Social Media Tools in Economics Teaching

I enjoyed a super time today meeting fellow teachers at Mill Hill School in North London - many thanks to Lesley Sharples for organising a terrific lunch in a lovely setting. My presentation and discussion took place in the Crick Room at Mill Hall, a newly restored room named in honour of Francis Crick who helped to discover the structure of DNA and who changed the course of history in doing so.

It is way too big a claim to say that fast-growing and ever-evolving social media tools on the web will have anything close an impact on teaching and learning as DNA did as a catylist for biotechnology and many related disciplines. But I am confident enough enough to suggest that more and more teachers are embracing, experimenting and enjoying the chance to utilise social media tools both in their own teaching and as part of continuous professional enrichment. My talk focused on sharing resources through the web - in breaking down barriers between schools and being more ready and willing to collaborate and connect with eachother to share good ideas, try things out and innovate through trial and error in the classroom.

Perhaps I went to far in suggesting that for any teacher claiming to work in a 21st century school, sharing resources should be part of their educational DNA!

I hope one or two of the links in the presentation streamed below might be useful

Sharing Ideas in Economics TeachingView more presentations from Geoff Riley.

Next week I am speaking to a national conference of Development Directors on using social media to grow bursary campaigns and deepen relationships with alumni. I have found some examples of schools, senior teachers and development offices that I feel really get what the social web is about (and plenty that don’t!) And I will post the presentation later on next week.