Social Media

Social media can be a blessing and a curse to educators. It can benefit student engagement, practicality, resource sharing, and a feeling of community. So many people are on social media, and the information flows nonstop. Teachers must find ways to help students navigate social media by combining traditional learning and social media (Raut & Patil, 2016).  

 10 Ways to use social media as a teaching tool in the Classroom, details different ways educators can implement social media flocabulary that can be applied to any social media app in their lessons. Social media can be used to broaden students' knowledge of different places and how content can show up in the real world through videos and apps. Also, social media can be a tool to show students how to detect misinformation with media literacy skills, how essential students' digital footprint is, and how to navigate social media communication properly. Overall, teachers can use social media in many ways to enhance and solidify their teaching content.   

The benefits of using social media in the classroom are that student's different learning styles can be accommodated and best meet students' individual needs. Also, these applications can create a feeling of community that students may not have in their immediate setting (Raut & Patil, 2016). Through implementing social media in the classroom, teachers can further teach students the importance of media literacy and digital footprint. Using apps or websites has increased the spread of resources and information in real-time and collaborative discussions (Evans, 2024). Since social media is an onslaught of information, students need help distinguishing factual and fictional items. The most notable challenge of social media to me is how distracting it can be for students who go between academic work and the media; they can quickly become off task (Raut & Patil, 2016). Also, Through the constant use of social media, students unfortunately engage in cyberbullying, which can cause other students great emotional harm. However, social media can be used to enhance learning. Teachers can teach students a lot of valuable and instantly applicable tools. Nonetheless, social media also comes with challenges that could be addressed through proper and strict modeling and monitoring.   

For my classroom, I would not be able to use social media traditionally. However, I do use the Remind app to message parents about important updates, papers I send home, and pictures of their students completing activities. In return, the parents messaged me with any questions or concerns. Suppose their student will be out sick that day if they want to check on how the student is behaving or if they do not have school on certain days. Of course, I consistently implement phone calls and face-to-face meetings with the parents, but with my population of students, this is how I can use social media. 

 

Works Cited:  

Evans, M. (2024, October 22). Social Media in Education: 13 ideas for the classroom. University of San Diego - Professional & Continuing Education. https://pce.sandiego.edu/social-media-in-education/   

Raut, V., & Patil, P. (2016). Use of Social Media in Education: Positive and Negative impact on the students. International Journal on Recent and Innovation Trends in Computing and Communication, 4(1), 281–285.  

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