3. 21st century students
5. Four exemplars of using social media for teaching and learning
5.4 Twitter
Twitter is another social media platform which can be used as 21stcentury education. It has been recognized as a platform that can be used in teaching and learning in many ways such as creating digital classrooms, which enables educators to teach media literacy, information literacy and digital skills as well as to promote students’ interaction and engagement inside and outside classrooms. Twitter is also able to connect educators all over the world, in order to share information and knowledge in education, thus indirectly aid them in professional development and continuous learning. Progressively over the years, Twitter has enabled educators to innovate their teaching and learning methods in many different subject areas at various levels of education. Educators can share videos and
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demonstrations and raise problems for the students to solve them and tweet back the solutions witha link to the source using a special hashtag. Educators can encourage the students’ reading habit from books that have been tweeted, improve writing skill, besides grammar and vocabulary learning applied in all subjects.
To start using Twitter in the virtual classrooms, an educator creates a special Twitter account, whereby it can be a personal account or a subject account for the students to follow. From their own accounts, they can search for theeducator’s user account using the symbol @, to call out the user’s name in the Search section. Through this process, students learn three skills to increase their ICT literacy.
Figure 13: Tweeting notes and resources of educators and students
An example of Twitter implementation in teaching Computer Science relating to C++ programming subject is shown in Figure 13. The educator shares notes of important topics by creating a thread of tweets or sharing the related links. Students are instructed to find their own notes and share extra resources. The regular news updates through the following relevant hashtags will provide an interesting topic for discussion in class. This trains students creativity and innovation, critical thinking, initiative and self-direction skills besides acquiring the content knowledge.
To engage students in group collaborations and discussions, the educator posts discussion questions through tweet and create a hashtag (#) to identify messages on a specific topic, and students use the same hashtag, to follow the conversation. Discussion will carry on and the educator needs to post regularly to encourage discussion. Therefore, students will acquire 21st century skills such as critical thinking and problem solving, creativity and innovation skills for discussion on problems to come to a solution. This also needs flexibility and adaptability, social and cross-cultural interaction skills when working in a group. Students may rotate leading the discussion to learn leadership and responsibility skills. If the solution to the discussion is an innovative product, the productivity and accountability skills are embedded in the learning process. This indirectly promotes active learning among the students.
100 demonstrations and raise problems for the students to solve them and tweet back the solutions witha link to the source using a special hashtag. Educators can encourage the students’ reading habit from books that have been tweeted, improve writing skill, besides grammar and vocabulary learning applied in all subjects.
To start using Twitter in the virtual classrooms, an educator creates a special Twitter account, whereby it can be a personal account or a subject account for the students to follow. From their own accounts, they can search for theeducator’s user account using the symbol @, to call out the user’s name in the Search section. Through this process, students learn three skills to increase their ICT literacy.
Figure 13: Tweeting notes and resources of educators and students
An example of Twitter implementation in teaching Computer Science relating to C++ programming subject is shown in Figure 13. The educator shares notes of important topics by creating a thread of tweets or sharing the related links. Students are instructed to find their own notes and share extra resources. The regular news updates through the following relevant hashtags will provide an interesting topic for discussion in class. This trains students creativity and innovation, critical thinking, initiative and self-direction skills besides acquiring the content knowledge.
To engage students in group collaborations and discussions, the educator posts discussion questions through tweet and create a hashtag (#) to identify messages on a specific topic, and students use the same hashtag, to follow the conversation. Discussion will carry on and the educator needs to post regularly to encourage discussion. Therefore, students will acquire 21st century skills such as critical thinking and problem solving, creativity and innovation skills for discussion on problems to come to a solution. This also needs flexibility and adaptability, social and cross-cultural interaction skills when working in a group. Students may rotate leading the discussion to learn leadership and responsibility skills. If the solution to the discussion is an innovative product, the productivity and accountability skills are embedded in the learning process. This indirectly promotes active learning among the students.
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demonstrations and raise problems for the students to solve them and tweet back the solutions witha link to the source using a special hashtag. Educators can encourage the students’ reading habit from books that have been tweeted, improve writing skill, besides grammar and vocabulary learning applied in all subjects.
To start using Twitter in the virtual classrooms, an educator creates a special Twitter account, whereby it can be a personal account or a subject account for the students to follow. From their own accounts, they can search for theeducator’s user account using the symbol @, to call out the user’s name in the Search section. Through this process, students learn three skills to increase their ICT literacy.
Figure 13: Tweeting notes and resources of educators and students
An example of Twitter implementation in teaching Computer Science relating to C++ programming subject is shown in Figure 13. The educator shares notes of important topics by creating a thread of tweets or sharing the related links. Students are instructed to find their own notes and share extra resources. The regular news updates through the following relevant hashtags will provide an interesting topic for discussion in class. This trains students creativity and innovation, critical thinking, initiative and self-direction skills besides acquiring the content knowledge.
