The Diigo group that I joined this week is Michael M. Grant’s Viral Notebook. Michael M. Grant is a professor at the University of Memphis, focusing on learning environments, graphic and instructional design to support learning, and specific learner characteristics. There are a number of really good posts about education and technology in this group. Dr. Grant also maintains a blog viral-notebook.com and a well-organized wiki that others might find useful.
Social media sites have a great deal of appeal to both young and old. Individuals use social networking sites like Facebook to connect with friends and family, share pictures, play games, and commemorate life events. Individuals use other social networking sites like Twitter to share brief posts, pictures, news stories, and comments about events and news stories. Twitter is becoming an important site for users to advertise their business or promote their blog or website. There are a number of photo and video sharing websites, and social networking sites for practically any interest. Social networks allow individuals to share what is interesting to them.
Social media websites can have tremendous potential for use in the classroom. They allow users to share, collaborate, and create a learning network. Networks allow people to make powerful connections with one another, connections that can enhance learning. Many schools block access to social media websites, and there are security and privacy issues that must be addressed when using social media. Some people and schools view social media as time wasters, so this perception needs to be altered if social media is to be used for educational purposes.
I do spend some time on social networking sites, like Facebook and Twitter. I use Facebook to check out what kind of posts and pictures my friends are sharing, and sometimes to share pictures, check-ins or posts of my own. On Twitter, I read the posts of those users that I follow. I have many users that I follow organized into lists, by interest, location, or type or user. I have several lists on Twitter, from locals to foodies, celebrities to members of the media. Twitter is a great place to follow breaking news stories. I have to admit that it’s kind of cool if someone influential retweets a tweet that you posted, or acknowledges your response to a post of yours. By the way, did you know that actor Hugh Grant became a father again today? He announced it on Twitter.
There are some benefits to participating on social media sites. You can get a lot of information quickly, read about what other people are interested in, learn new things, and become acquainted with others in virtual ways. There is so much information available, it is easy to get lost in it, and it can be difficult at first to determine what is meaningful and what is not. Like anything else in life, a balance between the virtual world and other interests with people and activities and the real world are important.
You make a great point about how social media is blocked or controlled in schools and it's probably necessary in many respects. Not only do school administrators need to learn how to better integrate this type of technology into the classroom, but students need to learn (be taught?) how to use this type of technology appropriately and wisely. While it's a lot of fun to use facebook and twitter for communication, students need to understand that once a picture, video, or comment is out there, it can be there for all to see and jeopardize a student's admission into a selective college, a person's ability to get (or keep) a job, and much more.
ReplyDeleteYou also made a comment about the difficulty in determining "what is meaningful and what is not." I certainly agree with you on this point, but would add one thing-- that the meaning depends on the user. Much of what I might find meaningful and useful on the web may not be at all meaningful and useful to someone else. So, it's all in the eye of the beholder.