Facebook as a communication tool?
I teach for an online career college, and I have found that one of my bigger challenges is to get the students to engage with each other. I had one class in particular that did a great job with this, and I could see that it made such an improvement on everyone's performance.
I was wondering if anyone had tried to use Facebook as a tool to get classes talking to each other. How did you set it up? How did it work? Would you recommend it?
Thanks!
Diana,
I have tried Facebook and Twitter in my hugh online class. I had over 220 students. We also use Blackboard as a learning management system.
I set up a discussion board in Blackboard as normal and also develop a group in Facebook just for the class. I set it up so that students would have to ask permission to be in the Facebook group. If they were in the class, I let them in the group. But, this prevented just anyone in Facebook to get into our discussion group. That worked well.
I allowed for discussions in Blackboard or Facebook. It was the students' choice. I had more students use Blackboard and tell me they think about school work in Blackboard rather than Facebook.
But, those that did use the Facebook (about 30-40 students out of the 220+) liked the Facebook experience and asked many questions.
It's always good to ask students what they prefer. Otherwise you end up duplicating your efforts and spending a lot of time in several different places. Hope that helps.
It's a little difficult because our school has a policy against talking to students on Facebook, even though I think it would be a great tool for communication.
Andrew,
Many schools do block Facebook, but there are other Facebook-like networking sites that my be available. OR Just check out whatever good discussion board areas you can use to keep students engaged.
Thanks!
I set up a discussion in my classroom called "coffee shop" where students can go to chat or ask random questions.
I also set up a discussion with a random question for students to chime in on.
I make sure to check these threads at least once a day to be sure I can interject and offer feedback in that area.
This seems to help build a bit of a community conversation.
Stephanie,
Cool. Anything like a coffee cafe or something students can relate to is helpful in getting them to talk with each other. It helps build that community and sounds like you are involved as well. Nice job.
I teach the dynamic aspects of platforms like Facebook in a course called Social Media Marketing but I do not use the platform to communicate with students.
Each institution I have taught at either has Blackboard or a similar communication platform that is far more appropriate to use as a tool to communicate with students.
Unfortunately I think it will be some time before our students can view Facebook as something other than a platform for self-marketing and intel gathering. :)
Kevin,
Even though I have BlackBoard at my institution, I have developed Facebook groups for my classes and communicated with them through FB and used it as a discussion board as well. However, at the end of the course, my students told me they preferred BBoard for course communication and work and FB for socializing. Each group of students, however, is different. I think it is good to try new things. Thanks for your input.
Yes, I do something similar. I believe it can foster a sense of community in an otherwise sterile environment. I always begin with an instructor bio, and then I let the students introduce themselves. Some platforms I use even have the capability to upload photos, so students, and instructors can actually see the other people.
Melinda ,
Building that community and helping students engage in the learning process is so essential. Keep up the good work.
What other tools, other than the threads and possible photos do you use to "humanize" the online classroom? I think some people think virtual is synonymous with anonymous, but I don't think it has to be that way.
I like the idea of calling the message board Coffee Shop or Cafe. It subtly implies that it's a cool place to check in and hang out. My school does have a policy against Facebook, but we do use YouTube for students to submit their speeches for Interpersonal Communications. It actually works really well as a communication technology tool. Word is the students now refer to COMM as the YouTube class.
Kelly,
True - Coffee Cafe does sound more cool that Discussion Board or "here's my email address." ;-) Some schools do have policies about social media, but I have used it effectively as a group (only those in my class were allowed in) for discussions. YouTube can be set up the same way - private - so only the course participants can see the information. That's nice too. Thanks for your input.
I have used FB and Twitter to communicate with classes. In particular, I like to use Twitter to send reminders. In general, I will send one reminder a week about a day or two before important assignments are due. Something that I found really interesting, was that when asked - the students asked me to send MORE tweets! I thought it would be invasive and annoying, but many students like daily tweets whether they be reminders, or information on material important to the course.
Also - for the standard tweets - I find it very useful to use a scheduler. That way, I set up my tweets and forget them - I only need to send "fun" things when I think about it.
Linnea,
Great ideas. It's good to see you being creative in your use of social media. Nice job.
Melinda,
I agree with your statement. I think that most people want to stay anonymous during online courses process.
Dr. Karina
Dr. Karina,
There are things you can keep anonymous and other times when you want to know who said what. Thanks for your input.
I agree with what many have said about "humanizing" the online experience. Students really like to hear a voice, see a picture or just take a moment to be a bit more "loose" in an online setting.
However, I have found that communicating with students can be difficult when Facebook is involved. Personally, *I* like to keep my Facebook presence private. I use it to socialize with my friends and I really don't think it would be appropriate to share that profile with my students. That said, there are other communication tools that can be used to engage students and make the course material more fun and interesting.
My school has a "commons" area on our campus with different clubs related to student interest. The clubs have discussion boards, live chat sessions and sometimes guest lectures. For a time I was the faculty advisor of a Poetry club on our commons. When I taught Literature courses, I could easily promote the Poetry club at the end of a live chat session in order to encourage students to share their interest in the course concepts in a more relaxed and social environment. I found that this involvement in the commons added another level of communication with students that was more relaxed and helped to make me (and the course subject matter) more approachable and interesting. --Erin
Erin ,
It is the development of that relationship or a sense of community that is essential. Nice job.
I have used both FB and a wordpress blog to interact with my online students (though it was one or the other I didn't want a million places for them to have to check in).
I love wordpress for the ease of use and set up but I like FB for the privacy setting.
I have found that making it a mix of fun and academic stuff- students get into. It also allows students agency to answer questions and share their experience and knowledge. Because I ask them to post fun stuff too (such as stupid trivia or best misheard song lyric) I find they check in more and when little questions crop up I get them earlier and can problem solve faster.
I do keep myself very professional in that space and because I teach English- there is no FB slang. I think it's a good tool- you just have to be aware that it is a tool and use it as one.
