Using social media in small colleges

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Permalink Reply by Dallas McPheeters on July 3, 2009 at 12:33pm

My question to your students would be, "What do you consider the top contributing factors to learning?"

The point is, general education has lost its sense of relevance in the eyes of the next generation. In a sense, food becomes irrelevant when you're without appetite. However food becomes very relevant when you're hungry. What is this generation hungry for? As the old saying goes, 'you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink.' But if you salt the oats, you change the odds of making the horse drink. What are the "oats" these students eat for satisfaction and how can we salt them to make them hungry for genuine learning?

Your questions are good and keep me thinking. Would love to post your comments on my blog with your permission.

This generation values the computer as a container of knowledge more than they value their own brain as a container of knowledge. How can we visionize them to see the import of the grey matter between their ears so they will pay any price to fill it with quality understanding?

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Permalink Reply by Satish Menon on July 14, 2009 at 1:10am

I am just curious. In an age where access to information has become very easy, should our brains continue be the repository of information (or knowledge) that is easily available? For example, today, does it matter that a student know which year the Magna Carta was signed when they can find it very, very easily? Isn't information utilization more important that information storage (or containment)?

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Permalink Reply by Brad Reamsbottom on August 7, 2009 at 4:28pm

I believe information utilization is absolutely more important, but having retained knowledge of an event such as the Magna Carta is still important. Retained knowledge should be a spring board for students to research a topic. It is finding the correct retained knowledge to build on in conjunction with research skills that should be key. Rather than the year the Magna Carta was signed, I think it is more important for students to realize why the Magna Carta was signed and where/how they can find more information about the topic. As information expands exponentially we can't expect upcoming students to recall everything we learned, plus all the new technologies, current events etc.

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Permalink Reply by Michelle Everson on July 3, 2009 at 9:57pm

Unfortunately, I don't have any answers for you, Gouri, but just as Dallas mentioned, your post got me thinking. About a year ago, I set up a Facebook account, and I have to admit, in the meantime, I've become a major Facebook addict (of course, I try to justify this by saying it's all in the name of doing research on how social networking might work in an online environment). I've thought quite a bit about how I might incorporate things like Facebook or Twitter into the courses I teach (many of which are online, but I do some teaching in the classroom as well). I teach statistics, so I'm quite interested in knowing just how you use Twitter in your math courses.

Part of the reason I want to explore this is because I happen to teach a subject matter than many students are scared and anxious about. My undergraduate students in particular come to the statistics course thinking that it's just going to be another math course, and that it won't relate at all to their everyday lives. Many take the course to fulfill a general education requirement and are thus not very motivated to learn the material at a deep level. I'm always trying to find ways to engage them, and I thought maybe incorporating something like Facebook might be the way to go. If students can make what they are learning more meaningful in some way, I hope that they will retain more of what they learn and have more opportunities to apply what they are learning about. I know many of my students use Facebook, but I haven't quite figured out how I might use it (or something like Twitter) in my course. I did recently have my students attempt to critique an exploratory study that looked at how Facebook use relates to GPA (http://www.internetnews.com/webcontent/article.php/3815241/Study+Li...), but that's the closest I've come to incorporating Facebook into the course.

Personally, I feel the trend in education is to use more and more technology for teaching, so I can't help but think that students will come to take this seriously at some point. I think we just have to think very carefully about how we use these tools and how we attempt to encourage our students to use them. I think one thing that sometimes holds me back is that I feel I might overload my students with too much technology. Even though I love technology and find it very useful, not everyone feels as comfortable with it as I do, and if there are students who can't get comfortable with it, that can hinder their performance in the class. Given that I already teach a course that students tend to be nervous and anxious about, I tend to find myself trying hard to do what I can to ease their fears, not increase them!

