Social media in education is designed to help connect students with one another and maintain a positive learning environment remotely.

What are some problems with social media communications in education settings? 

  • Lack of commitment
  • Lack of engagement
  • Sustaining engagement
  • Cyberbullying
  • Accessibility
  • Privacy

Explore the video provided and reflect on the themes of a PLN in a professional capacity.
The Brad Baker interview highlighted a great point regarding the effectiveness of utilizing PLNs and social networks to help promote tourism, economy, and connectedness within first nation communities. Establishing a social media presence can greatly help modernize a first nation community. The video also discusses the theme of outreach PLN and public networks provide. Public networks help allow users to form connections, gain creativity, and get inspired by other users to help them improve their own pages. In this case, a social media manager who manages a first nations community’s Instagram page could benefit from seeing another creator’s content to help improve their own page.

Which social media platforms are beneficial in education?

Growing up as one of the first generations intertwined with social media, but also remembering what it was like when I was young prior to social media platforms, I have had my fair share of experiences using these platforms in education. I’ve used Instagram and YouTube to create projects where myself and classmates display our findings in a media format. However, these platforms are not focused on or designed for educational purposes. They lack user privacy, as well as make it hard to maintain a work-life balance because users might not want their school or professors to see their personal profiles. UVic’s platform Brightspace is the best platform I have used. Being its own platform, this allows the student/user to log in and out when they want to work, promoting a strong work-life balance. Brightspace is beneficial for education as it features many excellent tools to allow for a wide range of user interfaces when displaying content. Users can post Blogs, comment on classmates, upload videos, and even create discussion forms to collaborate with each other. Having a platform tailored to education exclusively is the best option when looking for a beneficial educational platform.

When working with the vulnerable sector, how does social media fit into professionalism and regulations? 

  • Users can interact with each other
  • Expand the work environment remotely to maximize accessibility
  • Regulations must be in place to help protect user privacy and safety
  • Networks must be protected using firewalls and encryption to protect users from hackers and third-party breaches

How do educators create discourse? 

  • Discussion groups
  • Group projects
  • Feedback-oriented projects and assignments
  • Peer review processes