ECL Prompt – 8 Having the opportunity to search the hashtag #picturebooks in the social media platform ‘Facebook’, I came across an article which acknowledged that the picture books that we love, mold the people that we become. In this article, Jenni Buchanan notes that often our favourite stories are the ones that ‘whisk us away into a far-off world.’ This got me thinking, what was my favourite picture book, and what effect has this had on my life. My favourite picture book in primary school was ‘The Very Hungry Caterpiller’ by Eric Carle. Not only do readers learn about colors and counting when reading this book, but this gave me the knowledge of the life cycle of a caterpillar. Jenni Buchanan also makes an important point in her article that "Reading picture books with beautiful illustrations does more than just entrance children when they’re young; the evocative art of picture books encourages attention to and appreciation of the world around them, and beyond that, emotional intelligence and self-reflection–qualities that stick with children for the rest of their lives. I strongly believe that you can definitely use the hashtag to research information that is relatable to what a class is doing. Using the hashtag in multiple social media platforms opens up a whole new world of information that I feel would help students become better researchers. Taking part in these Tumblr posts, and the use of hashtag’s has really opened up a whole new side of social media, and the potential benefits this can have inside the classroom.
