Instagram, Flipagram, and Screencasts-Tools to Increase Student Engagement and Improve Technology Instruction

 March 12, 2017

Instagram at school? Why yes, yes indeed!

I'm going to admit it, I've never been one to share images on Instagram. I've had an account for years and when I had to use my account to explore this topic, I was chagrined to find I have only about 60 photos posted to it. I can honestly say I've never given a thought to using it in the classroom, perhaps because I teach 3rd grade. I certainly am beginning to see that it has a definite use as a proof of learning tool in the classroom and in a school library.

Ideas to use Instagram in the school library:

• Create a school library account for students and parents alike to follow.
• Post pictures of library events such as guest readers and author visits to your account.
• Students can post their MakerSpaces creations to the school account.
• School activities like book clubs or poetry jams. 
• Feature a reader of the week.
• Share book reviews 
• Create memes about a book or book character using photos of themselves.

If you want to add text to the photos, there's are many free options available on the Apple App Store or in Google Play for Android. I used one called Font from Apple's App Store for this photo. I love the font and I did this all from my phone. I had to rotate the picture by pinching and turning, which explains why it looks unlevel. You'd have to play around with the apps you think work best or make a few choices available on the device.

Now you wouldn't want to allow students unfettered access to your Instagram account. Just let them use the library devices to take photos of the activity and then you can upload the photos yourself (you wouldn't want to allow students to upload directly to the school account😱!!)

Flipagram-Make those photos into instant slide shows.

Now this is a tool I can definitely see a use for in the classroom. I remember using Animoto a few years back and it seemed like a lot of work for a 15 second video, even if it was free. Flipagram makes it easy to create slide shows using your devices existing photos as well as live videos that can be shared. But the best part? Adding your own music of course! I used these pictures of my students with their baby pictures and added Happy by Pharell to make it more fun. It was SO easy and free too! This would be a wonderful digital storytelling tool to use in the library.

https://flipagram.com/f/15OUH6EujDL/embed

Screencasts

Have you ever wondered how people make those computer tutorial videos? I always have and never realized how easy it is! I made a screen cast using Jing, which is also a great tool for saving screen shots. I shared an infographic I made last week in Canva, so this week I thought I'd make a little instructional screen cast about how to use Canva. There are other tools, like ScreenCast-Omatic, which I know is also very popular.

Using screencasts to present instruction is a standard form of instruction for online content. But it can also be a useful tool to share instructions for students. I use Google Classroom for my 3rd grade students and if I'd known how easy make a screencast actually was, I'd have made them for my 3rd graders long ago. I think I would have saved myself a lot of frustration when it comes to giving instructions about technology!

Here's my screencast about how to find the online resources on the Arlington ISD website.

I hope you have some fun incorporating these tools into your library and classroom instruction!

References

Hudson, H. (2014, August 7). 10 Surprising Ways to Use Instagram in the Classroom - WeAreTeachers. Retrieved from https://www.weareteachers.com/10-surprising-ways-to-use-instagram-in-the-classroom-2/

Moore, A. (2012, June 7). Using Instagram in the classroom. Retrieved from https://prezi.com/fvbrbbznr7ee/using-instagram-in-the-classroom/

Social Media Survey and Infographic

I am collecting some data regarding social media for an infographic assignment. If you could find the time to complete the survey, I would really appreciate it!

Social Media Usage Survey

Update to Social Media Usage Survey and Infographic

Wow, I was so excited to see that so many people participated in my survey regarding social media sites. Thank you to all my followers who responded to my survey.

I used an excellent infographic website, Canva, to summarize the data I collected in an eye-catching way. It was so easy! Canva provides a wide selection of free templates and layouts, you just need to choose the layout that best suits your needs then input the information you want to share.

