Which is more disruptive, an exam pad or an IPad?

And here I thought this whole “read and blog” thing was your brain child, Mr. Knoetze … :P

We live in a digital word where kids are growing ever the less comfortable and able to express themselves in person. There are many kids who would never make a sound in the classroom, but would feel a lot more comfortable to formulate their answers before outing their thoughts to the world. With this in mind, why don’t we use social media to our advantage in the classroom?

Nicholas Provenzano (2015) mentions being skeptical about interacting with the kids on social media, mostly because of the ethics behind it, if I am not mistaken. I think it should be perfectly fine to create and facilitate the platform, like in our Digital Pedagogy (DP) class, with the idea being that the learners interact with each other while you supervise and make sure that the learners stay on topic while treating each other with the necessary respect. This way, they don’t only learn and reinforce their knowledge of the content of the subject matter they are discussing, but you can also teach them acceptable professional conduct concerning social media.

Remind, as discussed by Provenzano (2015), is a good idea in theory, but at some point the kids need to learn responsibility. Reality is, they aren’t going to have someone spoon feeding them information and reminders after their schooling career. There are enough other ways of remembering things including reminders on your phone, a diary, keeping a calendar or asking a friend. By placing the responsibility on the learner, he/she learns vital organizational skills and responsibility in the process. Personally, I would not use this.

I like the idea of using Instagram to get the learners actively involved and thinking about the subject outside of a formal learning environment. If it’s not always possible to bring examples (of whatever we are discussing in class) to class. By using Instagram, you could regulate if the learners understood what they have been discussing in class by letting them post pictures of examples under a certain hashtag. For example, different types of trees. This can be done as a formal assignment or as opportunity deems fit (learners’ encounters with relevant situations). It is, however, vital to remember that the safety of the learner is of utmost importance. You cannot give the learners an assignment that could possibly lead to them getting hurt or placing themselves in danger.

Twitter seems like a good idea if it can be used to draw the kids’ attention to the work at hand. I would want to run a trial period of, say, a month to see how the kids use it and if it is efficient. The challenge would be to draw the learners’ attention back to you and off of their electronic device once you are done with the exercise on it (if used inside the classroom).

Besides for the points made in the prescribed blog, blogging is a good way to test the learners’ understanding of a subject matter, without the stress of a time constraint or the pressure of knowing that it is a formal test. Letting the learners know that it will not be graded, but that you will only use it to adjust your teaching, should also help them to share more openly. School being canceled due to extreme weather is very unlikely in SA. Due to protests, more likely. I would most definitely consider using Twitter in conjunction with a blog system in my classroom, as we are doing in the DP class. This is, if it is practical, of course.

An alternative to the real thing, would be to have a pin board in the class or just outside, where I (as teacher) could pin up a topic. The learners can the write short, anonymous essays (blogs), Sticky notes (Tweets) or newspaper/magazine pictures (Instagram) or articles (Facebook).

If paper was once thought of as a disruptive technology, but we were able to successfully integrate it into our everyday teachings, what is to say we can’t do the same with social media?

The fact is, the learners will most likely have some means of technology and communication with them. Be it their phones, IPads, tablets etc. If they are bored, they will divert their attention to it, rather than to your work. I personally believe, that if you cannot keep the attention of your learners, it might be time to reassess your approach to the way you are teaching. 

Here are the links to the blogs mentioned above, Provenzona(2015) and Davis(2015)