Facebook for Educators

During the last twenty years education approaches have changed trough time.
Nevertheless, it seems that teachers do not change or improve as the situation
requires; education has evolved and nowadays is pretty difficult to teach students
and is even more difficult to gather their attention. Being a successful educator
implies to use all necessary tools related with education process and others that
can be helpful.
Social Networking, has arisen in the
last five in an extremely incredible
speed; Facebook is the most
common one, it seems foolish but
facebook can be a helpful media in
order to teach a particular topic and at the same time focus the students attention
in something they already like and are willing to do it; old-fashioned teaching
approaches are based on the idea of prohibiting students use devices inside the
classroom during classes because this technologic stuffs decrease learning.
Furthermore for some educators social networks like facebook are just for social
protocols and no way are useful for the teaching-learning process.
This analysis focuses on the use of Facebook as a technologic tool for teaching
learners. The proliferation of digital, social and mobile technologies has created a
culture in which youth participate more in creating and sharing content, profoundly
changing the way students communicate, interact, and learn. In many cases
students spend as much (or more) time online in an informal learning environment-
-interacting with peers and receiving feedback--than they do with their teachers in
the traditional classroom. There are seven ways in which teachers can use
facebook in order to develop a class.

1. Help Develop and Follow Your Schools Policy about
Facebook
Facebook already has many policies, rules, and restrictions for its users no matter
they are adults or minors, these policies are useful and prevent facebookers to be
victims of cyber bulling, and sexual harassment. Also policies increase privacy, and
allow keeping in touch with friends, family, and a lot people you have something or
a lot in common.
Schools policy is not different to
Facebooks policy; the first step should be
decide whether or not social network can
be helpful and accurate for the institution;
then teachers should see if the education
goals can be easily achieved by using
facebook not vice versa; and finally set a current policy, that means to be aware of
all the apps, games and gadgets and its constant updating, a policy set in one
specific year could not be effective for the next one. An adequate school policy
must involve the whole school or at least the people who is able to use this social
network, because instead of using it as a recreation web now can be used as a tool
for enhance and improve all the knowledge and information taught in the
classroom.

2. Encourage Students to Follow Facebooks
Guidelines

In addition to developing and following your schools policy on Facebook, its
important to encourage students to follow Facebooks guidelines. Learners and
teachers should be aware of all the policies and rules that can allow or restrict
users during their navigation in the network.
Facebook protects minors users, 13 is the minimal age to access the web.
Nevertheless there are some kids who lie in order to become facebookers sooner.
For that reason is important that teachers let their students know about the correct
use of these social networks for education
purposes. Besides teachers must encourage
students to use all the Facebooks tools in order
to report abuse or bad behavior of others users.
On the other hand students have to be aware of
their own behavior avoiding bullying other people
and what kind of privileges they have and what
restriction they must respect. In short when it
comes about education process some
commitments ought to be set and follow for both
parts educators and learners, and at the same time the policies of the social
network too.

3. Stay Up to Date with Safety and Privacy Settings
on Facebook

Facebook has some privacy settings which are very helpful and necessary in order
to use those as part of the teaching process; a priority for Facebook is giving
everyone control over their privacy. This helps create an online environment where
teachers, parents, and students can connect and share safely. Unfortunately if
users do not use them it is not possible to be safe in a world were sexual predators
take advantages of neglectful kids; these settings differ according age, minors are
surely more restricted than adults and the pages they can access through
facebook are limited. Some features that can enhance your privacy on Facebook
are:
Connecting on Facebook: which shows the way how people can access
and look at your stuffs in your profile.
Sharing on Facebook: which shows you the possibilities of how you can
display your messages, thoughts, pictures,
and so on. These go from the most private
to the most public one.
Apps and Websites: these are all the
games, pages, forums, links in which you
can access via Facebook.
Block List: this allows you to block other
people and restrict them to find out your
information.
With all of this is much easier to get students using in the right way social
networking for learning. It is work of the educator make a great effort in letting
know students that if they are committed to do it is going to be under these safety
and privacy settings, otherwise is not possible.

4. Promote Good Citizenship in the Digital World

Educators are role models and students from little kids to teenagers learn some
behavioral aspect from their teachers too. It is important that students behave
themselves even though they are in the online world; the E-community also have
rules that resemble for those ones in the real world.
Teachers should encourage well behavior and students should know that
educators expect this well behavior too. There are many ways to define digital
citizenship, but we feel that it comes down to three main components:

Conducting yourself in a civil manner in the
online world just like you would be
expected to behave in offline world.
Universal rules of social conduct apply in
both environments.

Behaving responsibly and compassionately
with your online actions. And anonymity is not excuse to behave in an
improper manner. People would be easily offended by your comments and
you could be marked as a stalker and bully.

Watching out for each other in your online community much like you would
in your real world neighborhood. By doing so, you are promoting a healthy
and safe online community. Do not keep in silence if you see an improper
act.
Facebook already allow users to denounce bad behavior, teachers should enhance
this too; one thing that affects education and school environment is Cyber Bullying
which is more easier to do and travel faster than normal bullying, because can be
done via texts, e-mail, and social networking. Unfortunately people who suffer from
cyber bullying often do not report those abuses. The problem has become some
big and spread so fast that some institutions ask web users for support in order to
avoid this problem; Cartoon Network encourage kids, teens and adults to fight
against bullying in www.bastadebullying.com with a great acceptance among
children.
Educators and parents can make clear to students that what they post online is
traceable; it is not as anonymous as they might think. In the event that legal action
is taken, online services and Internet Service Providers can be required to provide
identity information to the proper authorities. In short responsible behavior is
required in order to navigate in the internet. Digital citizenship implies to take care
and look after everyone and protect the welfare of our students when emotional or
physical harm is being inflicted.