I chose to use the "Donation Charity" template because I liked the colors, fonts, and layout. Rather than use a graph to display the data from my survey, I chose to summarize it more informally. I wanted to explore the reasons most people use social media, but I lack experience in survey design, so I think my results were a little skewed, at least in a scientific, empirical sense. I also used the free version of Survey Monkey, which lacks some of the disaggregation capabilities the pro version provides. But for the purpose of this task, I think I gained some valuable experience. Here's the final product.

Last semester I used Wix.com to create a website for both of my grad school courses and it was surprisingly easy. My experience using Canva was very similar to creating my website on Wix. There are an abundance of free templates and layouts available. You can create customized announcements, presentations, menus, flyers, invitations, blog graphics, banners, ads and more. The company also provides many resources for design professionals and novices alike, as well as an online design school with an interactive online design course, teacher lesson plans, and free tutorials intended to "increase the world's visual literacy". To find out more about Canva's Design School, click here to get the information straight from the source!

For myself, I think Canva's ease of usability and eye-catching designs make it a premier infographic tool. I highly recommend it for those new to online design like myself.

Organizing My Favorite Blogs

Many moons ago, I served as a campus technology liason for a year. During the summer professional development, I learned about RSS feeds to organize blogs and how to use Google Reader as a easy method of accessing their content and loved how easy it became to follow my favorite bloggers. But my brief stint as a tech liason didn't prepare me to do much beyond train the teachers to use the new grading program our district rolled out that year. When Google discontinued Reader, I was way into Pinterest (which I still love!) and didn't feel the need to replace it with anything else.

Now that I'm working on my graduate degree in Library Science, blogs have taken on a new importance for me. Teachers work with many other teachers but schools usually have only one library media specialist. If we want to collaborate or connect with other librarians, we must join and participate in the online community of other library specialists, often referred to as the "blogosphere". Fortunately, there are many options for feed readers that can keep my favorite blogs organized.

I chose Feedly because it has a free option as well as an iOS app that automatically syncs with my account, so I can access my favorite blogs on my laptop and in the waiting room, even on my phone when I go to bed. There was no learning curve involved in setting it up, all I had to do was input some keywords or names I wanted to follow, and received immediate, relevant results.

The experience of actually reading specific posts is also simplified. I am easily distracted by a lot of graphics when I read, so I appreciate that the feed is clean and simplified. On my phone I am able to swipe through the posts just as if I'm reading the newspaper on my phone, which allows me to focus on the content, not the graphics.

These are some of my favorite blogs and bloggers. You can also find them and more on my Feedly page. I'd love it if you shared your favorites in the comment section of my blog.

The Daring Librarian
http://www.thedaringlibrarian.com/     


Gwyneth Jones is a frequent speaker on educational technology and has an award-winning blog. If you're interested in bringing technology into your library in new and exciting ways, her blog is a valuable resource.



Teen Librarian Toolbox
http://www.teenlibrariantoolbox.com/about-tlt/

TLT is part of the School Library Journal blog network and is a great place to go for professional development and resources for your middle school and high school library.

Heart of the School 
http://heartoftheschool.edublogs.org/

The blogosphere allows librarians to connect quickly and easily with teacher librarians, no matter where they are located. Caroline Roche is a librarian from the U.K. and began this website to highlight best practices in UK school libraries.

The Adventures of Library Girl
http://www.librarygirl.net/ 

Jennifer LaGarde is a frequent blogger with a terrific sense of fun. She's also a digital learning and teaching specialist and a regular presenter frequent speaker. Her blog is a wonderful reference for librarians with questions about incorporating technology into their curriculum.

Library as Makerspace
http://librarymakerspace.blogspot.com/

This blog has many contributors, but I love that it focuses on developing Makerspaces in the library. Many bloggers post about Makerspaces, but that is the main focus in the blog. It's not centered around school libraries, but there are a wealth of ideas available here.

The Nerdy Book Club
https://nerdybookclub.wordpress.com/

The Nerdy Book Club is wonderful place to find inspiration for librarians who want to up their game when it comes to integrating new tools and strategies when incorporating literature into their library lessons. The posts are organized like a Pinterest board as well, which makes the page especially accessible for visual learners.

