Monday, July 8, 2013

Do you use #hashtags?

I enjoy social media. For the most part. I try to not whine on Facebook or Twitter (I mostly save that for my lucky blog readers, lol) and I've never posted a "selfie." I do post about my kiddos every now and then, but I also post about myself and my interests. I share funny memes and I follow and "like" a lot of my favorite movies, TV shows, musicians, authors, etc.

Having said all that, I'm a lurker much more than a poster. I read what others are sharing, and tweeting. Why? I enjoy it. We don't have cable or satellite TV anymore, and I sometimes miss upcoming movie trailers or info about the next episode of a show I watch (we LOVE Netflix, Amazon Prime videos and On Demand programming) or the next book by my favorite author.

I also use both social networking platforms (as well as Pinterest too) in my homeschooling. I connect with other homeschoolers, find craft/experiments to do, learn about curricula and materials, find and download printables and games for my boys to play...just everything.

I have been using hashtags on Twitter for a long time. It makes searching for something specific SOOOO much easier! If I want to see what others are talking about in regards to spelling, I can search for #spelling or #homeschoolspelling. If I want to learn more about elementary level animal lessons, I can find others who are talking about #homeschoolelementary or ask for #homeschoolhelp. If I want to learn more about homeschooling through high school, I can look for #homeschoolhighschool info. Granted, you still have to weed through some not-so-useful posts, but for the most part, hashtagging is an incredible search tool.

Recently FB started allowing the use of hashtags as well, and that's been so much fun! I have "liked" an awful lot of homeschool related pages, but looking through them all one by one, or trying to go down my timeline constantly, can be frustrating and time consuming. Not that I don't enjoy it...but some days, I simply don't have time. So looking for specific search terms is a no brainer. :)

Are you interested in learning more about the differences between Facebook and Twitter hashtags? Here is a cool little infographic:


While I enjoy hashtags on both platforms, I'm a wordy sort, so it's probably not surprising that I would enjoy FB more than Twitter, lol. It's really, really hard for me to condense what I want to say into 140 characters. ;)

Anyway, that's really all I wanted to say today...just that I've discovered some really great learning/educational materials and websites through hashtag searches, and that it might be something that many of you would benefit from too. There is a Facebook page, Homeschool Hashtags, that has more information about using hashtags on FB, as well as nice list of hashtags you can use to search and share with. They are adding to this list everyday, and would love your suggestions for new hashtags to add!

Off to curl up in a ball and wait for Friday. I just dropped my boys off with my parents for the week and being the overprotective, sheltering, helicopter mama that I am, I miss them terribly when they aren't with me. :/

Hope you all have a great week!

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