State Of Social Media In Education
November 28, 2008 – 10:07 am | by Daryl TayTonight wrapped up my Film 240 class here at Queen’s University called “Media & Popular Culture”. One question asked was “Do you use RSS?” and the poll came to about 15% saying yes (which is not far off from the recent 11% RSS adoption rate that was researched). [No, I didn't count hands raised. The poll was done using electronic clickers so the percentages are shown instantaneously on screen.]
On the Twitter front, something like 25 out of 101 students interviewed by Hack College indicated they know what Twitter is, but of those 25, a subset did not know the exact function of Twitter. Check out the video:
If these are the numbers for the more functional and popular tools, I’m expecting the figures for other avenues of web2.0 in education (wikis, social bookmarking, blogs, document collaboration) to be much lower.
So my questions tonight to you are:
1) Do you think these numbers are generally reflective, or should they be higher or lower?
2) If you don’t know about these tools, do you wish someone would teach you how to use them?
3) If you do know about these tools and discovered about them yourself, do you wish someone had introduced you to them earlier?
4) What aspects of education would you be most keen to utilise social media tools?
5) Do you even think such Web2.0 tools have a place in education?
6) If you’ve heard of tools like RSS, Twitter, Wikis, etc, what’s stopping you from using them?
I really, really wanna hear from you, so help me out. If you already know the tools, pass this post on to someone who doesn’t, and ask them to answer the questions!
On a personal note, if you’d like to collaborate with me on an SMU project similar to the one Hack College did, drop me a line!
Tags: Blogs, document collaboration, education, film 240, Gen Y, queen's university, rss, rss adoption rate, rss usage, social bookmarking, students using social media in class, twitter usage rates, web2.0, wikis
5 Responses to “State Of Social Media In Education”
By Jo on Nov 29, 2008 | Reply
I was shocked to hear that only 74% of members of a small business association in the UK use EMAIL - never mind anything else! And this is in the most lively of new media towns - Brighton.
In my own village, very few people use internet or mobile phones and internet is not very reliable.
I’ve long wanted to start a readwrite site for the village and the recession is motivating me. Which brings me to my point. People want to use social media when their friends do. My mother wants to use Facebook to see her grandchildren’s photos as they travel the world. Other uses might come later.
I reckon my site will fly if I can get a critical mass on to the site and the non-users are motivated to learn to see what is happening and advertise their wares and services. This is the opportunity for the recession as the marginal cost of advertising within a community site is just the shopkeeper’s time.
On my part, it would be useful to know what the greengrocer has in stock before I leave for the shops!
Keep well,
Jo
By Daryl Tay on Dec 1, 2008 | Reply
That would be really interesting to see! Given people generally want really localised news, a site specific for the village (and so everyone can see what the greengrocer has in stock) could really take off if the advantages can be communicated to them! Really eager to see if it works out, Jo! =)
By Jo on Dec 1, 2008 | Reply
Yo, Daryl, you may regret that encouragement! I will be turning to you for marketing advice. As you will have noticed, marketing goes right over my head!
Thanks for the good words. I must say I think I get better advice from my Gen Y acquaintances than my own generation. Many thanks and once again, glad to have found you.
By Daryl Tay on Dec 1, 2008 | Reply
Jo, anytime you need help, I will be happy to offer it! The feeling is mutual =)