The Last Week-and-a-Half in the World of HBWReads

Our summer reading project has really taken on a life of its own over the last few weeks or so.  We are now the focus of some fairly robust national attention for the work you are all doing.

Last Tuesday, as I indicated in an earlier post, I was asked to speak about the work you are all doing at an event called the 140edu Conference.  This conference, modeled after a series called the 140Conference, was aimed at discussing how we are using social media (blogging, facebook, twitter, etc.) to promote real learning and authentic experiences for students in K-12 and college.  Each speaker was given ten minutes to talk about the work they are involved in and how they are using social media with students.

From there, our site got major attention.  The presentation was viewed by the over four-hundred and fifty audience members, plus an online audience that at times topped fifteen-thousand viewers!  Needless to say, there were a lot of eyes on your writing that day and the days that followed.

Based on that presentation, a magazine called School Library Journal, a publication for school media specialists, contacted me and asked to know more about the idea and the work you are all doing to promote reading during the summer.  After explaining the process to them, they decided to feature the idea during their Fall Leadership Summit in Washington, D.C. which will be attended by school and library leaders from around the country.

Additionally, during the 140edu Conference, I was contacted by a woman named Tonya Hall, a radio host from Colorado Springs, CO.  She describes her show like this:

The Tonya Hall Show offers captivating interviews from industry movers and shakers that have mastered the power of Social Media. It's the only one of its kind on the radio! 

She was so intrigued by the work you are all doing that she asked me to appear on her show yesterday to talk more in depth about the project and everyone involved.  I spent a good part of the time on air talking about how to access the writing on the site and the work that you have all been doing.  We even had a few callers ask the address of the site so they could check it out!

Editor's Note: I forgot to mention that the site has been mentioned at the Donorschoose blog, a site aimed at helping teachers and others find donors for much-needed classroom supplies.  

We are all so happy with the writing you are all creating, and you should know that the world is noticing and learning from you.  Keep up the great writing over the next few weeks!

The HBWReads Blog is Being Featured at the #140edu Conference

On Tuesday, August 2nd, I have the privilege of speaking at #140edu: Exploring the State of Education NOW Conference at the 92nd Street Y, NY, NY.  My topic: The Buzz Books.  

A while back, I was asked by the conference founder, Jeff Pulver, to participate in this conference, and if so, what did I have in mind to talk about.  Immediately, I thought of the Buzz Books and the HBWReads blog.  Reading, to me, has been a difference-maker in my life, taking me from a place of shadows and ignorance, to one of luminosity and understanding.  

Scholars have recently been examining the state of reading today among the general population of children in grades 5-12, and the statistics coming out of their work paint an awful picture.  There are extreme ramifications upon our society if we raise a generation of non-readers.  So, we as a school, looked at what we thought of reading in general, and more specifically of summer reading.  We looked at reading phenomena like the Harry Potter books, the Twilight Series, and more recently, the Hunger Games trilogy.

We saw something there that caught our eye.  

Reading is a social endeavor, and it's done best when we can talk about books with people we have an interest in.  When we read a book that is outstanding, the first thing we want to do is to run and tell someone who matters to us all about it and recommend it to them.  We wanted to capture that somehow.  

When I get on stage on Monday, I'm going to talk about that idea, but I am also going to talk about the work that has been done by all of the students and teachers at the site so far this summer.  Looking back at the statistics I shared the other day, we have had wild success in terms of readers and traffic through our site.  We have had conversations around books that would not have otherwise occurred.  We are making reading viral, and helping to spread it through not only our community here in Verona, but also in other parts of the county and world.  Don't underestimate the power of your thinking.  

The conference will be live on the web, and as soon as the information is posted as to how to tune in, I'll pass it along here.  (Here is the Ustream address if you are interested in catching the conference.  I go on roughly at 11:45am)

Keep up the great work!