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Permalink Reply by Gouri Banerjee (Ms) on July 5, 2009 at 8:23am

Twitter lends itself to many kinds of ice breakers, getting to know who is in the class during the first two-three weeks of class. Some of the question that worked well for me-
I had students create accounts, and then showed them mine in class. We played for ten minutes to get to know the software. Then asked them to twitter for three consecutive weeks.
Find a website that deals with statistical definitions and concepts, give the weblink and a one sentence description of the site.
Write one idea about when you last used the idea of "statistical mean" and it was totally inappropriate.
How comfortable do you feel with the statistical concept of "probability?"

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Permalink Reply by Florence Dujardin on July 6, 2009 at 6:24am

I like your idea of using Twitter for initial social purposes. The idea of developing a cognitive presence online through a task with a deadline is a very nice one too: this should have helped your students to see Twitter as a medium for learning (as well as a medium for socialising).

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Permalink Reply by Michelle Everson on July 6, 2009 at 11:26am

These are great ideas, Gouri! Thank you for sharing them.

I teach both online and face-to-face sections of statistics. In my face-to-face courses, I always set up a course website (we use WebVista at the University of Minnesota--it's a combination of WebCT and Blackboard), and I encourage students to go there to post questions outside of class and to download additional resources. So, no matter what course I teach, I do tend to emphasize technology to a certain extent.

I think I've been hesitant about trying to incorporate social media into my courses (both online and face-to-face) because I worry about those students who might not be comfortable with these things and who are struggling just to keep up with the technology that IS required of them in the course. Although I love using things like Facebook, Twitter, and NING, I don't know that my students would feel the same way, and would it be wrong for me to require them in some way to set up accounts on something like Twitter? I'm just curious about what you have noticed when you do this in your courses. Are there any students who are not comfortable setting up such accounts or who flat out refuse to do so? Do you include things they do in Twitter (or other social media outlets) as part of their grade? I assume you must do something to motivate them to use it.

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Permalink Reply by Isabelle Eaton on July 7, 2009 at 2:48pm

I really like the idea because it also allows knowledge sharing of resources AND creates a repository of exchanges and tools that students can refer to after the fact. Kudos!

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Permalink Reply by Florence Dujardin on July 6, 2009 at 6:31am

Would examples of professional use of social media be useful? Businesses, government and charities use social media for purposes other than recreation and social life, so given students some idea of how they could use their existing digital skills in a different context might help. Are there communities of mathematicians or engineers blogging or twittering out there to share knowledge?

Just a thought (I am neither a mathematician or a technologist)

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Permalink Reply by Gouri Banerjee (Ms) on July 6, 2009 at 1:36pm

Hi: this is Gouri. I like Florence's idea about getting engaged with business, government and other users of social media. Virtually every newspaper these days has a blog or twitter site. Florence has given me an idea. Have students twitter and blog at the NY Times or Economist site to a topical issue in class or some important current event that is unfolding. I think that may work????? I would be able to identify my own students if I asked them to add a code before their name "tweetingJoe" or "bloggerJane."

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Permalink Reply by Isabelle Eaton on July 7, 2009 at 2:47pm

Can you think of good examples to share?

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Permalink Reply by Gouri Banerjee (Ms) on July 7, 2009 at 4:51pm

In a course on globalization, the NY Times and the Economist are great places to blog. For example, frequent articles on energy, environment, global attitudes to the economy, and others are available. I have blogged often but have not asked students to do so. Instead, I used to set up my own blog at blogger.com. But that takes a fair amount of time. This fall I shall try the newspapers and magazine blogs instead. Questions I may ask are--
After reading the article about the Pew research on global attitudes to economic recovery what is your opinion about where the US economy is likely to be in two years? Can you share a couple of ideas that support your position?
Read the article about the decimation of the Amazon rainforest and ask yourself, is it fair to ask Brazilians to cut back their pace of deforestation and burning given that in in A.D. 500 four-fifths of western and central Europe lay under forests and swamps. By A.D. 1200, half or even less coverage remained. Peat bogs and marshes were drained, dykes built, and ditches dug to create cities, farms, pastureland for cattle and sheep (Brian Fagan, The Great Warming, 33). What justification may there be for us to ask Brazilians to cut back?

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