Embracing Social Media - Handout

Here is the text from the handout that I used for my LearnLive session at BETT 2013 on 'Embracing Social Media in the 21st Century School'

Broadcast

Communicate interesting and relevant information to parents, students and the wider community. Promote the school’s ethos and celebrate the amazing things that happen on a daily basis.

Use Facebook and Twitter pages to reach your target audience – “fish where the fish are”.

Interact with your audience – respond to comments – see all forms of communication as an opportunity to promote the school. www.twitter.com, www.facebook.com/pages

Teach

Use social media to engage students in their learning. This is familiar territory for them which should be exploited.

Find out about the Flipped Classroom and Front-loading teaching concepts which lend themselves to social media.

Use teacher-generated videos to expose students to content outside of the classroom. www.khanacademy.org, www.ted.com, www.thevirtualschool.com.

Use Twitter (e.g. @DHSBusiness) or other blogging sites to keep students and parents informed of what is happening in lessons. www.blogger.com, http://wordpress.com.

Learn

Exploit social media to develop independent and collaborative learning.

Use social networks like Facebook and Google+ to create online communities for classes.

Encourage students to blog about their learning experiences (e.g. http://durringtonlearningblog.wordpress.com, @stjohnsclass8, @Hotspur3Y)

Use tools such as SkyDrive or Google Docs to encourage students to collaborate on learning.

Encourage students to make their own videos.

Protect

Teach students about digital literacy and online safety as part of your curriculum. Advise parents about the risks and opportunities of social media.

Ride the crest of the wave rather than bury your head in the sand.