Tumblr is also a good place to follow leaders in information science and librarianship. Here's the link to my Tumblr feed: https://www.tumblr.com/dashboard

Facebook Pages

January 30, 2017

Some of the comments on my previous post expressed concern about how administrators of a Facebook page could monitor comments by their followers. I did a little bit of research and there is an option in the settings to prevent comments from being published until they have been reviewed by the page administrator. I included a screen shot below.

If administration has concerns about privacy, this is one way to put those concerns to rest. Ironically though, many districts don't allow the use of social media on the district Wi-Fi, so librarians may have to manage their school Facebook page from home.

Have a great evening!

Reaching Parents and Students Where They Live-On Social Media

 Social media has become a daily presence in our lives, most notably, Facebook and Twitter. I use both regularly, sometimes to a fault. But used responsibly, social media can be utilized to connect with parents and students at all levels. Schools across the country are using Facebook to advocate for their libraries by promoting important programs library media specialists use daily to support classroom teachers as they prepare students to be competitive in the 21st century workplace. Leaders in educational and informational technology are able to quickly share links to new Web 2.0 tools with their followers. This power, the quick access to people and information we now possess, was inconceivable just a decade ago. And now we take it for granted. 

I've always thought of Facebook as a place to connect with friends near and far rather than a place for educational purposes. But just like parents proudly highlight their children's accomplishments, librarians are using Facebook to share MakerSpace challenges, promote new additions to their collections, and demonstrate how technology is being used in the library. Finley Junior High School in Waxahachie, TX has an active page which is frequently updated, Their librarian has done an excellent job of highlighting the importance of a school library.  Sangamon Elementary School is participating in a contest to win free Jan Brett books and competing to win a free school visit by the author herself. They are also promoting a program that involves reading to certified therapy dogs one Saturday each month. What a wonderful way to reach out to parents and students alike. Librarians can post colorful newsletters directly to their Facebook page and reach parents and students where they spend much of their time
instead of relying on students to take them home. 

Finley Junior High Library Facebook page

 Twitter is an excellent tool that allows users to connect with leaders in many fields and educational technology is no exception. I've read many interesting articles by following links posted by those I follow on Twitter. Gwyneth Jones shared a brief article that gives 3 ideas to use QR codes in the classroom as a means of sharing and gathering information as well as distributing materials and resources.  I learned of Scoop It by following some of Jim Lerman's posted links on Twitter and have set up my own Educational Technology Scoop It page, which acts a bit like Pinterest but you can upgrade to a Pro setting, which allows you to create a web page or blog with the ease of Pinterest. From following Linda Braun's Twitter feed I followed a link to an article by Valerie Hawkins outlining the "digital divide" that prevents lower income students from fully engaging in the digital learning that many districts are now requiring, a which is a very real problem in the community in which I teach. 

This is a fun activity I found via Gwyneth Jones Twitter feed.

Library media specialists and classroom teachers must also consider possible downfalls that come with the use of Facebook and Twitter to share information and promote programs. Before posting photographs and videos, one must be sure to have signed permission to post student pictures to the Internet. Also, the page needs to be monitored closely by the LMS administrator in case inappropriate comments should be posted. And always, always, consider the district guidelines regarding social media. 

From what I've seen, social media can be a powerful platform for raising awareness of all the wonderful things taking place in school libraries. You can promote literacy and programs, connect with parents and students alike, share resources, articles and more. I can't wait to try using these tools when I have my own library.

Welcome to my blog.

Hello! My name is Marty DeVarennes and this blog represents a large body of my graduate work as I finish my master's degree at Sam Houston State University. I anticipate graduating in less than a month, and am looking forward to having my own library in the very near future. I hope you find my blog inspiring and informative. I've worked extremely hard on all the posts, but the work I've put into it is probably one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. 

July 9, 2017