1

Effective Pedagogy of Social Media in the

Classroom

Gordon F Snyder Jr

Gsnyder@stcc.edu

www.twitter.com/gsnyder

www.gordostuff.com

www.ictcenter.org

2

Reference

With Presentation Download, Use,& Remix Permission

http://www.slideshare.net/ammoore/incorporating-social-media-into-the-classroom

Amy Mooreammoore@fscj.edu

www.twitter.com/amylizmoorewww.twitter.com/fscjopen

http://blog.fscj.edu/socialmedia

3

ICT Center

4

History• A division of Springfield Technical Community College in Springfield, Massachusetts

• Began in 1997 serving New England and New York secondary and post-secondary institutionsas Northeast Center for Telecom Tech.

• Focused on areas of computer networking, fiber-optics and wireless communications

5

History, continued

• Changed from the Northeast Center to the National Center in 2002

• Expanded from “physical layer” content offerings to encompass emerging technologies and more comprehensive technician education

6

Our Primary Goal

Create a comprehensive and sustainable national education system for the Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) industries.

7

Three Challenges

1. How can ICT pedagogy - both content and means of delivery - be kept current?

2. How can a group of highest quality subject matter experts be readily engaged?

3. How can the best of this knowledge be shared and disseminated across the nation quickly?

8

Community of PracticeA new vision for ICT education, partnership and collaboration

An expanding group of of academic professionals and industry experts who share a common goal of ensuring a quality and industry-relevant education for all ICT students

Spans Grade 11 through community college and four-year college levels

Formal partnerships with 14 academic institutions in 10 states

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

Join Us in Scottsdale, AZ on July 19-22,

2009

http://www.highimpact-tec.org/

18

Workshop DescriptionProvide professional development in the area of effective pedagogy of using technology to teach. This includes an understanding of the science and power of marketing; the quality of students they will attract and retain with this understanding. Each participant will be expected by the end of this course to have developed a personal six-month plan for using social media in the classroom.

The course will be an in-person, traditional class setting while using online tools in class as well as have the ability to access course materials after the course is completed. Last, qualified participants will be offered an opportunity to participate in a 6 month analysis of the effective use of social media in an educational setting.

19

Day 1

1. Join Winter Retreat wiki so that attendees will be participating in a form of social media through out the course.

2. Lecture/Discussion - Impact of the science and power of marketing to recruit and retain students within classes.

3. Participants will work independently and/or in pairs to find information regarding social media in education to share with the rest of the class. Students will post information on class wiki.

4. Discussion and sharing of information found.

5. Attendees will be offered an opportunity to participate in a 6-month study of the use of social media in an educational setting.

6. HOMEWORK - Each individual will put together a rough draft of goals for a 6-month social media plan.

20

Day 2

1. Participants will be grouped and share/ discuss their rough drafts. Overall classroom discussion will follow.

2. Participants work in stations as they work with different mobile devices and online applications to determine what devices they would like to have as part of their 6-month plan.

3. Participate in online meeting with CTC mentored college colleagues. Demonstration of use of online meeting tools like gotomeeting. Discussion topic: How technology and social media is currently being used in different classrooms and schools.

21

Day 3

1.Class presentations on individual plans for implementation of social media within their academic setting.

2.Decision on commitments to participate in 6-month follow up activities.

Original By: Hector Guerra. Remixed under Creative Commons License

23

This Presentation at a Glance

• What? Social Media Definitions• How? Some Statistics• Why? Questions and Concerns• Giving It a Try. Description of Tools and Uses• The Payoff. Classroom Examples• Talk Back. Conversation

24

The not-so magical mystery of Social media

What?

25

What Is Social Media?

Social: refers to the interaction of organisms with other organisms and their collective co-existence.

SharingSharing

Media: the storage and transmission channels or tools used to store and deliver information or data. 

InformatioInformationn

Original By: Hector Guerra. Remixed under Creative Commons License

26

Intro to Social Media ToolsWhat Is Social Media, Really?

Social Bookmarking – Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon, Delicious

Blogging – FSCJ Blogs, Wordpress, Blogger, Tumblr, Posterous

Twitter – Social Networking and Microblogging

Location-Based Social Networking – Foursquare, GoWalla, Facebook Places

Social Profile Networks – Myspace, Ning, Linked In, Facebook

27

How is higher ed using social media?

How?

28

Culture Shift: A Necessity in Online Education

Some Findings from Pearson’s new survey, “Social Media in Higher Education” (2010)

1. Nearly 25% of the 1000 respondents had accounts on four or more social networks;

2. A reasonably high number, more than 30%, communicate with students using social networks*.

3. Just over half use video, podcasts, blogs and wikis as part of their classes. 4. Social media use is higher among faculty in the Humanities and Social

Sciences than those in Mathematics, Science, Business and Economics. 5. Facebook was the most widely used social media service, with more than

60% of respondents having a Facebook account. However, YouTube was most commonly used for communicating with students*.

6. Despite the high take-up, 25% of respondents disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement that social networks are valuable for communicating with students.

7. Survey respondents use most social media tools between 10%-50% more often for personal rather than class use.*

Portions of survey findings excerpted from Stephen’s Lighthouse.

29

Ripe for the Picking!

Swapna Kumar “The Net Generation’s Informal and Educational Use of New Technologies.” ineducation.ca. 2010.

Students are almost universally using social media informally, so why not exploit that built-in knowledge to close the gap between personal and educational use, thus improving their learning experiences?

30

I’m busy. Why is this worth anything to me?

Why?

31

Social Media in the Classroom:Questions and Concerns

Does it cost anything?How much extra time

will it take for me to do this?

Is this just a distraction from what I should be focusing on?

