Students use social media extensively to learn for school and for their hobbies. They give each other tips about YouTube videos of teachers who can explain better than their own teacher or they give each other advice. They also actively support each other in doing homework by using, for example, Whatsapp.
Students already exchanged knowledge before the advent of social media, but with the use of social media such as Twitter, WhatsApp and Facebook, information exchange has become a lot easier and 'richer'.
This is all evident from the research ' Samen leren – Tieners en sociale media ' by the foundation Mijn Kind Online and the foundation Kennisnet. The research was conducted among 1500 pupils between the ages of 10 and 18 in primary and secondary education.
Best critical and aware
In addition to a great deal of numerical data on the availability and use of wifi, digital devices and learning resources, the research provides a wealth of insights, nice quotes from students and teachers about the use of social media in school. What is particularly striking is that students are very aware of the limitations and possibilities that the various social media bring with them.
The research focuses on learning with social media and distinguishes three applications: learning about your hobby, orientation on your future and learning at school. I would like to highlight the last topic in particular.
About learning as a hobby, nice examples are given of young people who find instructional videos on YouTube for literally everything you can think of.
Bram (17 years old): “I watch videos on YouTube of Victor Wood, a bass player, and he puts rhythm exercises online, he has had sessions of 2 hours long. You can watch parts of them and try to play along.”
figure 2.1
Self-evidence
The next part of the research is about social media and learning for school. Many teachers are still astonished when they hear that almost all of their students have an account on Wrts , a simple quiz program, with which students can memorize the words from their school books.
Learning words
The unfamiliarity of teachers with this program is indicative of the quiet naturalness with which these apps and applications find their way among students and achieve a huge spread. Learning words on the bus to school, with an app that allows you to improve your own score. That's how it goes with most social media.
Students appear to actively support each other in doing homework. They did that before, of course, but it has become a lot easier and 'richer' through the use of social media. For example, they can now work together on papers from home and send photographed notes around with WhatsApp. The research also shows that this happens more intensively as the level of education increases.
3.6
Critical
But young people are certainly not only positive about the use of switzerland mobile phone number list social media in the classroom. They look at it critically. It is mainly the variety and convenience that social media can offer that is appreciated. The research does not reveal a real contrast between the negative and positive sides of social media. It is more about dimensions:
Social media can make the lesson more fun, but the teacher still has to explain;
Young people still prefer face-to-face contact, but sometimes social media can help if you are shy.
Students understand that telephones are banned from the classroom. Social media are not an absolute requirement for successful knowledge transfer, according to the research. Students do not find it important whether a teacher uses social media: only 13% find it important. They find it much more important that a teacher can explain well (84%). And if this is not the case, then it is logical that you use the easy explanation of another teacher on YouTube, right?