Engaging Students with Social Media at SciO13
I won't be able to attend the ScienceOnline conference this year, but hope to follow along using some of the new remote participation tools. One of the sessions I am interested in is Engaging Students with Social Media by CogSci Librarian and Nerdlet Estuary. They have a questionnaire for their session that I am going to answer here.
Do you use social media to engage with your students?
- For work I currently use social media to engage with the teachers and organizers of our programs with students but not with K-12 student directly. We do use social media directly with adult learners.
What was your biggest social media success in the classroom? Failure?
- I've used Shutterfly in the past to organize events and photos for workshop participants. They have a theme for organizing student groups. It's a sort of poorman's Ning.
To what extent should social media be embedded in curriculum? Or used to supplement the curriculum?
- It already is in the hidden curriculum. But formally, I occasionally get contacted by students via Twitter, etc. as part of their school projects.
Are some social media tools more academic than others?
- If by academic you mean the second definition (not of practical relevance; of only theoretical interest), then I guess Google+ counts for that. :)
How can we help students navigate their personal vs. academic / professional personas?
- Publishing social media under a pseudonym (=/ anonymous) can help separate personal from professional writing. But those boundaries are blurring and increasingly difficult to separate.
How important is social media to our students’ future? As they consider jobs and/or graduate school?
- The things that I posted 10+ years ago online are still out there. I expect it will be even more true for students now. So whatever they are posting online now (both good and bad) could potentially be there in their future.
How does social media advance the content of the courses?
- It's easier to contact primary resources. One can theoretically find the author of a research paper and very likely find some social media channel by which to contact them directly.
Does social media improve the efficiency of communication?
- Depends on how you set the noise to signal filters.
If you aren’t using social media to teach, what would make you start?
- N/A.