Do I need to keep track of student work outside the LMS?

How should I grade students on their use of social media?

Is social media just a passing fad?

Why should I use social media?

What are the benefits to students?

32

Some Answers

A: Most social media platforms are free

A: Your social media efforts only have to take as much time as you prefer. Ideally, it can integrate into your existing time online

A: This is not a distraction but an effective way of reaching students.

A: Think of students’ time outside the LMS in the same way you think about the time they study together in libraries or speak on the telephone. You don’t need to track it, yet you know it’s valuable.

A: You don’t grade students on phone calls or social interactions on campus; you encourage those interactions, but only grade on the outcomes they create.

A: Social media has already insinuated itself into nearly every aspect of life. If anything, it will grow more pervasive.

A: Only you can answer this question.

A: The benefits to students are: more communication with you and with one another. More opportunities to learn outside the classroom, to gain context, some degree of integration of academic and personal lives.

33

Intersection and Integration

Image from http://mchabib.com/2006/10/05/digital-library-as-third-place

We have an opportunity to reach students in that rich area between socializing and formal learning – why would we ignore that opportunity for engagement?

34

How to give social media a try in your classes – if you’re so inclined

Giving It a Try

35

A Caveat:Cart before Horse = Bad

Rather than pursuetechnologies just becausethey’re the new hit in theblogosphere, think in termsof desired outcomes first,and then find technologiesthat can aid in reachingthose outcomes.

So – what are some of yourdesired learning outcomes?

*

36

Some Options for Online Instructors(How to Help Students Reach Desired Learning Outcomes)

Conduct Office Hours via Skype or Elluminate

Use Twitter hash tags to organize weekly discussions

Use Social Bookmarking to Note Important Sites for Learning

Create a Class Group Page on Facebook

Use Google Docs for Group Work and Collaboration

Use Skype to Bring in a Guest Speaker (and record the talk)

Use Foursquare for students to check in at assigned locations

Create Foursquare educational scavenger hunt

Create a college WikiSend Video Messages (via

Eyejot) rather than Standard E-Mail

Use Google Earth or Google Maps to Explore Cities or Regions of the World

Have students create blogs to journal and display work

37

What’s This “Twit” Business?

From Twitter.com –“Twitter is a real-time information network powered by people all around the world that lets you share and discover what’s happening now.”

1.Visit Twitter.com to create an account. 2.Create a username that is simply your name, or some variation on it.3.Share your username with students, ask them to follow you, and follow them.4.Start a conversation – using a prompt of 140 characters or less, with a topical “hashtag.”5.Watch the conversations collect around that topic!

38

Google What? Google Docs.Some Features and How to Start

Upload and convert Word, rtf, txt, xls, and Open Office docs and spreadsheets, or create from scratch.

Edit documents with whomever you choose.

Make comments on documents for others to see.

Share documents with anyone you choose.

Chat in real-time with others as you edit and collaborate on work.

1. Sign up for a free Google account.

2. Visit docs.google.com• Create or upload

documents, spreadsheets, or forms, and share!

• Watch the collaboration in real-time.

39

Skype and Elluminate

These services are free; why not give them a try for virtual office hours? Online students’ number-one complaint is lack of communication with professors; this is a great solution. Simply commit a couple of hours per week (preferably timed to accommodate those in different time zones) to make yourself available for synchronous chat.

1.Visit skype.com or elluminate.com(Use free “VRoom” option in Elluminate)2.Create your account.3.Share your account info with students.4.Set a schedule of times you’ll be logged in.5.Offer regular synchronous sessions as a supplement/alternative to regular LMS-constrained communications.

40

Some Real Examples and Outcomes

The Payoff

41

Backchannel Conversation

University of Texas at Dallas History Professor, Monica Rankin, has found

an interesting way to [engage students] using Twitter in the classroom.

Rankin uses a weekly hashtag to organize comments, questions and feedback posted by students to Twitter during class. Some of the students have downloaded Tweetdeck to their computers, others post by SMS or by writing questions on a piece of paper. Rankin then projects a giant image of live Tweets in the front of the class for discussion and suggests that students refer back to the messages later when studying. ..[while individual levels of engagement are mixed] it is clear that more students are participating in classroom discussions

than they used to.

Marshall Kirkpatrick. “How One Teacher Uses Twitter in the Classroom.” ReadWriteWeb.com. June 1, 2009.

42

“As Good as Face-to-Face”A Case Study of Ning Implementation

“there was a positive shift in student perceptions as evidenced in…end-of-course evaluations.” “the students wrote about the importance of Ning and the social environment” “personalization and knowing others increased their enjoyment, sense of involvement, and the friendliness of the course, all elements typically accorded to the attitudinal domain of learning, particularly motivation and engagement. “ “A few noted that the interactions were as good as face-to-face classes…On the rating of preference for distance learning over classroom learning, two-thirds now rated distance learning as good as or better than F2F, a significant increase from earlier evaluations in classes without Ning.”

Ellen Hoffman. “Social Media and Learning Environments: Shifting Perspectives on the Locus of Control.” ineducation.ca. Issue 2. May 2010.

43

“The Ultra-Collaborative Composition Classroom”

A Case Study of GoogleDocs Use

Julie Meloni. Washington State University. 2009.

44

What are your thoughts?How Can we help you get started?

Contact Usammoore@fscj.edu

www.twitter.com/amylizmoorewww.twitter.com/fscjopen

Please Feel Free to Download, Use,and Remix this Presentation

Social Media Tutorials Available @ http://www.fscj.edu/tutorials/index.html?

webSiteID=fm72vxfLVEqp37iOFomo5g&pageIndex=1

Talkback