Palmer 1
Nicole Palmer
TLS 318
September 22, 2015
Social Media Reflection
Technology in the classroom has increased immensely in the last few years. It has greatly altered the way we approach education and tools in the classroom. A large piece of technology is known as social media. Social media can be used to interact with other people from all across the globe. There are some advantages and disadvantages to using social media, especially in the classroom.
Social media is a big part of our adolescents’ lives. There is very little that parents can do to keep their children from engaging in some sort of social media. Thus, it is important to address how your children use social media and try to monitor it as needed. Some parents are very trustworthy of their children and do not think that kids get into trouble on simple websites, but that is not true. Social media like Facebook, Instagram, and SnapChat are huge gateway tools to online bullying and even engaging in conversations with strangers. So how does this change when we are using social media in the classroom? For one, it is much easier to monitor a task while you are looking over a child’s shoulder at a computer than when they are secretively on their phone. Secondly, if given a task to do on social media, instead of free reign, a child will be more likely to stay on task. This is not something that a teacher can do to provide daycare for his or her classroom. Social media can be easily abused and it is very important to regulate its use.
There are positive factors to using social media in the classroom. One of these positive aspects is a student has access to people from all over the country. This would be a great way to start pen pals for students or even to learn another language. Say a class is learning Spanish and the students’ pen pals personal message them on Facebook or Instagram, this would be a wonderful way to immerse the students in learning a new language while still keeping their attention and interest. It can also be used to learn about how social media can improve a business or a profile for someone who is trying to find a career. Social media has its benefits, but it also can be very dangerous.
Social media is one of the biggest tools for cyber bullying. This is a huge problem and has even led to young kids committing suicide. Even if used for school, social media can still create a hostile environment that allows for bullying. Additionally, it would be very difficult to make sure that every student is doing what he or she should be doing. It is easy to get off task or distracted when on social media because there are different notifications popping up every couple of seconds. Finally, this would require every student to have a profile, with which his or her parents may or may approve. Thus, not all the students may be able to participate in whatever task it is that the teacher has planned.
Ultimately, I am against using social media in the classroom. This is not to be confused with technology in general. I am a strong advocate for increasing the technology in the classroom, but in my opinion, social media has greater negatives than positives. I think it is important to integrate popular trends into schooling in order to keep kids excited about learning, but social media is something that should be used outside of school.
Works Cited
Lederer, Karen. "Pros and Cons of Social Media in the Classroom." Campus Technology. Public
Sector Media Group, 19 Jan. 2012. Web. 22 Sept. 2015.
"5 Pros and Cons of Social Media in the Classroom for Educational Use." School Is Easy
Tutoring. Vancouver Web Development Services, 21 Feb. 2014. Web. 22 Sept. 2015.