I have read in so many books about the importance of telling your school's story. Some of my inspirations for this are @Joe_Sanfelippo and @GustafsonBrad. First, their books are must reads. Second, their passion for education and learning is so clear by what they do daily. How do I know this? Their twitter feeds, both personal and professional.I recall being at a Fall CUE in Napa four or five years ago and hearing all of the positive things @PrincipalDurham said about his use of social media. I figured I needed to give it a try. I found that is was super successful with engaging the parent community at Kenilworth Junior High while I was principal there. However, I realized I was not reaching the students. I needed to use the app/social media they were on too. I add instagram to my Facebook/twitter accounts and found success.
Now, I want to show off all of this story telling at the school. I want parents, community members, family and students to see the learning happening as they walk into the office. I had a big screen TV installed in the office and I hook a chromebook up to the TV. I tried multiple #hashtag displays/social walls. I tried Tweetbeam, the images were too small. I tried social wall, but the features I wanted cost money. I wanted a free, large picture display that I could control the dates of the posts being displayed. #Hashslider.com (@Hashslider ) has been awesome. You can change the date of posts displayed. This is super helpful when trying to promote different events. It shows videos! I love this. I can make a quick video and have the students "show" what they are learning. It also displays comments. Therefore, people see what others are writing and that we read the comments and replay back.I know that there are other powerful social walls out there. What you do you love and why?
