Social Media

                 Social media has become the easiest way to stay in touch with family, friends from high school and college, and colleagues. Like most, I typically begin my day by logging on to Facebook to get the latest updates from my friends and family. Social media has become such a mainstay in everyone’s life, regardless of age. Tweens to 80-year-olds enjoy interacting online for various reasons, but it all boils down to communication.  

     My example of social media interaction is a conversation on Facebook that occurred a couple of years after graduation. According to the MAPS heuristic, this social media thread is very casual with a goal of staying in touch. One person tagged everyone from the same graduating class to share what was going on in their life. Everyone from the graduating class had news to share. It was amazing to see where everyone was working, as well as information from their personal life. This thread could have been the start to many conversations through the existing thread, a new thread, or private message. Collaborating with others by sharing lesson plans and strategies that work in the classroom is an exciting way to continue a relationship, even if it is simply through social media. This thread could have been more digitally enhanced by adding photos and video. Even though life gets busy, staying in touch is easy through social media because it offers so many features.

     Since social media is so embedded in our lives, it only makes sense to integrate it into the classroom. Educators have an obligation to teach students to become responsible digital citizens. Johnson (2010) explains that teachers should advocate using social media in the classroom to teach students how to become knowledgeable users. We would not give a brand new car to a 13-year-old without a license. Yet most 13-year-olds are given permission to explore and use social media without learning how to use all of the features safely. According to Hicks (2013), young people are constructing their identities, building (or destroying) relationships, creating new opportunities for learning, and remixing media to create new compositions. Students use social media to discuss, promote, and share their thoughts and opinions with the world. According to Hicks (2013), encouraging students to think about what they are saying in text, will help them to present a positive image and participate in a variety of communities safely. Teaching students to become responsible digital citizens is critical because their digital footprint will remain with them for the rest of their life. 

References

Hicks, T. (2013). Crafting digital writing: Composing texts across media and 

     genres. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Johnson, S. 2010, March 11. Guest Blog: Making the case for social media

     in education. Edutopia. Retrieved November 21, 2014, from 

     www.edutopia.org/social-media-case-education-edchat-steve-
                 johnson.