Remembering the Benefits

Next Tuesday is the first day back for public school teachers. For an elementary school teacher like myself, this means going back early to get the classroom ready. Since I’m a computer teacher, getting my classroom ready means that I had to put all our desktop computers back together. This was a task, but it was nothing compared to what I had to do last year to get my classroom ready.

What does this have to do with anything that this class is about? Well, keep reading . . .

After reading other classmate’s blog posts, one being Berna's, about how social media is affecting them in their lives, I couldn’t help to think about how I used social media last year to help me get my classroom ready last year. My classroom, the computer lab, was a mess! It was dingy and dirty. I hated everything about the room. I knew everything had to be cleaned, but I wanted to paint all the walls too. I knew this would be an impossible task for me to take on by myself, but I was determined.

I went on Facebook and posted a plea for help. Here’s my actual post:

Just got home from looking at my new classroom...our Computer Lab. It needs a new paint job badly. Anyone know of a painter who would donate his or her services? I can get the paint and I am willing to help, but I couldn't do it myself. Please help!!!

From this post, I got many comments from friends offering help. I’ll keep this short . . . yes, I got the people to help me paint the room and I even got paint and money donated. I couldn’t have done this huge job without participating in social media.

The differences in the room showed on the kids’ faces…simply priceless. That first week of seeing each grade level, 5-10 minutes was given to them so they could talk about the changes they observed. I decided to let them do this because of the chatter that was occurring as they entered the new lab. Throughout the year and all the way to the end, students, teachers, and other staff members commented on how wonderfully different the lab was.

I’m still reaping the benefits of this event. This year my room was easy to set up and I had very minimal cleaning to do…and, thank goodness, no painting!