To engage students in group collaborations and discussions, the educator posts discussion questions through tweet and create a hashtag (#) to identify messages on a specific topic, and students use the same hashtag, to follow the conversation. Discussion will carry on and the educator needs to post regularly to encourage discussion. Therefore, students will acquire 21st century skills such as critical thinking and problem solving, creativity and innovation skills for discussion on problems to come to a solution. This also needs flexibility and adaptability, social and cross-cultural interaction skills when working in a group. Students may rotate leading the discussion to learn leadership and responsibility skills. If the solution to the discussion is an innovative product, the productivity and accountability skills are embedded in the learning process. This indirectly promotes active learning among the students.
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Figure 14. Interaction of educator with students over assignment questions and answers
The educator also can easily and quickly tweet details of homework and assignments questions as shown in Figure 14. Students replied to assignment questions posted in the educator’s tweet, by stating the question number and included the hashtag (#) of the topic. Twitter enables real time intervention at any point of students’ progress by giving feedback on their answers, comments and good advice to students. Students can use Twitter to ask each other questions. Thus, this will encourage cooperation among students and thus, improving their interrelation and social skills.
Figure 15.TweetDeck usage in monitoring discussions using the discussions’ hashtag
The educator can also use TweetDeck to track their classes’ discussions by creating a search column in TweetDeck using the discussions’ hashtag. This provides convenience to the educator to closely monitor the participation of the students in the discussion and build Tweet collections for a particular topic in one easy interface as shown in Figure 15. This will enable the educator to assess each group assignment and make comparisons based on Bloom taxonomy.
101 demonstrations and raise problems for the students to solve them and tweet back the solutions witha link to the
source using a special hashtag. Educators can encourage the students’ reading habit from books that have been tweeted, improve writing skill, besides grammar and vocabulary learning applied in all subjects.
To start using Twitter in the virtual classrooms, an educator creates a special Twitter account, whereby it can be a personal account or a subject account for the students to follow. From their own accounts, they can search for theeducator’s user account using the symbol @, to call out the user’s name in the Search section. Through this process, students learn three skills to increase their ICT literacy.
Figure 13: Tweeting notes and resources of educators and students
An example of Twitter implementation in teaching Computer Science relating to C++ programming subject is shown in Figure 13. The educator shares notes of important topics by creating a thread of tweets or sharing the related links. Students are instructed to find their own notes and share extra resources. The regular news updates through the following relevant hashtags will provide an interesting topic for discussion in class. This trains students creativity and innovation, critical thinking, initiative and self-direction skills besides acquiring the content knowledge.
To engage students in group collaborations and discussions, the educator posts discussion questions through tweet and create a hashtag (#) to identify messages on a specific topic, and students use the same hashtag, to follow the conversation. Discussion will carry on and the educator needs to post regularly to encourage discussion. Therefore, students will acquire 21st century skills such as critical thinking and problem solving, creativity and innovation skills for discussion on problems to come to a solution. This also needs flexibility and adaptability, social and cross-cultural interaction skills when working in a group. Students may rotate leading the discussion to learn leadership and responsibility skills. If the solution to the discussion is an innovative product, the productivity and accountability skills are embedded in the learning process. This indirectly promotes active learning among the students.
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Figure 14. Interaction of educator with students over assignment questions and answers
The educator also can easily and quickly tweet details of homework and assignments questions as shown in Figure 14. Students replied to assignment questions posted in the educator’s tweet, by stating the question number and included the hashtag (#) of the topic. Twitter enables real time intervention at any point of students’ progress by giving feedback on their answers, comments and good advice to students. Students can use Twitter to ask each other questions. Thus, this will encourage cooperation among students and thus, improving their interrelation and social skills.
Figure 15.TweetDeck usage in monitoring discussions using the discussions’ hashtag
The educator can also use TweetDeck to track their classes’ discussions by creating a search column in TweetDeck using the discussions’ hashtag. This provides convenience to the educator to closely monitor the participation of the students in the discussion and build Tweet collections for a particular topic in one easy interface as shown in Figure 15. This will enable the educator to assess each group assignment and make comparisons based on Bloom taxonomy.
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6. Conclusion
The advancement of technologies in the 21stcentury has changed the traditional methods of teaching. The 21st century learning is no longer confined within the four walls of classroom learning. With the rapid improvement in social media platforms, they have become the latest trend of teaching platforms which complement the weaknesses of traditional face to face learning to accommodate the trend of the 21st century students. The expansion of classroom learning to virtual classrooms via social media platforms, is not a challenge to 21stcentury students as they are internet savvies or digital natives. They are connected all the time via their smart devices. The examples of the four social media platforms have demonstrated that organizing teaching resources and activities on one’s own website and integrating technology can bring students’ learning experience to a different level. It has been demonstrated that the 21st Century Knowledge-and-Skills Rainbow can be acquired in line with the Bloom Taxonomy. It is the changes in the demand for the skills that have profound implications on competencies which educators themselves need to acquire to effectively teach 21stcentury skills to their students. The shift from looking upwards to seniority must now be towards looking outwards to young educators. Younger educators, who are from the generations Y and Z can easily adapt to 21st Century Education and will not feel stifled with the traditional classroom teaching approach.
