A teacher’s guide to Pinterest

Pinterest is an information sharing website and app that lets people ‘pin’ content and build and maintain ‘boards’. The digital equivalent of an old-fashioned mood board, or a folder crammed full of interesting content, Pinterest isn’t just for sharing fashion, food, and home decor tips.

In fact, Pinterest has become a great way for teachers to share resources and information; and even has a dedicated hub – Pinterest for Teachers– designed specifically for educators to find and swap creative ideas.

Here’s how you can get the most out of Pinterest in an educational setting:

Inspire independent learning

With a Pinterest account, pupils can create boards to collate resources and inspiration for projects. Teachers can even create boards for the whole classroom to pin to, fuelling collaboration and engagement. Once done, teachers can view the board, and leave comments and feedback on the resources pupils have pulled together. For example, Pinterest can be used to create a board full of information about World War II, bringing learning to life and aiding independent research.

Show off student work

If a class or a pupil has done particularly well on a project, teachers can pin their work to a special board to celebrate their achievement.

Likewise, Pinterest can be used to create an online portfolio of student work. Art and Design teachers, in particular, can use Pinterest to help prepare older students, with the creation of online portfolios to show university admission officers and future employers. Check out these student portfolios for inspiration.

Access educational resources

Pinterest is an information repository and many teachers are using it to access educational resources; with hundreds of boards on lesson planning alone.

While a large percentage of teachers on Pinterest are American, you can easily find age-specific content that can be adapted to suit the UK educational system. To help you get started, here are some key ‘pinners’ who regularly share interesting and informative content on Pinterest:

Educators Technology.
Bio: Teachers library of the best curated EdTech content on the web.
Followers: 30.7k

Teachers on Pinterest
Bio: A pinspiring place for teachers to find and share creative ideas. Follow these boards for lesson plans, classroom decor and lots more for lively learning.
Followers: 145.4k

Pinterest for Teachers
Followers: 12.4k

UK Teaching Resources
Bio: UK teaching ideas and resources created for UK teachers.
Followers: 368

Seusstastic
Bio: I am a first grade teacher & the author of seusstastic.blogspot.com!
Followers: 81.5k

Teaching Ideas
Bio: Teaching Ideas shares free lesson ideas, classroom activity resources, educational links and news with busy teachers around the world.
Followers: 23.9k

TES Special Needs
Bio: A collection of resources, ideas and links to help you support pupils with special needs.
Followers: 240.4K

TES Teacher Tools for the UK
Followers: 138

Most good Pinterest accounts will cover a wide variety of themes, grouped into ‘boards’ so it’s easy to access what’s most interesting to you.

Create a reading list

Many teachers are using Pinterest as a place to collate and post their reading lists. Teachers can create a list and integrate it into lessons, or even start a reading challenge or club to engage students over the holidays.

Improve pupil behaviour

Acknowledging and celebrating success is key to creating a positive learning environment for students. With some intelligent suggestions for creating reward systems, as well as ideas on how to address wider behavioural issues, teachers can use Pinterest to help create motivated and confident pupils that are inspired to do their best.

Network with other teachers

Pinterest makes it easy to swap pins and ideas with educators across the globe; helping to keep lessons fresh and exciting. To do this, as well as connecting with existing contacts, teachers can also search for educational content and boards, and follow those educators that inspire them.

Become an educational thought-leader

Admired lesson plans on Pinterest can be posted and reposted thousands of times. So, as well as accessing other people’s boards and content, teachers can also use Pinterest to create and share their own thoughts and resources. This approach will help teachers to grow their follower base and gain greater recognition in their field.

In conclusion

A modern day enablement tool, Pinterest can help teachers to supplement lesson planning and enhance learning in the classroom; and while nothing beats face-to-face contact, it has also become a space where educators can share and learn from each other’s expertise. Helping teachers to meet their personal and professional goals, if you’re not already using Pinterest you could be missing out.