Activity 7: Learning through Social Media

 

Social Media can serve a myriad of purposes in learning. It can be used to:

·         Help shy students. Shy students who may feel uncomfortable approaching their teacher in person can use social media as a way to communicate. 

·         Share interesting websites. Both students and instructors can share interesting websites or links related to topics o interest via social media.

·         Foster collaboration among students and their audiences as they work together on projects and participate in dynamic learning opportunities.

·         Assign class assignments or grades. Teacher can allow students to set up e-mail accounts then e-mail assignments to them r their test results.

Social Media can also

•  support interaction which is a highly effective form of active learning. It helps learners to network with people of similar passion and goals as well as to share ideas and experiences, and obtain competencies implanted in real life, unravel opportunities and recommend the path to success.

• allow persons to experience natural learning which has a direct impact on the way people learn.

• help learners to easily access information anytime and anywhere. It also facilitates access of information of a diverse kind on a given topic with ease and efficiency. In turn, it supports lifelong learning processes.

• allow learners to access information through a range of visuals, text and perceptions on a given subject. It also encourages one to actively participate by posting content on social networking sites. It helps users post or express individual views, thereby generating a great deal of content on the site.

Social media can have both positive and negative effects on learning but as Teachers, we must teach appropriate and ethical use of technology and be proactive rather than reactive. There can be great uncertainty because social media is subjected to continuous change and may lack the required structure to fit into the exact learning need.