
Karen I love your sense of humor! I agree with you, I am also glad Twitter increased the word count. However, I think I'm okay with 4 pictures only, because it keeps my reading and browsing short.
ReplyDeleteI have to agree with you, Facebook isn't used as much as other social media platforms. I know the district I am currently in would like everyone to have a Twitter account and to post regularly. I for one am still not comfortable using Twitter.
ReplyDeleteI found the same to be true with Facebook. With younger generations shifting their focus to Snapchat, Twitter, and Instagram, Facebook school library pages aren't receiving as much attention or interaction from students.
ReplyDelete