Reflection on Social Media

What potential threats and concerns do you have about the use of social media in education? Why might students feel uncomfortable about using social media in a course and how might a teacher best educate and facilitate successful use of social media?

Social media has created a reality where social and educational life is intertwined. This is a great interest for teacher’s who want to set their students up with a prosperous future in whatever they teach.  There are three main concerns of social media and education we could discuss: context management, social media as a distraction, and degrading grammar skills. And finding out the best way to teach social media practices when there is so much information and interconnectivity of personal and professional forums.

Many colleges and universities now include some kind of social media etiquette statement in their student handbooks. Some colleges are pushing for more social media education, while other schools do not see that as a need. I think starting social media education is important for younger generations. I believe the best way to facilitate successful use of social media is though progressive education. As an educator social media etiquette can be intimidating because there is so much to teach about protecting yourself on the internet.  

Social media is so contextual, which can be dangerous for students who do not censor themselves. An example of these “blurred lines” would be employers and colleges looking at potential candidates’ personal Facebook pictures, posted pictures that some do not recognize as inappropriate.  A more intense example of social media ambiguity is the case of Caleb Jamaal Clemmons. Clemmons, a 20 year old, former Georgia Southern University psychology student, was arrested after telling his followers on Tumblr that “i plan on shooting up georgia southern. pass this around to see the affect it has. to see if i get arrested.” Clemmons’s experiment was a success. He was arrested hours after the post, spent six months in jail and is now banned from social media for the five years he will be on probation. No evidence was found that show Clemmons intended to act on the threat.

Social media can also serve as a distraction for students. For example, Facebook, instead of tuning into CNN, The New York Times, or Google News, many students find themselves refreshing a newsfeed that updates them on what is going on within their community of friends, and not the outside world, which may have affects their grades. There is also no way to monitor what students are doing on their own personal devices. Yet, educators encourage projects where internet use is necessary. I do not know a way this can be prevented. However, being aware of this possibility with your students may be beneficial in how we teach and assign projects.

Another threat social media brings to our generation of educators and students, alike, is improper use of English language. According to William J. Bennett of CNN, the College Board found that just last year, “SAT reading scores for the high school class of 2011 were the lowest on record, and combined reading and math scores fell to their lowest point since 1995."  The article went on to state that much of the concern is due to the fact that the score deteriorated the most in the writing section, which is reflective of students’ abilities to control grammar, as well as understand vocabulary. This is because we straight-up depend on our computers to correct our error and instantly validate our work. It is very interesting look at this evolution in our literacy. Social media is inhibiting our culture to write like we talk, expressing more personality. Does this devalue our work, or can it be perceived as a new sort of human-computerized language. As an educator, who is well adapted to Word Doc. corrections and not AP styling my social media networks, it will be hard for me to figure out my way of carrying out traditional English expectations.

The culture of social media is more complex than many believe. It is reforming our educational system. It also has a huge impact on our social trend and psyches’. As an educator I will maintain realistic expectations for my students and try to instill ethical guidance for proper social media use.

Citations:
Read more: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/08/26/social-media-education-absent-orientation-sessions-despite-new-arrests#ixzz2flljB1VP
Inside Higher Ed

Randall, Andy. "The Grammar Devolution: Why Social Media Is a Threat to Education." Uloop. Uloop, 6 Nov. 2012. Web. 23 Sept. 2013.

Straumsheim, Carl. "Social Media Education Absent from Orientation Sessions despite New Arrests | Inside Higher Ed." Social Media Education Absent from Orientation Sessions despite New Arrests | Inside Higher Ed. Inside Higher Ed, 16 Aug. 2013. Web. 23 Sept. 2013.

Zeng, L. & Pitts, M. J. (2012). Cultivating a community of learners: The potential and challenges of social media in higher education. In H. S. Noor Al-Deen & J. A. Hendricks (Eds.), Social media usage and impact (pp. 111 - 128). United Kingdom: Lexington Books.

Reflection 6, Visual Learning Methods

I really enjoy visible learning tools such as Wordle and Mind Mapping, as a means to help creatively contextualize the student thought process. I have had the opportunity this week to experiment with these visible learning programs. Most which are free to the public.

I think Wordle is really easy to use and effective in pointing out key terms in the lesson. Wordle uses URL or pasted text data and generates a mix of words in a creative format. In language class, this could be useful in pointing out a collection of words for students to learn, discuss, and use in their occupational world. Students could even create their own Wordle to be involved in typing in context to study. This is effective because I think students want to feel as if they are able to be creative. Wordle gives students that fun word identification, creative opportunity.

