Social Media and Technology in the 21st Century Classroom

Technology in the Classroom

Technology is an inevitable part of the classroom as we make our way further into the 21st century.  Many teachers have taken advantage of this and the new found popularity of social media.  Many educators are using sites like Facebook and Twitter in order to make their curriculum more accessible and attractive to their students.There is a large debate that exists over this topic and whether it crosses too many personal barriers, and everyone has a different opinion.

There are so many benefits to using social media in the classroom, if done correctly.  Students are able to connect the sites that they use at home to make their school work more interesting and relevant.  Patrick Larkin, Assistant Superintendent for learning for Burlington Public Schools in Massachusetts was quoted saying, 

“To be able to know where to find people and connect is one of the most important things we can teach our students to do,” he said. “If we can find out how the world is ticking and how things are changing from [using] social media tools outside of schools, I think it’s past time that we started embracing this tradition in our classrooms.”

This video at the end of this post is an illustration of just how important the use of technology in education is in our schools right now.  Even though it is hard to know what the world will look like economically and technologically when our new generations are graduating high school and college, we need to prepare them to compete on a global platform. 

Some other benefits include:

• Use of the of it in the classroom helps students use Social Media in a more professional manner
• "Social media tools can boost student engagement, link students to content experts, and real-world examples of classroom lessons, and help them establish and online body of work."

I grew up in a small town in suburban New York, where all of the schooling was relatively traditional, so I took a look at the staff social media policy for the New York City Department of Education, which is a bit more progressive.   They allow the use of social media and have a couple of loose rules, including this main guideline:

"a. Professional social media sites that are school-based should be designed to address reasonable instructional, educational, or extra-curricular program matters"

On top of this one guideline, they are very clear about the fact that they think educational technology and social media are tools that can enhance the learning experience.  They encourage the involvement of parents and give information that parents can use to become more familiar with the new sites.  I really agree with the NYC Department of Education when they explain that.

• For other information about these guidelines, you can visit the NYC DOE's Social Media Policy

Some basic guidelines for using technology in many schools are:

• Running parent technology nights so that there can be parent involvement in technological activities
• Make sure that teachers and students are aware of policies regarding personal versus professional profiles
• Abide by county and district policies when using social media in the classroom

Although there are many benefits to social media education, there are also many concerns that people have regarding it. Some say that the use of social media in the classroom brings too much personal interaction into the classroom.  Privacy can be breached for both teachers and students, and it is hard to find the line between personal and professional when it comes to Facebook and Twitter. Many teachers in my high school were opposed to using social media, because the fact that it is so new to the educational world is daunting.  Teachers are struggling with how to construct a grading system baed on homework assignments such as blog posts, and treading very carefully when it comes to privacy.

Pearson, and education technology company put out an info graphic that included a list of the most common social media concerns. Integrity of student submissions, as well as pinpointed privacy concerns often stop schools from creating a social media policy, because of the trouble it can cause.  Parents often get worked up about the privacy of their child's information, and it could get very messy for the school if something were to ever go wrong. For this reason, many schools think they are smarter to stay away from social media education.  In my personal opinion, I think that when schools do this, they rob children from a proper 21st Century Education.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nA1Aqp0sPQo&feature=player_embedded

References

Jukes, I (March 25, 2013). The benefit of using social media in the classroom [Blog]. Retrieved from http://fluency21.com/blog/2013/03/25/the-benefits-of-using-social-media-in-the-
classroom/

How professors are using social media (October 21st, 2013). Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/21/professors-social-media_n_4137697.html

AITSL (May, 2012). 21st century education [video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nA1Aqp0sPQo&feature=player_embedded

NYC Department of Education. (2013). NYC Department of Education social media guidelines. Retrieved from http://schools.nyc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/BCF47CED-604B-4FDD-B752-DC2D81504478/0/SMG_FINAL_20130415