Social media consists of the following components:
Wikipedia states that social media refers to websites and applications that enable users to share content or socialize online. Social media is more than just posting holiday photos online. Social media has gained credibility in recent years as a reliable source of information and a platform for organisations to interact with audiences.
The role of social media in education:
Today’s educational institutions are incorporating these changes into their systems and relying on group resources and mechanisms to improve student life. Social media in education is used by students, teachers, and parents to obtain more useful information, connect with learning groups, and access other educational systems that make learning easier.
Social network tools provide students and institutions with multiple ways to improve learning methods. With these networks, you can integrate social media plugins that facilitate sharing and interaction. Online tutorials available on YouTube, courses delivered through Skype by universities abroad, as well as a wide range of resources shared via social networks are available to students.
Social media can be used to collect valuable information such as analytics and insights on a variety of topics or issues. Education institutions must participate in as many social media platforms as possible, as this aids in the development of better student training strategies and shapes student cultures.
Social media in education
In using social media in education, you soon learn who the experts are in different fields. As you follow these experts, you learn more and gain more useful content, which empowers you to produce great results.
A social media account can broaden your perspective on a variety of subjects and provide enlightening, instant content. If you need help with a topic, you can engage experts to get answers.
Social media networks
Learning colleges can connect with students through social media networks such as Facebook, Google Plus groups, and YouTube. You can use these channels to communicate campus news, make announcements, and provide students with useful information. The interactions between the college and students build engagement between the two.
Institutions can share supportive and positive posts through networks and pages that reach all students who are connected. To engage students and facilitate online discussions, you can use hashtags on social media. Social media videos are a popular and effective tool that you can use to share videos that inspire and help students learn.
Students and institutions can engage through social media such as YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram live video. Using social media in the education process doesn’t have to end the teacher-student relationship.
Higher levels of social networking can also provide a variety of other advantages. Principals and administrators can use social media in novel ways. Social media can be used to disseminate school information, hold online parent meetings, and begin fundraising for various school projects.
We live in a fast-paced world, and because parents are too busy with work to attend school meetings, social media becomes the only means of communication. It doesn’t mean they shouldn’t keep up with events or check in on their children on occasion.
It is one of the best data extraction platforms, and it offers useful audience and subject monitoring tools. Using Instagram or Facebook Polls, Google Forms or Survey Monkey, or forums like Quora to learn how experts perceive and advise on specific issues, you can learn how people feel about a specific topic.
Students can use this to compile and produce useful research content. When students are working on an assignment, a project, or trying to gain more insight into a subject, social media can provide some of the best information and results. Slideshare could make presentations using such data.
LMS
Learning management systems deliver educational programs and provide administrative capabilities to institutions. Learning with social media can include instant chat, video, forums to share information, and other lesson resources to help students.
An LMS system strengthens student participation and makes team projects easier to collaborate on. This system was created to improve educational programmes by addressing student and learning issues. Popular learning management systems with social media integration can give institutions the best reach and effect through the system. Live conferencing systems, webinars, group reviews, blogs, and more are other social learning benefits.
They also use social media to find new resources to supplement their lessons, activities to teach specific concepts, bulletin board ideas, and information on new apps to follow up on specific topics, as well as to network and learn about what is going on in other schools around the world.
Bottom line:
Social media is a huge part of our daily lives, so excluding it from education makes no sense. Staff at schools, colleges, and universities should be encouraged to communicate with students and parents using technology. Benefits range from improved parent-teacher relationships to a permanent change in the way our children learn.
Also check: Tips for Online Learning You Can’t Miss!