Instagram for School Library Promotion


Since I am not currently a school librarian, I created a fictional one called Sweet Valley Elementary (yes, you know why...) and decided to use Instagram to promote it. The handle is @SVEreads. I chose Instagram because I feel like it overlaps the target audiences of students, parents, and other school librarians with whom I would like to learn from professionally. Although I hope not many elementary students have their own Instagram accounts, I think that this is the most visual social media platform of the three, which appeals to this age group of students. 

I am a newbie with all types of social media and so I am learning as I go. This was a great week to start a school library with it being Read Across America Week. 


My plans are to highlight not just SVE's library events, but other literacy and book related events. I plan to promote new additions to the collection and spotlight books with a monthly or holiday focus. I will follow fellow teacher accounts, other school librarians, children's authors, and local and national professional organizations associated with school libraries. 


Social media is a way to collaborate with teachers, which in turn supports instruction. We can promote the projects or assignments we have co-taught. Doing so, in turn, will help advocate our school library. Parents and other stakeholders can see that librarians don't just check out book or help with research. I also like Dr. Green's idea of having students do an account take-over. Parents are more likely to share posts that their children had a hand in creating and students will learn a little more about digital citizenship (or just citizenship, according to Robertson).

I look forward to seeing how social media will continue to have an impact on school libraries.

Works Cited:

Green, L. (2021). Harnessing the power of social media to advocate for the school library [Google slides]. Google.                  https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1rswnwL_QA16SjO3gE5KzLH26OeReTFxdJkJ3_xz8uYk/edit#slide=id.g2ef0537a07_0_140

Robertson, N (August 17, 2018). 5 ideas to tap social media to enhance PD and student learning. [Podcast] Cool Cat Teacher Blog


Comments

  1. Catherine MileyMarch 7, 2021 at 9:29 PM

    I love your school name! I did not focus on your point about getting engagement from parents via posts that relate to their children's work (or really engagement at all, other than getting views). I think that's such a vital part of social media that I did not focus on when making my plan. The more the community is incentivized to share posts with one another the more we can display the importance of the library and our students' educational needs!

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