Mind Mapper took a little longer for me to figure out. But, I believe it to be extremely effective in organizing student thoughts and intergrading participation from everyone in the classroom. I like in the Classroom Assessment Technique: Concept Mapping video, writing the word you want to discuss in class and having students silently add onto the concept map on the board. This practice helps quite students participate, organizes thoughts, gives teachers an idea of where student thoughts are at, and generates deeper discussion amongst classroom. The video states that concept maps heighten students’ critical thinking skills. I think concept maps have been really effective in my personal learning career, especially in essay writing. Writing essays is the best way to evaluate student comprehension in any language class. Knowing how to structure thoughts and ideas in a supportive way is important in classrooms. Concept maps should be very useful in language classrooms because I will be teaching my classes using digital media concepts and information technology and communication trends because that what the student will be using in their professions. The concept maps using mind mappers is an extension of what teachers already use to organize thoughts in less tech-savy classrooms, from the whiteboard to the smart-board.

Refection 7 on TESOL, USFCA

I visited a few websites to get an idea of how other ESL teachers were using multi-media to teach ELL. My favorite find was through the University of Illinois at Chicago, ESL directory, http://www.uic.edu/depts/tie/coolsites.htm ,

which organizes several ESL websites into different categories of ELL focus. The categories are listening comprehension, reading, writing, speaking, grammar, vocabulary, test prep, culture, news, research study, and multi-purpose ESL sites. The are about 10 different websites listed under each category. I found a great link to a site called Englishlistening.com. I noticed it was a .com, so I was somewhat hesitant to spend time at that site. However, I really liked the site because it was built on Wordpress, so it is live, and it reminded me of how we are setting up our E-portfolios through Google Drive. There was a selection of listening comprehension-based sound-clips. They were from students of all different cultures. You choose a subject, I chose Vietnamese food tutorial, then took a quiz. I loved it because it seemed to be a project-based learning project for students. They emphasized culture and background of different students.  I think is the best way to teach in a diverse classroom. The website was very plain, and focused specifically on listening comprehension. I don’t know if I would recommend EnglishListening as a resource site for students, but I will in the future, have my student create a Project based learning project of making videos for a website similar toEnglishListening.com. It would give students a chance to create and educate eachother. I think learning is more fun and involved when students feel like they are contributing to others education I.E. talking about there experiences and culture,.

A more impressive multi-media website I found through the University of Illinois, Chicago, was http://www.youtube.com/user/Bookfill, a ESL youtube lesson jackpot. I found so many great videos on English Language activities. Each lesson is short and specific. There was a video on compound words. So there are a list of words and student decides which side the word goes on to create the correct compound word. For example, “down” connects to “downtown,” and “showdown,” or “line,” connects to “up” and “air” to create the words “lineup” and “airline.” I think that is pretty creative and explanatory. The only problem I found with this particular website is that it may note be interactive enough for student, especially if they are studying at home alone. There are so many more websites, with a so many great ideas.  I is really nice to have a forum to find ideas to incorporate into my web-based TESOL education.

I just went through my Rosetta Stone lesson. I have to say, I really enjoyed it. I chose to tryout level 1 Portuguese. I chose Portuguese because I have a few Brazilian friends and I was curious about their language. The instruction was challenging and fast-pace. The multi-media usage was not as creative as in other instructional language learning videos I have seen. However, part of what I enjoyed so much about the lesson was that I was simple and clear. There were photos, computer teacher, voice recognition, and matching quizzes to test comprehension. As the program continued, I felt like each word learned was incorporated and built-apon in a creative fashion. I would say this program, while lacks multiple multi-media material development that we are learning, it is effective in that the lesson is clear and to the point for students. I felt as if I was picking up quickly on the language and able to connect the photos with the speaker. So listening and identification skills were refined. The one area of Rosetta Stone that was really noticeably lacking was the pronunciation of words. The speaker had a thick accent, which is realistic, but there were times where I was way off in pronunciation with little direction on how to say the word, besides repeating what I hear. Essentially, this is how most every human learns language, through listening, repeating, repetition. I would suggest adding in a visual of how to say the words correctly and slow the speaker down enough to catch the enunciations in the words. This would allow a more efficient speaker because I just didn't think the voice recognition was really that accurate.