Promoting Your Comic Con is the fifth post in a series about Comic Cons.
Now that you know that you are having a Comic Con, it is time to get the word out. One of the tricky things that we have found, is that it is really not clear what a Comic Con is until it has been experienced. Make sure that at the very least staff, students, and families know that it is a literacy event.
You can also call it a STEM or STEAM event.
First things first, get it on the school calendar. We always put it on the calendar the year before to make sure that no one else scoops up your day!
Get posters up. We hang these bad boys up around the building, put them in Seesaw, and post on the school’s Social Media about a month or so before so the date is out there.
About two to three weeks before the event, you are going to want to share a little bit more information with families and staff.
Families will want to make sure that the children can come to school dressed up. This is also a great opportunity to clarify the costume guidelines. For us, we ask that it be based on a character, school appropriate, and no masks or props until the parade. Below is a video that we shared with families in Seesaw about two weeks out from the event.
We did something similar for the staff. One slight difference is that we provided them with some general information about what they day would look like.
To make these videos, we first uploaded the Jachimo template from SlidesCarnivals into Google Slides. We made a few edits to share information; keeping in mind to keep it as brief as possible. Once the slideshow was complete, we used Screencastify to record the screen while we shared information with each slide. Once the videos were done, we shared the family video in Seesaw, and the staff video via email.
One thing that is really successful when promoting any event, is providing a count down. You don’t want to overdo it and annoy people, but you do want everyone to remember that it is coming up! I recommend reminding everyone at these points:
We do this in Seesaw and on the school’s social media accounts.
We have found that the students watch the Seesaw videos and spread the word about what to look forward to during Comic Con. I put aside time during scheduled library media classes about two to three weeks before the event to do a rapid fire Q&A. They can ask anything they want about Comic Con. They just have to raise their hand, and I will answer questions only once. In other words, if one students asks a question I will answer it. Everyone else’s job is to listen because I won’t answer that same question again.
