Gwen Mueller is an IT Professional, #dnd Gamer-girl, #coffee drinker, geek in Secondary Education, editor on tumblr #education, curating #science, and #tech resources to inspire lifelong learning with 1/4 cup of #fun.
Showing 85 posts tagged Social media
By focusing only on content, new online instructors often forget about the social aspects that engage students and foster community building.
Here are five ways you can build social presence in your online class:
- Have your online students introduce themselves.
- Introduce yourself to your students.
- Create a “commons area” for off-topic discussions.
- Use synchronous tools for office hours.
- Don’t be the center of every discussion.
High-res
Fear of Missing Out Drives Use of Social Media
Emerging research implies that fear of not keeping up with friends, and consequently missing some fun, motivates use of Facebook or Twitter.
Experts say the rise in social media, where we can keep up-to-date with each other’s every movements like never before, has led to the curse of “fear of missing out” (FoMO). And a new study develops a way to measure the concept of FoMO.
“I find Facebook rewarding to use, but how we are using social media is changing,” said Przybylski. “It is no longer something we have to sit at a computer and log into as we have access all the time on our phones. It is easier to get into the rhythm of other people’s lives that ever before as we get alerts and texts. We have to learn new skills to control our usage and enjoy social media in moderation. Until we do, it creates a double-edged sword aspect to social media.”
image via flickr:CC | AFS-USA
High-res
As more classrooms fill up with technology, so increases the need for our students to truly understand the concept of Digital Footprint. There are quite a few great websites geared toward kids. Here are a few to explore with your students:
Where is the line of appropriate contact? As an educator, I would not want people posting items to my personal page nor calling me at home uninvited. How much training do we provide for our staffs about issues like this? Connecting with parents and students through personal pages? Are mandates and policies needed? Guidelines?
stoweboyd asks:
Please take my survey, here. I’ll publish results.
High-res
Social Media Helps Students Bond, Say Researchers
Both in and out of school, students are socializing more online. According to an annual report released last month by the Pew Internet and American Life project, 95 percent of teenagers are active online, and nearly three out of four children ages 12 to 17 access the Internet via mobile devices, making virtual connections much more integral to most students’ daily lives.
At the same time, more than 6.7 million students took at least one online class in 2012 according to an annual national survey; most of those classes require students to interact or collaborate with classmates and instructors virtually.
The closer the virtual method to live interaction, Ms. Sherman found, the better students were able to engage socially. Students using video chat—which allows the most identification of facial and body gestures, voice inflection, and other cues—had the greatest depth of social interaction, and students reported the greatest feeling of social engagement afterward. Students using text messaging felt and acted the least connected.
photo via flickr:CC | rorymarinich
High-res
Social Media, Facebook & Twitter Use May Harm Grades of College Freshman
A new research study finds that widespread use of media among freshman college students may compromise academic performance.
Researchers determined that freshmen women spend nearly half their day — 12 hours — engaged in some form of media use, particularly texting, music, the Internet and social networking. Investigators discovered that media use was generally associated with lower grade point averages (GPAs) and other negative academic outcomes.
However, there were two exceptions as newspaper reading and listening to music were actually linked to a positive academic performance.
photo via flickr:CC | Jason A. Howie
It behooves parents to keep up with the technological advances, not because they are good or evil, but because we need to learn their values and their dangers so that we can help our kids. We cannot help them navigate the landscape of social media, if we don’t know how works.
But there is a more important reason: When our children know something we don’t know, it gives our relationship with them a chance to be reciprocal. Kids teaching adults? That’s good for the family in the short run and the future of homo sapiens on the planet in the long run.
“Think Facebook’s your biggest productivity killer in the office? Think again. Social network-obsessed employees just might be your highest performers. A recent survey by the data analytics firm Evolv suggests that employees who use up to four social media networks are exceptionally productive—and they stay in their jobs longer, too.”
(via brooklynmutt)
Key: set a schedule, tell students, and stick to it!
While some begrudge the ubiquitous distraction of social media, others are using Facebook to build community in their classes. Hosting a class page, they say, promotes solidarity in large classes in particular, by providing a place where students who might not otherwise connect outside of class share digital flash cards and encourage each other to study harder.
“They’re not competing, they seem to be saying, ‘Look, we are in this together,’” says University of Kentucky psychology professor Jonathan Golding, PhD. He uses Facebook to answer questions about labs and assignments, highlight deadlines and post psychology humor and YouTube videos that reinforce course concepts for his classes. “As an instructor, that’s a very gratifying feeling.”
New research, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, shows that surprisingly accurate estimates of Facebook users’ race, age, IQ, sexuality, personality, substance use and political views can be inferred from automated analysis of only their Facebook Likes — information currently publicly available by default.
Models proved 88% accurate for determining male sexuality, 95% accurate distinguishing African-American from Caucasian American and 85% accurate differentiating Republican from Democrat. Christians and Muslims were correctly classified in 82% of cases, and good prediction accuracy was achieved for relationship status and substance abuse — between 65 and 73%.
But few users clicked Likes explicitly revealing these attributes. For example, less that 5% of gay users clicked obvious Likes such as Gay Marriage. Accurate predictions relied on ‘inference’ — aggregating huge amounts of less informative but more popular Likes such as music and TV shows to produce incisive personal profiles.
“Understand the social network not as your new water cooler, but as your new production line.”
(via stoweboyd)
What most students (and parents) fail to realize is that the success of the American college system has less to do with the quality of the formal education than it does with the social engineering project that is quietly enacted behind the scenes each year. Roommates are structured to connect incoming students with students of different backgrounds. Dorms are organized to cross-breed the cultural diversity that exists on campus. Early campus activities are designed to help people encounter people who’s approach to the world is different than theirs. This process has a lot of value because it means that students develop an appreciation for difference and build meaningful relationships that will play a significant role for years to come. The friendships and connections that form on campuses shape future job opportunities and help create communities that change the future. We hear about famous college roommates as exemplars. Heck, Facebook itself was created by a group of Harvard roommates. But the more basic story is how people learn to appreciate difference, often by suffering through the challenges of entering college together.
Facebook Can Stimulate Cognition in Older Adults
Researchers wanted to study whether teaching older adults to use the popular social networking site could help improve their cognitive performance and make them feel more socially connected.
Specifically, after learning to use Facebook, seniors performed about 25 percent better on tasks designed to measure their ability to continuously monitor and to quickly add or delete the contents of their working memory — a function known in the psychology world as “updating.”
photo via flickr:CC | KimSanDiego
