Beyond Passing Notes: Social Networking in the Classroom

On October 1, 2010 The Social Network was released into movie theatres around the world.  In less than a month, the blockbuster had grossed over $132 million (Wikipedia).  This film, about the rise of the most popular website of all time Facebook, received critical acclaim and has even generated Oscar buzz.

Not bad for a movie about a site not many had heard about until a couple of years ago!

First Impressions

Some Facebook stats (Wikipedia):

• Facebook has been intermittently blocked by some countries such as Syria, Pakistan, China, Vietnam and North Korea (not to mention thousand of workplaces and school districts around the world!)
• In December, 2009 the New Oxford American Dictionary declared their word of the year to be the verb "unfriend”
• As of July 2010, Facebook had 500 million active users (that comes out to about 1 in 14 of the world’s population)
• The fastest growing section of the population joining Facebook are women over 55 (Inside Facebook)

With statistics such as these, it’s hard to ignore the societal and cultural implications that social networking has on our lives and the lives of our students.  Facebook has become a tool for people to connect with old classmates, update friends and family on life changes and a place to post photos and videos for comment.  It is a part of our world and pervades television shows and advertising on a daily basis.  Our students are using Facebook, no doubt about it, so the question becomes how do we, as educators, leverage the power of this tool for our purposes?

Bringing it Home

I have been using Facebook for a couple of years now.  I check it daily to see what my friends are posting and updating.  I enjoy the ability to share photos and send messages, and I even throw out the odd status update (“off to Cabo!” or “Happy Friday everyone!”) but I do try to be responsible with what appears on my page.  I keep my privacy settings to the highest limits and, as a steadfast rule, do not “friend” students or their parents.  I do not update the world on what I am doing every minute of every day and I rarely post photos or videos of friends, family or myself.   I see Facebook as a personal tool and do not see myself ever using it for professional purposes (in the classroom or out).   It is for these reasons I approached this week’s blog post with trepidation: after all, how am I supposed to write a post about social networking in the classroom if I truly don’t see myself using it in this way?

And then, something wonderful happened: I discovered Edmodo.  Edmodo is the wannabe technologically with-it teacher’s new best friend.  According to the site, Edmodo is “a private social platform for students and teachers to share ideas, files, events and assignments.”  The look of Edmodo is a lot like Facebook and it has some amazing features (more on this later).  Signing up and getting started with Edmodo is easy, in a few clicks you are ready to start collaborating and communicating with your students on a whole new level.

After choosing a username and password the first thing I needed to do is set up a group.  I decided to create a mock group for my class members of EDES 544:

After creating my group I then received a unique access code that I can share with only the students I wish to.  This way you could set up multiple groups for different classes taught (or professional learning networks) and easily keep everything straight:

Next, I wanted to play around a little bit with the basic functions of the site.  I sent out an “announcement”:

I added a poll for students to view and respond to when they logged on:

And I easily added an assignment.  You can type the assignment in and upload a file for more details or even a rubric:

Another handy feature of Edmodo is that everything you upload as you are using it (links, documents, etc.)  goes into a “personal filing cabinet” in your account.  This would make it even easier to use for a second year around, if you are teaching the same subjects of course.

After going through this process I was curious to see how a student would experience my EDES 544 Edmodo group, so I created a dummy student account to check it out:

Pretty cool!!  Edmodo also has many more features that I have yet to explore.  There is an RSS feed that would allow you to aggregate blog posts you wish to share with your students, a calendar and even mobile phone updates!  Students (or their parents) could receive a text when you post a new assignment, grade or due date. 

Edmodo would also lend itself beautifully to professional development opportunities and learning networks.  Groups can be created around content and subject areas and even personal interests such as a book club.  As a teacher who enjoys using Facebook in my personal life, I think I would find using Edmodo quite motivating.

Bringing it to School

After thinking about Facebook and discovering Edmodo, it seems that this week I am exploring a loaded dilemma:

Facebook in the classroom: to do it, or not to do it?  That is the question.

The educational technology community is abuzz with this debate.  During my research I came across countless debates, blog posts and podcasts that included viewpoints ranging from “no way” to “go for it”.   Will Richardson in his book Blogs, wikis, podcasts and other powerful web tools for educators on the debate:

“Whatever the challenges that prevent us from making social networking a part of our curriculum, they should not stop us from being able to talk about Facebook or to share our own experiences there in appropriate ways so kids at an early age have some context about for what the expectations and roles are that await them there.” (p. 134)

In one of his blog posts he makes his stance more clear: “Teach. Facebook. Now.”  Doug Johnson adds to the discussion by saying:

 “As others have said, I think that it is important for teachers and administrators to have Facebook accounts so they understand the technology and its implications. And, eventually, I think schools will come to leverage social media technology in many of their instructional and collaborative processes.”

But, Doug makes an important distinction by clarifying that it is within “walled garden” environments that social networking will be most feasible in our schools: “we will begin to see more and more social networking features grafted onto learning management systems and other software already in use in schools.”  To me, this is where sites such as Edmodo will help bridge the gap between the using social networking sites for personal use and help ensure that the the private and public worlds of teachers and students remain separate.  

However, despite the benefits of using these tools in the classroom, educators are facing some strong resistance from stakeholders regarding Facebook (and the like) in the classroom.  The site is blocked in many districts and some teachers and parents see then as "nothing more than forums for hurtful behaviours like gossiping and cyber-bullying" and "worry about the time spent staring at digital profiles, convinced that our students are losing the social skills necessary for interacting in face-to-face environments." (Ferritier & Garry, 2010, p. 122).

There are a couple of reasons why it is becoming so important to teach students responsible behaviour in online environments (especially social networking sites).  "The persistent, searchable and replicable nature of digital conversations held publicly in front of invisible audiences means that social gaffes can be especially costly for today's teens" (Ferritier & Garry, 2010, p.124).  We need to be teaching our students that whatever they put out on the Internet today can impact major aspects of their life down the road.  

Packing Up and Moving On

The bottom line is this: our students are using Facebook and social networking sites daily, even hourly.  As responsible, “with-it” educators we should be tapping into the power of these sites, as well as teaching students how to use them properly.  Teaching kids to be responsible citizens in their digital world is becoming more and more important (and urgent) in society today.  

Next stop: Twitter....

References:

Ferritier, W.M. & Garry, A. (2010). Teaching the iGeneration: 5 easy ways to introduce essential skills with web 2.0 tools.  Bloomington, IN: Solution Tree Press.