References
Ben-Av, M.B. & Gurevich, I. (2018). Students’ Perception of the Mathematical Classroom while Integrating Digital Technologies. Res Rep Math 2:3, p.3449. ISBN 978-84-09-02709-5.
Boholano, H. B. (2017). Smart Social Networking: 21stCentury Teaching and Learning Skills. Research in Pedagogy, 7(1), 21-29. Doi:10.17810/2015.45.
Chan, MKY, Ling SE, Ling SC & Adeline Engkamat. (2019). Integrating Instagram in learning strategies for tertiary blended learning course: a case of student experience. 1stInternational Conference on Education in the Digital Ecosystem (ICEdDE 2019). DEStech Publications, Inc., USA, ISBN: 978-1-60595-658-9:
360-366
Chaffey, D. (2020, Aug 3). Global social media research summary 2020. Retrieved from https://www.smartinsights.com/social-media-marketing/social-media-strategy/new-global-social-media-research/
Chaubey, A., & Bhattacharya, B. (2015). Learning Management System in Higher Education. International Journal of Science Technology & Engineering, 2(3), 158-162.
Kemp, S. (2020, Jan 30). Digital 2020: Global Digital Overview. DataRepotal. Retrieved from https://datareportal.com/reports/digital-2020-global-digital-overview
Khoros. (2020). The 2020 social media demographics guide. Retrieved from https://khoros.com/resources/social-media-demographics-guide
Paulsen, M., & Taekke, J. (2013). Social media and teaching: Education in the new media environment. Paper presented at the 40thAnniversary Nordmedia Conference, Oslo and Akershus University College.
Trilling, B., & Fadel, C. (2009). 21stcentury skills: Learning for life in our times. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
ISBN 978-0-470-47538-6.
102 102
6. Conclusion
The advancement of technologies in the 21stcentury has changed the traditional methods of teaching. The 21st century learning is no longer confined within the four walls of classroom learning. With the rapid improvement in social media platforms, they have become the latest trend of teaching platforms which complement the weaknesses of traditional face to face learning to accommodate the trend of the 21st century students. The expansion of classroom learning to virtual classrooms via social media platforms, is not a challenge to 21stcentury students as they are internet savvies or digital natives. They are connected all the time via their smart devices. The examples of the four social media platforms have demonstrated that organizing teaching resources and activities on one’s own website and integrating technology can bring students’ learning experience to a different level. It has been demonstrated that the 21st Century Knowledge-and-Skills Rainbow can be acquired in line with the Bloom Taxonomy. It is the changes in the demand for the skills that have profound implications on competencies which educators themselves need to acquire to effectively teach 21stcentury skills to their students. The shift from looking upwards to seniority must now be towards looking outwards to young educators. Younger educators, who are from the generations Y and Z can easily adapt to 21st Century Education and will not feel stifled with the traditional classroom teaching approach.
References
Ben-Av, M.B. & Gurevich, I. (2018). Students’ Perception of the Mathematical Classroom while Integrating Digital Technologies. Res Rep Math 2:3, p.3449. ISBN 978-84-09-02709-5.
Boholano, H. B. (2017). Smart Social Networking: 21stCentury Teaching and Learning Skills. Research in Pedagogy, 7(1), 21-29. Doi:10.17810/2015.45.
Chan, MKY, Ling SE, Ling SC & Adeline Engkamat. (2019). Integrating Instagram in learning strategies for tertiary blended learning course: a case of student experience. 1stInternational Conference on Education in the Digital Ecosystem (ICEdDE 2019). DEStech Publications, Inc., USA, ISBN: 978-1-60595-658-9:
360-366
Chaffey, D. (2020, Aug 3). Global social media research summary 2020. Retrieved from https://www.smartinsights.com/social-media-marketing/social-media-strategy/new-global-social-media-research/
Chaubey, A., & Bhattacharya, B. (2015). Learning Management System in Higher Education. International Journal of Science Technology & Engineering, 2(3), 158-162.
Kemp, S. (2020, Jan 30). Digital 2020: Global Digital Overview. DataRepotal. Retrieved from https://datareportal.com/reports/digital-2020-global-digital-overview
Khoros. (2020). The 2020 social media demographics guide. Retrieved from https://khoros.com/resources/social-media-demographics-guide
Paulsen, M., & Taekke, J. (2013). Social media and teaching: Education in the new media environment. Paper presented at the 40thAnniversary Nordmedia Conference, Oslo and Akershus University College.
Trilling, B., & Fadel, C. (2009). 21stcentury skills: Learning for life in our times. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
ISBN 978-0-470-47538-6.
102