This article was originally published in the January 2009 Integrating Technology column of Beyond Penguins and Polar Bears
, an online magazine for elementary teachers. All versions of this article are licensed under a Creative Commons License.
The Middle School Portal Math & Science Pathways project has has its own online social network - check it out!
When you hear the words “social network” what comes to mind? We all have social networks - our friends, family, work colleagues - but what about your online social networks? Do you network professionally with colleagues through LinkedIn? Do you keep track of high school buddies on Reunion.com? Facebook and MySpace are two of the most famous (or infamous) social networking sites. CNET News reported in June of 2008 that Facebook had 50.6 billion page views and MySpace had 45.4 billion. Wikipedia has compiled a catalog of social networking sites that contains over a hundred listings. These sites are being used regularly by millions of people and are transforming the way people communicate and share information with friends and colleagues.
According to Steve Hargadon, an online social network is the aggregation of web tools for building community and content. Members of online social networks share interests and activities and are interested in exploring the interests and activities of others. Social networks provide ways for users to interact and form groups around topics of interest such as literature (Shelfari) or photo sharing (Flickr). For instance, Beyond Penguins has its own Shelfari group where users can add, review, and discuss their favorite children’s books. With Flickr, users upload their photos and provide descriptions. Users with similar interests in photography are able to form groups and communicate with each other.
ESTABLISHED EDUCATION SOCIAL NETWORKS
Many educators are using MySpace, Flickr, and other popular social networking interfaces to support educational endeavors; however, some social network interfaces have been built with education in mind. Tapped In, ePals, and Curriki are online social networks built for educators.
Tapped In is a web-based learning environment created in 1997 by SRI International to transform teacher professional development. Through Tapped In, educators can extend their professional growth beyond courses or workshops. It provides the online tools, resources, colleagues, and support educators need to implement effective, classroom-centered learning activities. Tapped In allows for the creation of virtual communities of practice around a wide variety of topics. The environment is built on the metaphor of a college campus with buildings, floors, conference rooms, special interest groups (over 700!), and offices. Beyond Penguins has a room and “holds” monthly events where participants meet and discuss the latest issue of the magazine.
Using the ePals social network, half a million educators and millions of learners across 200 countries and territories safely connect, collaborate, and build community, using school-safe email and blog tools. Teachers can set different levels of monitoring, even for individual students, make pages public, or limit blog views to particular audiences, including workgroups within a class. Students can upload files or photos, create polls, and use a calendar. The technology received an award for excellence from Teaching & Learning Magazine in 2006.
Curriki is a community of educators who support the development and free distribution of world-class educational materials to anyone who needs them. There are 40,000 registered members, and more than 14,000 learning assets in the repository. Founded by Sun Microsystems in 2004, the organization has operated as an independent nonprofit since 2006.
BUILD YOUR OWN SOCIAL NETWORK
Ning (which means “peace” in Chinese) currently provides a free, easy-to-use platform for setting up a fully functional and visually appealing social network from scratch. There are 11 products that come “standard” when building a NING network - everything from custom video players to event listings. Premium services are also available. There are many reasons to build a social network - a few are described on this page.
A couple of NING groups that I recommend are NING in Education and Classroom 2.0. Both of these social networks are all about using social networks and other collaborative digital tools in education. When you are ready to participate at a higher level -
Reply to someone else’s Forum or Blog post.
Start a discussion using the Forum.
Give your opinion by creating a Blog post.
Keep track of all new Forum discussions or Blog posts and comments by using the RSS feeds.
What about using a social network with your students? NING allows for private networks. What kinds of groups do you think your students might start? NING has a program where they will remove the ads for free for sites that will be used by students under 18 - the normal charge for this premium service is $24.95 a month.
Whether for personal, professional, or classroom use, social networking sites have the potential to enrich existing relationships and foster new ones. How can social networking transform your life?
[…] See more here: » Integrating Technology: Social Networking » Exemplary Resources … […]
nice post, thanks for sharing!
This is a great post! It is interesting to see what other people think about integrating technology and using social networking in classrooms. It gave some very useful information and ways to social network. I use classroom 2.0 but it was good to see some other accounts available for social networking. Thank You!
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Since a community consists of limited members coming together to share their concerns and opinions, technology gives them a platform to improve their quality of interactions.
Since the advent of Internet, emails, mobile phones I prefer to call up my loved ones rather than have a get together and share my experiences over the weekends. So while the technology tools are available in all types and shapes and sizes, the usage of the same makes my lives easier and more comfortable on one side, and on the other hand can also make me distant from my close ones.
Families increasingly view themselves as management problems to be solved, just as they would be at work, with technology. So, I see more technology tools being used to solve the household problems. There will be organizers, pagers etc used to keep track of the groceries or used as reminders to pick up the kids from school etc.
With the help of technology, communication has also become cheaper, quicker, and more efficient. I can now communicate with anyone around the globe by simply text messaging them or sending them an email for an almost instantaneous response. The Internet has also opened up face-to-face direct communication from different parts of the world thanks to the helps of video conferencing.
Pagers, cell phones and answering machines, PDAs etc are being used increasingly to coordinate complex household schedules. There is a feeling of togetherness built in when families watch television, go for movies, travel together etc. The devices that facilitate these like phones, computers, and answering machines help my family to efficiently plan our outings or get together in a well planned manner.
My family tends to use these tools on a regular basis once we get used to the advantages of the tools and also tend to pass on the same to other families or even our co-workers. But the level of technology usage depends from family to family.
With the use of advanced technologies, there is a shift in the work-home relationship. With the ability to work at home, I find myself leaving my job for the opportunity that allows me to, spend quality time with my family and still am prepared for class in the morning.
With the information overload by the usage of technology, the work load has also been increasing. So in effect I have lesser time to spend with my loved ones. But also since we know that my loved ones or colleagues are just a call away, I tend to get immersed in my work and tend to be very short and static in our conversations. So while technology should be making my lifestyle more comfortable and bringing us closer to my loved ones and family and friends, it is in fact bring in formalized and cool behavior patterns into the picture.
Have you ever read an email, blogs or an SMS sent on the mobile phone? If we read out any of the above, I can guarantee that 90 % of the above will not have the correct spelling or grammatical sense. I however, before I send anything from my blackberry, I always use spell check; force of habit.
Now most of these communication tools are being used by the next generation children who are being educated. But if we don’t monitor their level of education and the “shorthand language” being used by them, then it will affect their further interactions while growing up. The responsibility is on us as to how to guide the users towards better usage of the English language, or any other local Language. It is more important that the language should not lose its purity and accuracy, in such means of communication.
The increased use of technology sources has affected my lifestyle. Be it television, Internet, mobile phones, pagers etc, it has affected my social life. The increased usage of technology not only affected the interaction levels between my family members, it also affected the time needed to monitor my children and disciplining them. As a result of this the new generation of children are more independent and in need of discipline and guidance from their parents. As a teacher I see this everyday, sometimes I really wonder where their parents or guardians are.