double dipping

Okay... so now as well as being responsible for keeping the kindergarten blogsite running as well as my own I now have their public facebook page and the 'closed' whānau facebook group to manage. Definitely time to up-skill some of my colleagues - at least they all know how to use facebook to an extent already which is a definite bonus! It has been a steep learning curve for me though figuring out how to set up groups, pages and inventing a persona for the kindergarten so I don't end up personally 'friending' every parent etc in order to add them to the group!

We are constantly trying to figure out ways in which to engage our kindergarten community more with what we are doing, make sure information reaches everyone and that we do so in an accessible way. I can't really see us ever having the time, let alone the technology on hand to 'tweet' on twitter - but hopefully facebook will help engage some of those we miss with newsletters getting lost before being read etc and passwords forgotten for logging in to the blogsite.

In some ways it feels like we are putting distance between us, an electronic interface rather than face to face, yet some parents we don't see as other relatives or caregivers drop off and collect the children. Others have english as a second or third language and (unsurprisingly!) prefer to have the time to read what we have to say rather than make sense of a message given amidst the hustle and bustle of kindergarten whilst also trying to keep track of a toddler in tow.

It is interesting seeing the facebook persona of people too, the sides of them you never knew about - admittedly sometimes this isn't always a positive experience when politics and senses of humour vary greatly from my own - but it helps understand the community we're working with. If that is what they really believe then we probably have to work one heck of a lot harder at getting across what we're trying to achieve for their children and for our society.

Hopefully I'll manage to keep up with blogging and facebooking for both home and work yet keep the balance right without feeling like I'm living more online than face to face.