Social media is appealing to the young because they can keep
up with their friends and know what everyone else is doing, virtually all the
time!! Older adults, like my grandparents, are using Facebook and LinkedIn to
re-establish connections with friends and co-workers that they have lost track
of over the years, with the exception of a Christmas card. There is a ton of appeal in social media for
all ages, it allows people to maintain contact, to admire from a distance, and
to engage with people they may have otherwise left touch with. For me, I use Facebook
the most, but I have started to also follow more pages than people, currently
my favorite is Chris Powell (fitness and lifestyle celebrity) and the Healthy
Eating for Life page. I do follow my
friends and my family members who are spread all over the country, but I mostly
preview new baby pictures and see what people are up to. The problem is that
what you put out there you can’t get back, so it has to be carefully thought out.
In the educational arena, I feel that Personal Learning Environments
(PLEs) engage students in self-directed and group based learning that focuses
on flexibility and customization (Johnson, Adams, & Haywood, 2011, p.
30). This technology shifts the approach
of teachers to the role of a guide; helping students to develop their learning
goals, plans, and tools, instead of the leader, which could be considered a
drawback. This concept allows student to
learn at their own pace and in a manner that best suits them, which are two
huge advantages. The 2009 Horizon Report
stated that the use of PLE’s and social media in school is severely “hampered
by access and filtering policies” and that the restrictions set up to keep poor
content out can also block out some of the resources that are useful and
engaging to students (Johnson, Levine & Smith, 2009). Although I think some of these things have
been resolved since 2009, the use of PLE’s is nowhere near where it should be.
As someone who has always devoured material at an extremely fast pace, I was
often bored in school and eventually began to despise going. PLE’s promote learning at your own pace,
which is a benefit for every single student, not just those who take a little
while longer to learn or those who learn at a fast pace.
I really enjoyed the time I spent on the Center for Teaching Quality site, this site was extremely interesting to me as a novice educator
and I read through several of the blogs and some of my ideals about teaching
that are based on my educational experiences were highlighted!
I joined the diigo group called Health Literacy and Patient
Education Resources. This group
highlights an area that as a nurse, I am very interested in. This group highlighted what I would consider
“hot topics” in health literacy and provided me with some very interesting
reading!
Reference:
Johnson, L., Adams,
S., and Haywood, K., (2011). The NMC Horizon Report:2011 K-12
Edition. Austin, Texas: The New Media
Consortium.
Johnson, L., Levine, A., & Smith, R. (2009). The 2009 Horizon Report. Austin,
Texas: The New Media Consortium.
Amanda,
ReplyDeleteI thought that this was one of the harder assignments. Having only so many words that we can write I found difficult. I guess this is good practice for when we are all tweeting. I also believe that younger people enjoy social media because they can keep up with everyone. I find it astonishing how many older people are on Facebook. My grandmother is on Facebook and she uses it to stay in contact with me and all of my cousins who live around the world. I think that social media gives learners the unique opportunity to use as studying tools and distance learning. For example in this class next week we are able to have a meeting using Skype since we are distance learners. I think the concept of students learning at their own pace is one that is being used more in education. I looked at the Center for teaching quality. I think that this is a great site for educators. I will use this as a reference as I shift my focus more into education.