5. Use Pages and Groups Features to Communicate
with Students

in the educational environment between teachers and students always have been
a proper way to establish relationship; as tutors,
teachers demand respect from students and give the
same in return. Using Facebook this does not have to
change at all. There are some ways to communicate
with students that are professional and appropriate.
For people new to Facebook, it may seem a little
confusing. Here we want to make it easier to
understand. Youll get more clarity if you understand
these four Facebook features:
Home: This has your own News Feed, which includes updates from friends.
You are able to comment and see what is going on with everything on the
social network. Furthermore displays all the possible web links that could be
interesting for the facebook user, such as Barcelona FC, Discovery
Network, and Naruto Shippunden and so on.
Profile: This shows a persons photo, interests and other info about them. It
is unique and displays a lot of information of the user, also their preferences
such as music, movies, sports, and relationships. As teachers we should be
aware that our privacy settings must be high and have an appropriate profile
picture.
Groups: This is a good tool for projects. Groups can be closed, open or
private. In this features teachers should get focused because in that way
they are able to keep in touch with large groups of students at the same
time.
Pages: Pages are a public space for businesses and celebrities, among
other things. You are able to choose the pages you can receive information
about.
Communication between students and teachers is mostly formal; in facebook it
should seem inappropriate for an educator have his/her students as a friend on
Facebook. For that reason educators can create groups on facebook as a manner
to keep track of their students without friend them; display materials, set
homeworks, and information, clear doubts about a topic discussed in class, and
many other uses, are the benefits of this groups; the advantage of this groups is
their privacy because their members share only among classmates.
It is sure that teaches also can create pages that have the same features of private
groups but are public, it means parents are able to see what kind of information
and stuffs their kids are seeing and downloading. In this way the relation between
tutor and learners remains the same, but they are using Facebook as an improver
of the education process. Both, groups and pages are good choices to start a
forum in which students can be part of their own learning.

6. Embrace the Digital, Social, Mobile and Always-
On Learning Styles of 21st Century Students

It seems strange but in order to use the
advantages that offer Social Networking, teachers
should promote among their students the use of
social media such as facebook; there is no doubt
that most part of teens and adults use their
cellphones to be connected.
The term Always on, should be part of the
course goals when it comes to the incorporation
of technology into the learning process; understanding and incorporating these
digital learning opportunities into teachers coursework will increase student
motivation and enhance learning. These are some features that make Digital
Learning an effective tool for an academic course.
Interactive: Students who create their own content and interact via social
media can express their identity and creativity; then share it with others, in
that they enhance the use of digital tools.
Student-Centered: Shifts the learning responsibility to the student,
requiring students to take a more active role in their own learning process,
teachers on the other hand end up being just facilitators and helpers when
the situation requires.
Authentic: The use of social media and technology should be tied to a
specific learning goal or activity; students should be able to feel interested in
the use of a social network for study out of school time.
Collaborative: Learning is a social activity, and many students learn best
through working with a group of peers. This collaboration and peer feedback
can take place in either a virtual or in-person environment. Students are
able to compare their thoughts and doubts about topics, assignment, and
classes.
On-Demand: Course content should be made available on-demand so
the learner can view course materials
when, where, and how they want to
view the content, whether on a desktop
computer, mobile phone or other
handheld device. There are many ways
to keep in touch, so there is no excuse
for teachers avoid using these social
media tools.
Mobiles are for sure the most common and practice device people use to be
connected to the web; facebook have platforms and apps in order to allow
smartphones access to the social network, let the users to do all the functions and
setting they would do using a computer.

7. Use Facebook as a Professional Development
Resource

Being a teacher is not an easy job; educators have to learn new and more effective
ways to teach contents that twenty years ago were taught in a specific manner.
Nevertheless, with the use of technology teachers can find out awesome ways to
teach, facebook can be used as resource in the learning environment.
Educators face the same problems in every part
of the world; ten years ago there were books or
articles in newspaper or magazines where a
teacher can read other teachers experiences
about issues in the classroom, school, or
educative environment. Nowadays using social
networking educators can share their
experiences, thoughts, and skills in order to teach
a particular group of students, and for solving
problems related with education. There already
exist pages with that purpose of sharing knowledge among educators and people
who deal with education problems like psychologist and so on. Nevertheless if
educators want they can create their own group or page using facebook in order to
share with the teachers they want like the same school, city, country or continent.
Remember that education approaches can vary according cultures so an approach
used in Japan could not be so effective in Bolivia.

Conclusion

There is no doubt that technology is spreading pretty fast in the world; new devices
allow people to connect to the web, and for that reason they should take advantage
of that. instead of seeing Facebook and social media as a distracter that steals
students attention, educators should notice the potential these social webs have in
the education process.
Applying the rules, being aware of Facebook policies, and using privacy settings,
are very important. Then make students compromise with the purpose of using
Facebook as an extension of the learning process; if both teachers and learners
can enhance the education process and the exchange of information and most
important take advantage of the students love for social media such as Facebook.