Social Media Applications in K-12 1

Social Media Applications in K-12

Chandace C. LeSure

ED 501-5A Integrating Technology Across the Curriculum: Research and Assessment

Professor: Victoria Eby

Notre Dame College

May 20, 2019

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Abstract

The objective of this paper is to research and discuss the potential benefits of teachers using

social media applications as a means of teaching. Thanks to technology today, both teachers and

students can interact with each other in a matter of seconds. Students often complain about being

intimidated or bored in the classroom, social network applications may help them feel

comfortable to express their creativity and voice their opinion. Given that a large number of

internet users are teachers and students, social media seem to have greatly influence the way we

teach and learn.

Keywords: Benefits, Collaboration, Communication, Education, Engagement, and Social

Media.
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Social Media Applications in K-12

Relating with students on a social and academic level is very important. As educators we

should teach our students how to properly use social media. Integrating social media applications

in the classroom can be very beneficial to both teachers and students. Creativity on the teacher’s

hand will be needed to incorporate teaching standards. Social media applications that can be

effective in the K-12 environment include but are not limited to: TeacherTube, YouTube, and

Google+, all these applications provides a fast thrilling educational experience. However, it can

also be frustrating and confusing with so much to choose from. That’s why as educators we have

to our own research to determine what is best for our students based on educational standards

and classroom environment.

Social Media Apps

TeacherTube has useful tools that help teachers communicate with students. Their goal is

to provide an online community for sharing instructional videos. They seek to fill a need for a

more educationally focused, safe venue for teachers, schools, and home learners. It is a site to

provide anytime, anywhere professional development with teachers teaching teachers. As well, it

is a site where teachers can post videos designed for students to view in order to learn a concept

or skill.

YouTube is useful at any grade level, they have an education level with all sorts of

education, docs, and audio. YouTubes Educational Channel provides engaging information and,

on any subject, and topic relating to education. Videos are presented in an engaging manner that

is easy to listen to and entertaining. Videos are now used for classroom lectures, institutional

promos, bulletins and newsletters, and teacher training. YouTube has been leading the change as

the most versatile medium for disseminating video content in the classroom and beyond.
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Google+ is an app that has great graphics and themes that takes teachers and students to a

greater understanding of education and media. This app gives schools that aim to simplify

creating, distributing and grading assignments in a paperless way. The primary purpose of

Google Classroom is to streamline the process of sharing files between teachers and students.

This well-rounded app is one of my favorites to use in my 9th-12th classroom. With visual posts

texts and images students, allowing you to get a snapshot or video along with the text of the post.

Exploring the Potential Benefits of Using Social Media in Education

Social media applications foster collaboration as they allow students to work together to

achieve a common goal. Collaboration means working together jointly, intellectually, and

socially to achieve common goals. Within an online learning community, collaboration refers to

any instructional method in which students work together in groups towards a common goal

[11]. As such collaborative learning can be viewed as encompassing all group-based

instructional methods, including cooperative learning. Following Ingram and Hathorn [12], true

collaboration consists of three critical elements: participation, interaction, and synthesis. This

means that collaboration in educational settings requires that students move beyond merely

dividing up assignments (p. 2).

Conclusion

Overall, exploring the potential and advantages of social media in education is beneficial.

Research and experience have revealed that these online social apps have many educational

benefits for grades K-12. Therefore, educators should use online social communities whether

they are working in fully inline, blended, or face-to-face learning contexts. Within the traditional
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classroom, providing students with additional learning materials can be very expensive and

logistically complicated. This would enable students to learn from each other and interact with

other people beyond the school walls.

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References

Faizi, R., Afia, A. E., & Chiheb, R. (2013). Exploring the Potential Benefits of Using Social

Media in Education. International Journal of Engineering Pedagogy (iJEP), 3(4), 50.

doi:10.3991/ijep.v3i4.2836
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