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How to Make Social Media Work for Your Classroom

Michael Nutter

July 19, 2017

Teenagers are using social media and the internet more than ever today, and for parents and educators, that poses some significant challenges. A 2015 Pew Research study found that 92% of teens (ages 13-17) use the internet daily, and 56% report doing so several times a day. With this level of absorption in the virtual world, it’s hard not to worry that getting kids to focus on real-world needs like their education will only get more difficult.

Besides trying to draw middle and high school students out of social media, however, there exists a much more practical and exciting option for teachers: bringing the educational experience to social media and harnessing some of its attention-grabbing power. Popular platforms like Snapchat, Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram can all be used to keep students and teachers in contact with one another both in and out of the classroom, boosting engagement with the curriculum and ensuring everyone remains up-to-date on class assignments.

But the internet comes with risks and dangers that schools must be responsible for if they adopt these platforms. How do you stop students from encountering inappropriate material? How do you protect students from digital attacks and fraud? More fundamentally, how do you ensure that social media is used as a learning resource in the classroom and not a distraction for young people with increasingly short attention spans?

Bringing social media to your teaching approach can have a big impact on your students’ learning experience, but you need to think out how you’ll address the challenges of the world wide web before you find any success. Follow this how-to guide to ensure all your bases are covered.

Inappropriate Content

A huge factor explaining why schools haven’t fully embraced social media is the ease with which students can find and post inappropriate content. Posts with foul or hurtful language or explicit content can damage the reputation of the school and negatively impact the learning experience. For many, it seems easier to block social media altogether than it is to constantly monitor the online activity of students to prevent this kind of thing from happening.

The default solution used by many educators is the web filter, software implemented at the school or district level to block students’ access to explicit or inappropriate content. Some services like Gaggle also offer algorithms they claim can detect harmful or dangerous images, text, or links before they reach students, analyzing emails, search queries, and social media for anything that would negatively impact your students’ learning experience.

However, it’s good to be aware that these filters and policies can go too far. Some have noticed that filters are at times used excessively or for purposes besides the safety of students — for example, blocking access to resources for LGBTQ youth. Make sure to think carefully about what content should be blocked, and remain vigilant and attentive so that your approach to web censorship evolves in step with the rapidly changing digital world.

Privacy

A good cybersecurity/privacy policy is already essential to your educational environment — the use of social media only makes that need more urgent. Make sure your district’s IT infrastructure uses standardized security protocols, incorporates firewalls, and uses intrusion detection/prevention software (IDPS), and that your compliance with legal security frameworks is regularly audited.

Beyond that, the best way to prevent hackers and fraudsters from getting access to students’ private information is to educate them about privacy settings and security policy on social media. Kids are going to be using sites like Facebook and Snapchat regardless of whether you put them to use in the classroom. Use your social media initiative as an opportunity to teach them how to control who sees their posts, how to avoid phishing scams, what constitutes a strong password, and other cybersecurity basics. Adults are just as susceptible to these digital threats as kids, so you might even learn a thing or two in the process!

Measuring Success

Social media can be a powerful resource, but if you can’t see any positive consequences in the way that students respond to the curriculum, you won’t be able to extract the maximum value from it. Set goals for your initiative before putting it into practice so you’ll be able to make helpful adjustments and tweaks in the weeks following implementation.

Platforms like Facebook show you metrics that gauge not only how many people are viewing the content you post, but also how many are actively engaging with it. Follow the trends demonstrated by those analytics platforms and fashion the content you post in the future after what works (while of course maintaining that students should be engaging with your posts regardless of what content type it is). Finally, remember to ask students what’s working for them and what isn’t, whether it’s through an online poll or simply by soliciting their opinions during class time.

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