A recent assignment in my INTE 5665 Social Media and Digital Cultures class led me to exploring new social media tools. I've used Facebook for years,  Linked In only marginally, and Pinterest for collecting recipes, so there were plenty of social media tools I hadn't yet tried. 

At first blush I found Instagram interesting. I soon learned I would only use it for sharing with friends and family, so it wouldn't be a tool I'd use often. That said, however, I've suggested it to friends who work in historic preservation: it's a super-tool for sharing images of buildings and landscapes and I can see it being used to expand the reach of historic preservation activities and to build advocacy for individual projects. Instagram makes sharing photos easy, and I can think of several ways to use it in course design and especially for group activities

I moved on to another highly visual  social media tool, Learnist. Learnist is similar to Pinterest in that you create learning boards onto which you pin content. The audience is a bit different, though: Learnist is designed for teaching and learning. Board curators can structure content to initiate and build learning. I'm quite interested in digital storytelling, and so I began a Learnist Digital Storytelling Board (click on link below to take a look). I've been collecting resources on the topic, and my Learnist board helps me visually organize the resources. I've found I remember the content of an article or website more easily if I have an image associated with it. Creating the board has been fun! Knowing I have a way to share what I find valuable has provided me with a goal of sorts. Soon I'll create a social media board. I've also started following a couple of other Learnist boards and have many more to explore.

I've enjoyed using Learnist so much that I'm moved to create more boards, but not all on Learnist. I'm working on a Pinterest board for humane education resources. I chose Pinterest for this topic because of the audience I want to reach. I feel Learnist reaches a professional audience and Pinertest reaches everyone, as evidenced by content from how to build a garage to Halloween treats for kids. The content for my humane education board will be designed to reach people, most likely volunteers, who present local animal shelter outreach programs, and I feel they are more apt to find my board on Pinterest than Learnist. Then again, I have so many professional-level  humane education resources, I should create another Learnist board!

If you haven't tried Learnist yet, I encourage you to give it a go. If you're a visual person who wants to share content from websites to videos to PDF's and original work, you'll probably become as hooked on Learnist as I am.

I admit it: I'm a data junkie. It seems a new report on who-uses-what comes out every few months. Because you have to be careful who you believe, I always look for the original source of the survey or poll. In this case, it's the Pew  Research Center's Internet and American Life Project 2012, which I consider a reliable source.

As educators, we can use the data from the Pew report to inform our teaching strategies the same ways businesses use it for marketing.  According to the data, we can use for example, Facebook, to market a product or create a learning community for 18-29 year old Hispanic urban women with some college who earn more than $30,000 year.

By knowing our learners we can better craft learning experiences that incorporate social media. To this end, we can poll our students at the start of each semester to learn their attitudes and preferences for social media. Just as we match the media with the message when we design online learning, we can match the social media with the learner.









Image source and link to article:
Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram-Social Media User Demographics 2013
http://www.mediabistro.com/alltwitter/social-user-demographics_b39963

I've just read a brief article in Edudemic summarizing the results of the annual Pearson Social Media Use by Higher Education Faculty Survey .  I was surprised to learn that just 55% of those surveyed reported using social media professionally, although this indicated an increase over the previous year. Faculty use of social media in teaching increased from 34% in 2012 to 41% in 2013. Blogs and wikis comprised a single category and were the heavy favorite for assignments in which students created or commented on content, followed by podcasts. Blogs and wikis and podcasts were equally used for read/watch/listen assignments. Twitter and Linked In were seldom used, and Facebook only marginally. The survey also reports on faculty attitudes about technology and communication as well as concerns about using social media in teaching. 

After reading the article I noted the numbers in the "share" categories: 1,012 Tweets, 611 Facebook Likes, 351 Pins, and 175 Linked In shares. These numbers make me wonder: if I infer that faculty are tweeting the article, how can we encourage them to expand their use of Twitter in the classroom? 
 
Read the article here: 
How Social Media is Being Used In Education 
http://www.edudemic.com/social-media-in-education/