Librarians UNITE!.... or at least let's get organized.

I remember not too many years ago when Twitter was the new kid on the block and #EdChat was the first and only educational Twitter Chat available as a place to connect, share, learn and grow together as educators.

Now the field has become saturated with speciality area chats from all corners of the world and with topics I didn't even realized existed in the education world.  Both Participate Learning Chats and Cybraryman's Educational Hashtags provide comprehensive lists of ongoing Twitter chats but sometimes finding just the right search term to put in to find the one you need, especially for us librarians, can prove to be a challenge.

Please use the form below to help bring our communities together from across the nation and around the world so that we can continue the thing that makes us as school librarians so awesome...CONNECTING!

They Go Together Like Peanut Butter and Chocolate

Recently I read two social media posts and decided these would be great together; kind of like chocolate and peanut butter! Also, they merge perfectly with Teacher Appreciation Week!

Ginger Lewman posted about the hashtag, #eduhero. This is a hashtag you can use to celebrate the #eduheros in your life.

Matthew Winner, Andy Plemmons, John Schu, and and Jennifer LaGarde all posted about Mo Wiilems’ new book that has the hashtag #ThankORama attached to it. #ThankORama gives you the opportunity to thank people, cats, dogs, pizza for being AWESOME! I used the activities included on Mo Willems’ site with our special education self contained students last Wednesday and we will be doing #ThankORama activities all month long in the JCHS Library. I think it is the perfect end of the school year activity!

The JCHS Library has set up the green screen so student can make the subject of their #ThankORama the background with speech bubble added later. We also have space for student to fill out Post It Notes with their #ThankORama pick! I can't wait to see the wall grow!

Jennifer jazzed up her #ThakORama posts with her great Library Girl avatar! If you don't yet have an avatar challenge yourself to create one with one of these avatar maker sites (courtesy of the amazing Gwyneth Jones) and then create your own #ThankORama/#EduHero message!

Who will be YOUR #eduhero/#ThankORama?!

Nurph: A Twitter Chat Moderator's Dream Come True!

Nurph is the #1 BEST product I have found to assist with moderating and archiving Twitter Chat sessions.  It beats other archiving websites hands down!

Here are just a few things Nurph allows: (a lifesaver for moderators)

• set up the chat with questions in advance for participants to view

• add more than one moderator to the chat

• promote the chat with a link provided by Nurph

• view how many participants RSVP'd via Nurph

• participate in the chat live via Nurph

• chat questions highlighted at top of Twitter stream inside Nurph

• view number of participants who joined the chat using Nurph

• view detailed statistics from your chat

• allows access to a "replay" of your chat

Not convinced?  

Take a look at this #TLChat archived provided by Nurph: http://nurph.com/TLChat/chats/861 OR

take a look at this #MOEdChat archive provided by Nurph: http://nurph.com/MOedchat/chats/1474

Need help setting up a Nurph for your Twitter Chat? Vox me at nrober7689

Want to know more about Nurph? 

Check out these resources: 

http://www.tech-stories.co.uk/reports/EdChat_Resource_Plan.pdf

http://www.marketme.co.uk/10-reasons-to-use-nurph-for-twitter-chats/