{"id":2922,"date":"2012-12-18T17:30:26","date_gmt":"2012-12-18T15:30:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/oeb.global\/OEB_Newsportal\/?p=2922"},"modified":"2016-11-21T17:37:26","modified_gmt":"2016-11-21T15:37:26","slug":"the-role-of-social-and-mobile-media-in-education","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oeb.global\/oeb-insights\/the-role-of-social-and-mobile-media-in-education\/","title":{"rendered":"The role of social media in education"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>ONLINE EDUCA BERLIN 2012 was a great success and featured three outstanding sessions that focused on the role of social media in education both inside and outside the classroom.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Though these sessions differed in style, and their speakers came from varied fields, each presenter illustrated different ways in which social media is being used to enhance education and create a range of opportunities for both students and teachers alike.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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By Matthew Labrooy
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The social media theme began with Enhancing Participatory Culture: How to Design International Collaboration with Social and Mobile Media?<\/em> Ilona Buchem along with three of her students demonstrated their work as part of the \u2018Icollaborate project\u2019 in which they used Mahara, a social media platform, to aggregate the produced content, document their findings, blog their opinions and importantly receive peer feedback from other students all over the world.<\/p>\n

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It was discovered that though Mahara was a \u2018new media\u2019 for all students, it operated similar to many of the more popular social websites, thus it was easy for students to assimilate themselves into documenting and sharing their projects on this platform. The students were positive about the use of Mahara and, in particular the ability to receive praise and constructive criticism from other students of diverse cultures, which was seen as hugely motivating and important. The initiative is to be replicated in future programs at Beuth University.<\/p>\n

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The next session to provide commentary on the use of social media in education was Facebook for Education: Passing or Failing the Test? <\/em>This session discussed the successes as well as the dangers of students using social media as part of their education.<\/p>\n

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Providing a valuable presentation of \u2018lessons learned\u2019 Colin Gray of Edinburgh University explained how instead of using an existing social network such as Facebook, a social network called \u2018Napier Exchange\u2019 was built, so students and teachers could collaborate and share. While similar to Facebook it allowed teacher and students also to blog, create wiki\u2019s, share documents and have discussion groups. Napier Exchange has had unprecedented success, in particular with the rich student-teacher discussions.<\/p>\n

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On the trail of Napier exchange\u2019s success, Nick Kearney explained how using an existing platform, Facebook, was not successful. This was explained by the social media website\u2019s association with leisure time and fun; students were very talkative but never produced any materials. Kearney explains that \u201cFacebook is a social space, and not a work space\u2026 it is not good for structure, but very good for communication.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The final social media specific session was Social Media: A Teaching and Learning Experience with Facebook<\/em>, one of several \u2018learning cafes\u2019 that were popular at ONLINE EDUCA BERLIN. \u00a0The session was aimed towards educators and with a tagline as bold as \u2018how to implement Social Media into your teaching without increasing your own workload\u2019 it had a popular turnout.<\/p>\n

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This was more than a simple session where the speakers present their latest findings. Participants were encouraged to discuss the topics in groups with the presenter acting as a guide and mediator between groups. This workshop was of particular importance as it countered the previous session\u2019s argument that Facebook was a poor platform for education because of its close link with \u2018social time\u2019. Wim Oostindier explained his success using Facebook and Twitter with his language-learning students, by utilising the websites as continual reservoirs of knowledge and information \u2013 even after the course was finished.<\/p>\n

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The success that Wim Oostindier had using Facebook and Twitter, which was in sharp contrast with the failures observed by Nick Kearney can be explained by the differing usage by their students. Oostindier used Facebook as an educational \u2018supplement\u2019 and a way for motivated students to continue their learning, long after classes were over. On the contrary, Kearney\u2019s example of Facebook\u2019s failure as an educational tool had students thrown into a vast pool of strangers, telling them to start socialising and forming groups, a very different and ultimately disastrous approach.<\/p>\n

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The sessions heard many stories of success as well as a few failures, but the overarching opinion of using social media as an educational tool, was extremely positive. Educators walked away from the session with the knowledge that though social media changes the focus of education from single person to groups, the students\u2019 individual learning experience is enhanced through collaboration and informal learning with their peers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ONLINE EDUCA BERLIN 2012 was a great success and featured three outstanding sessions that focused on the role of social media in education both inside and outside the classroom.   Though these sessions differed in style, and their speakers came from varied fields, each presenter illustrated different ways in which social media is being used […]<\/p>\n

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