CDES 219 Blog Post #7

Social Media & Learning: How has social media changed learning?

I believe social media has allowed for the ease of sharing material with students, either from a teacher or peer to peer. Having something like a Facebook group for a class discussion section could be very beneficial. Social media's core design is the streamline and ease of sharing content among a large amount of people. With a platform of that design, there is a simplicity of sharing everything from articles to YouTube videos. With a teacher as an admin or group administrator, the group could be carefully monitored so that students don't post unrelated content or get off topic. Social media has the potential to replace traditional practices such as after school study groups. Students no longer would need to all be available at the same time to give input on a project, and the teacher also has the capacity to answer questions or clarify a piece of information in a group setting. This also helps to reduce the confusion of tons of emails to a teacher, all trying to keep track of each individual thread, in which they could all be related to a similar question or topic.
It also allows students to pool ideas and resources.

It is my personal opinion, however, that social media only be used as a tool at the teacher's disposal, to be used at their discretion. Much like a calculator or pencils, social media should simply be available as a tool and not a core component of traditional classroom teaching. This may not hold as true to all online classes/online schools.