Socializing in the Age of Technology
“Like all technology, social media is neutral but is best put to work in the service of building a better world.” — Simon Mainwaring
Social media is a prevalent part of our day to day lives. I have four Google accounts, one personal account, one from the University of Hawaiʻi and two from Kamehameha Schools (thankfully one is going away soon as we move to a new domain). I have a Facebook, Twitter (I used to have two), Instagram, Two Google+ (see the previous sentence), a YouTube channel, and this blog on Medium (and a WordPress version that I will copy this into later). I’m active on Foursquare (sorry, Swarm), Edmodo, Thinglink, Shelfari, Pinterest, my Playstation Network account, a clan in Clash of Clans, Soundcloud and Beats Music and those are just the accounts that I have accessed within the past week or two. I use Pushbullet so that I can get notifications from my cell phone on my laptop screen and I wear a Pebble so that I can get my notification on my wrist when Iʻm not able to access my phone. It’s exhausting considering how connected we have become. Ok, so maybe we isnʻt the operative term, I understand that my connectedness is my own doing and is a little extreme, but considering the direction that we are headed, how long will it be until this becomes the norm rather than a rarity.
As I reviewed the infographic by Katie Lepi in Edudemic on “How Social Media is Being Used in Education,” I was intrigued to see that only 55% of higher education faculty use social media in heir day to day lives. However, it was nice to note that 41% of faculty use social media in the classroom, thatʻs roughly 75% of faculty social media users. This tells me that these faculty members see the value of social media.
In my classroom, I use a closed social media tool called Edmodo. I have it set up so that students can send me a direct message in Edmodo and I will receive a text message on my cell phone alerting me of their message. This allows me to be available to my students whenever they need me. Consider that for a moment. At any time, one of my students can get in touch with me, instantly. That to me is both the blessing and the curse of where we are headed with social media. If I am always connected to my students, I can give them assistance, but I have to always be “on,” which can, quite frankly, get exhausting. It is important to set up boundaries when using social media in education. My students know what a direct message to me in Edmodo is for emergency only, when all other avenues have been exhausted. Most students instead send their questions out to the group as a whole and a great community of learning has emerged. I often see questions like “hey guys, I was absent, what was for homework?” or “what is Mr. Bowmanʻs email address again?” or “I donʻt understand question number 4 HELP!!!!!!!” I feel like I am captitalizing on the direction that the world is moving in and through the use of social media in the classroom, I am also able to teach digital literacy and by extension, digital citizenship. Itʻs an exciting time to be a connected teacher, but Iʻm not sure that all teachers are ready to be that connected. According to Edudemic, at least 59% arenʻt quite ready yet. but as you can see, the students are most definitely ready to be connected.
