darim online

Q: What do you get when you cross a former social media nerd turned marketing guy with a couple of tech-savvy teachers and instructional technology coaches, plus an expert at integrating social media technologies into Jewish education?

A: A toolkit of social media case studies highlighting how teachers can use common social media and Web 2.0 tools and technologies to facilitate student interaction, collaboration and learning.

At Bernard Zell Anshe Emet Day School, a community Jewish day school in the city of Chicago, we came into the school year with a healthy knowledge of what social technology tools were out there and a thought that we'd like to identify a few of those tools for widespread teacher and student use. Thanks to our participation in Darim Online's Social Media Boot Camp for Educators, we're heading out of the school year with some key technologies identified and faculty members who have designed learning experiences around those technologies that are scalable across the organization. In fact, after some in-house professional development, we already have teachers trying new things that have worked in other teachers' classrooms.

Specifically, we've recognized the power of simple platforms including Twitter, Skype and YouTube to both facilitate interaction within our school community (among students and teachers, for example) and to facilitate interaction with students, classrooms and experts in other states and countries.

A handful of case studies highlight how our faculty members have used these technologies to drive cross-cultural communication, collaboration and learning. If you've never heard of or conducted a Twitterview, or an author-Skype session or mystery-Skype session, or if you've never Explained Everything via a Youtube "flipped classroom" video, we can help...

These things don't just sound fun—they are fun, and, per the title of this blog post, they enhance student learning. Once teachers see what these tools can do and hear from colleagues about the excitement created around learning by incorporating these technologies, we're pretty sure they won't hesitate to try their hands with social media. Here at BZAEDS, after hearing from another faculty member at a professional development session about an eighth grade / author Skype session, one of our third-grade teachers set up an author Skype for her students, much to their excitement and enjoyment.

So if you'd like to hear more about our success with a social media toolkit of case studies, or read more about any individual case study and see photos or videos that accompany these, please don't hesitate to reach out to that former social media nerd (if you check my Twitter timeline you'll see how rarely I use it anymore--even Facebook is no longer a regular thing)—he's here to help!

Derek Gale is the Director of Communications at Bernard Zell Anshe Emet Day School in Chicago.  They participated in the Social Media Boot Camp for Educators, a year long program generously funded by The Covenant Foundation.  This series of blog posts this spring chart the learnings of the 10 teams in this year's cohort.

As a school who strives to be on top of the latest and greatest forms of social media, this year was the time for Scheck Hillel Community School to explore one of the most popular outlets used today: Instagram. With one click on the app, you can quickly see what is going on around campus and in classrooms. In the past, Scheck Hillel has used Facebook and Twitter to reach out to the community and share what is going on at school. Now we have taken the jump not only with a school account (@eHillel) but also individual classroom accounts to reinvent photo sharing, making it easy for families and students to stay connected. Instagram also links to other forms of social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr. This allows our followers to branch out and explore eHillel across the social media world.

In the classroom, Instagram has taken a different turn. Students as early as third grade are excited and eager to explore the social media world with their iPods, iPads, and iPhones. What better way to do it than linked to school! With followers in many grade levels, we are sharing our classroom with the rest of campus. Parents are slowly but surely starting to follow and engage in Instagram by liking and commenting on photos. Siblings and former students are among our greatest followers, and are encouraging their teachers to jump on the bandwagon.

As a third grade teacher, I was unsure of how Instagram would impact my class. Would parents be interested? Would students want to follow their class?  My worries were quickly erased as I have only seen a positive response! Students are excited to be involved in writing captions, adding filters, and creating appropriate hashtags to share our photos. Another third grade teacher was persuaded to create a page when her students started to follow my class page @see3c. She found that her students were eager to get involved as well. Teacher Jennifer Cohn, @3bpics, says “Students are commenting on photos after school. It gives them a chance to go back and reflect on what was happening in school that day.” Scheck Hillel’s third grade was recently empowered with a couple iPads for each class, so the students can get involved with our Instagram page more easily. It has become a class activity and the students are deciding what is important to share with our friends in the community. We look forward to sharing our achievements as we engage more teachers and classes to connect to social media!
 

Jenna Kraft is a Grade 3 teacher at Scheck Hillel Community School in North Miami Beach, Florida. Taking a lead beyond the classroom, she recently co-authored Scheck Hillel’s Social Media Guidelines & Policy with the School’s Advancement department.

The Jewish Day School Social Media Academy is an intensive program designed to help Jewish Day Schools advance their strategic use of social media in areas such as communication, marketing, community building, alumni relations and development. The 2012-13 nationwide cohort of 20 schools was generously supported by The AVI CHAI Foundation.  Each of the schools will be sharing insights from their experience through blog posts here this spring with the tag #jdsacademy
 
The 2013-14 cohort is currently in formation. If your school or community is interested in more information, please contact Lisa Colton.