Hamilton and the #IMMOOC…what are you waiting for?

Life. Life, ya’ll. You never know what each week will bring. It’s easy to have a couple of days that can shake all that you’re doing or wanting to do in life. It reminds me this week of a stanza from a “Hamilton” song..

[HAMILTON]
Hey
What are you waiting for?
What do you stall for?

[BURR]
What?

[HAMILTON]
We won the war
What was it all for?
Do you support this constitution?

[BURR]
Of course

[HAMILTON]
Then defend it

[BURR]
And what if you’re backing the wrong horse?

[HAMILTON]
Burr, we studied and we fought and we killed
For the notion of a nation we now get to build
For once in your life, take a stand with pride
I don’t understand how you stand to the side

 

If you’re not a fan of Hamilton…bless. Go listen to “Non-stop” and see how very closely that song relates to what you, you innovative educator you, are pushing for. Hamilton is asking Burr why he is allowing excuses or the status quo to allows him to stand to the side, when there are so many fights to be won. It’s greatness.

I’m currently participating in Couros’s Innovators Mindset MOOC, (massive open online course).  Per usual, in the spring I find it to be both overwhelming and energizing. There are so many great thoughts shared, daily, …and as usual, social media is discussed quite a bit. Even if it wasn’t directly referred to as “social media”, the words twitter, facebook, snapchat, and instagram were talked about. More importantly, the verbs “connections, collaboration, risk taking” were prevalent.

 Just like any other new initiative if you’re deciding to get serious with your social media presence for the purposes of innovation or opening up your, albeit for your classroom or your campus, I challenge you to BE INTENTIONAL.

Regardless of your own personal stance on using social media, you can’t deny the ever increasing use of it in our students lives. To not take advantage of a tool that your students and families are already utilizing is missing a huge opportunity to truly CONNECT. Relationships are always going to be more important than technology, but why wouldn’t you USE technology to leverage those relationships? If you dismiss an entire generations mode of communication, how relevant are they going to find your instruction or opinions?  If your opinion is that what you’ve been doing is fine, and that you have no need for MORE connections with your students & community, call me. ????

Building relationships is what we do! Utilizing some form of SM to help facilitate those relationships makes sense. You don’t have to do them all, pick one, that you’re comfortable with, and then BE INTENTIONAL.

Decide what you’re going to share. How often you’re going to share. When you’re going to share. The challenge, just like with any other form of communication, is to maintain your presence to help ensure the  validity of  your communications. Don’t do all the heavy lifting of getting your parents invested and then in two months let life get away from you and forget to post anything. It will be next to impossible to get them to commit to something else in the future.

Need some data to help back up my social media “claims”?

• 72% of all internet users are now active on social media
• 18-29 year olds have an 89% usage
• The 30-49 bracket sits at 72%
• 60 percent of 50 to 60 year olds are active on social media
• In the 65 plus bracket, 43% are using social media
• Time spent on Facebook per hour spent online by country. USA citizens get the top gong at 16% followed by the Aussies at 14 minutes and the Brits at 13 minutes.
• 71% of users access social media from a mobile device.

As my buddies Joe Sanfelippo and Tony Sinanis share regularly, “Never give up the opportunity to say something great about your school”!  I will add that there’s too many FREE and easy places to say it!

 

Relationship building& Alexander Hamiltion humming,

Amber