Whether we like it or not social media is here to stay. When do we begin to teach children of the ill effects? How young is too young? There needs to be parental responsibility behind a child being issued a smart phone, computer, tablet, or other technological devices that have internet connections or used as a device for communication. Social media plays a significant role on the life of all users. Children need to be aware of respectful uses and the dangers of negative results. They need to be warned to be careful when the send key is hit. So how and when does the school come into this picture? I say through everyday activities and as young as possible.
If your school uses technology and encourages its use at home for assignments, then the school is partially responsible to teach and reinforce the consequences of ill-use. Federal legislation has taken measures to protect children under the age of 13 with COPPA – Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act and CIPA – Children’s Internet Protection Act. This is not enough. Both parents and teachers need to help protect children.
Parents as well as educators need to work together to show childen how to create a personal profile. Teach and reinforce specifics such as; not posting a home address, email address, phone number, or school name. This is information that should remain private and not shared. Children need to understand that what is posted on the Internet never gets removed even when the delete key is hit. Discuss the choices of usernames and passwords. Make sure passwords cannot be easily guessed and insist that they do not tell anyone except a parent.
Many schools use social networking to help students gather information, news, and tools that they wouldn’t otherwise be able to access. Many educators feel that by using sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube encourages students to do better work. Many teachers use Facebook to communicate to a select audience of parents, family, and other classrooms about the work of their students. Sharing information in this manner is faster and better than a classroom blog or website.
There are many reasons for schools to promote the use of social media. Society has become used to the social media as a means of quick communication. The top social media sites have a couple of billion users. Users of smart phones check Facebook and Twitter several times a day. A large percentage of college members use social media in the classroom and for emergency use of lock-downs or weather alerts.
By using social media in schools students can share assignments through links and classrooms and study groups can be created. Collaboration is a built-in advantage of social networking and is a skill the students will use in their future on the job. Instead of shouting out answers or making comments at inopportune times, students can backchannel with a hashtag if they are using twitter. As students are researching material they will learn to store and catalog information for later use. Students have a chance of greater participation for questioning and engagement with social media far more than they have in the classroom.
Not only do we need to use social media we need to prepare students on how to survive in the social media world. Social media is one way to prepare students for the future. It can improve education because it increases access to people and information in various literary forms i.e. Twitter feeds, blogs, videos, wikis, games, and books. Many businesses use social media to post positions for new employees and many require an application to be completed on line. Schools tend to be concerned for the privacy of individuals, cyber bullying, and texting inappropriate pictures. The concerns over safety will be there whether or not it is taught in schools. In my professional opinion, it’s taught when teachers include rules on privacy and safety and use the classroom to build on the social media that is growing rapidly in today’s world. Social media should be a very important part of education.
