Citation: Moody, M. (2010). Teaching Twitter and Beyond: Tips for Incorporating Social Media in Traditional Courses. AEJMC Journal of Magazine & New Media Research. Vol. 11, No. 2 Spring 201
Teaching Twitter: Tips for incorporating social media into traditional courses
Abstract
Social media can be powerful tools for engaging, teaching and learning in the college classroom. They enable students to retrieve information and interact with others in real time. This paper discusses the benefits of integrating social media in classrooms and provides examples of projects that may be useful in courses such as magazine writing, reporting, public relations and minorities in the media. The goal is to pique and hold student interest while arming them with skills that will help them get jobs in the future.
Introduction
Social media have rapidly changed the way people live, do business and connect. Unfortunately, many professors have not been as quick to modify their courses to reflect these sweeping changes. Professors of media courses should make sure they are contemporary and relevant to today’s students.
This paper offers tips for integrating social media into magazine, reporting, public relations and minorities in the media college courses without changing the overall content. The goal is to pique and hold student interest, and to prepare them for a rapidly changing media climate.
Fedler (2005, 19) asserts that the key to successful integration is to “mix things up.” For example, professors should break up long, boring lectures with activities of varying lengths, i.e. transparencies, PowerPoint slides and video clips. “If the students never know what’s coming next, it will probably be an effective course.”
In addition, instructors must take students’ different learning styles and preferences into consideration. For example, Tang and Zhang (2010) found that younger students prefer video, whereas older students favor lecture. Findings also indicated professors should use a mix of technologies in the classroom, apply them creatively in order to promote the most learning for students and satisfy students’ learning needs and objectives.
Social networking: friend or foe?
Social-media technologies, such as social networking, wikis and blogs, enable collaboration on a grander scale than traditional media (Kaplan and Haenlein 2010, 60). Critics blame social media for a variety of problems, ranging from increasing child molestation to hastening the moral decay of society. However, social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook can actually help professors communicate with students. Users create, swap and manipulate information on many levels and in real-time.
Professors may create a Facebook group for courses and invite students to post articles and information about various topics. This encourages an open dialogue via a medium that undergraduates often use many hours throughout the day. Professors may chat with students who have questions about a project and need a few minutes of a professor’s time, versus stopping by for an in-depth office visit. This works particularly well with students who have a disability or those who have internships or jobs.
Students are often willing to open up and discuss topics on the Web when they are too shy to discuss them in front of their peers. Students also tend to open up after they collect their thoughts and put them in writing. This exercise lets them post information in a public setting and get feedback in a nonthreatening manner.
Magazine and feature writers may look to Facebook for story ideas, trends and sources to interview for stories. Professors may also use social media to encourage critical discussions on topics such as media stereotypes. For example, one exercise might encourage students to discuss the prevalence of hate groups in social media or to compare and contrast the goals and objectives of race-related groups on Facebook.
Illustration 1. Example of Facebook hate group
Professors may foster a particularly rich discussion by encouraging feedback from participants who are not in the class. This opens discussion with a diverse group of people and offers insight into the ideas and objectives of hate groups. Such exercises have two benefits: they help students question media portrayals and become aware of their own biases.
This type of exercise not only opens up dialogue about common stereotypes, but also allows participants to familiarize themselves with the prevalence of hate groups in mainstream society. As a result, they may become better journalists and consumers of the news in the future.
Illustration 2: Facebook hate group
Blogging and beyond
Blogging is an excellent way to help students improve their critical thinking and writing skills. A blog (short for Web log) is an online discussion group in which people post comments about a topic in a running conversation with each other. Almost any course can benefit from having students practice their writing skills.
For example, magazine students who blog on current trends might receive reader comments and suggestions they can incorporate into feature stories, with both local and national angles. Professors of media culture studies courses may assign subject matter that explores issues of race, gender, religion and politics. They provide ample controversy and rich content for blogging.
Current events also make great topics. For example, combine discussions focusing on how media frame race-related issues with an exercise that directs students to compare and contrast two different media outlets’ coverage of a racially charged issue in a blog. This allows participants to critically analyze a situation through primary research and disseminate their information in a new media format.
Instructors may also relate blogging to real-world experience. For example, point out blogs have gone beyond the confines of the private home and permeated every aspect of life. Most news organizations have launched blogs to discuss everything from parenting to sports. By one estimate, there are 80,000 new blog sites launched daily, and there are 29 million blog sites tracked by the blog search engine Technorati (Biagi 2009).
In recent years, corporations have begun to hire students to create a social networking presence and to blog about products and services on Web sites such as Facebook and MySpace. Students who know how to create Facebook groups, events and have a history of blogging on such sites, have a better chance of making a good impression at job interviews for such positions. This area of mass media will undoubtedly continue to grow.
Tweaking Twitter
Although Twitter is not yet as popular with students as Facebook and MySpace, it may be useful in the classroom. Twitter is a social networking and micro blogging service that enables its users to send and read messages known as tweets. Tweets are text-based posts displayed on the author's profile page and delivered to the author's subscribers or followers.
Twitter allows users to update their status and simultaneously send the information to everyone who is following them via a text message. It might be useful for professors or students who need to send a message to the whole class. Users can update their Twitter status, and followers can retrieve the information without having to check e-mails.
There are a number of other beneficial exercises involving Twitter. For example, professors might have students follow two different news outlets, such as FOX and MSNBC, and analyze the types of tweets, or posts, they make. Once again, this allows them to discuss critically how media outlets cover issues differently.
Tweets from selected news sources also provide story ideas and keep followers up to date. News outlets such as National Public Radio usually provide at least 30 updates throughout the day, ranging from music to politics. Tweets contain a link to the full story. Such exercises encourage students to become better followers of current events.
Empowering PowerPoint
Another way to make use social media in the classroom is to have students create a PowerPoint/video to display key points from feature stories, magazine articles and other course projects completed during the semester. Students may easily convert PowerPoint slides to video using applications such as authorstream.com or slides.com and upload them to YouTube.
Illustration 3: Student video clip that illustrates stereotypes of Asian women
This exercise may prove useful when creating a slide show presentation to accompany a magazine article. Students may illustrate ideas with photos and video clips and add background music.
Reporting students may create short video clips using Skype, video cameras or Flip cameras, all of which provide easy, inexpensive methods to record interviews for stories. Skype offers a range of free services, including voice or video calls and instant messaging to other Skype users whom students may videotape from remote locations.
Computer webcams offer an instant means to add interviews to slideshows. Many computers now come with pre-installed cameras and, with little prodding, professors can encourage students to use them for more than Web chatting with friends.
Shameless Plug
The “Shameless Plug Multimedia Autobiography” may replace or supplement the customary memoir or autobiography that students complete in magazine, reporting and writing classes. The goal of the project is to let students describe and illustrate their biographical information, such as hometown, extracurricular activities and family in a multimedia package.
The final product should include text, photos, audio and video clips that are meaningful to them. Graduating seniors can also emphasize job skills, strengths, aspirations, goals and internships to highlight their skills to recruiters and potential employers.
Students may use a PowerPoint slide show converted to video or a Web site such as Prezi.com or Slides.com to display the items listed above. Instructors should show them several examples to give them an idea of how the finished product might look.
Professors may slightly alter the assignment for different courses. For example, Instructors of media culture courses might incorporate information about a student’s ethnic background or media stereotypes. Instructors of women and gender courses might encourage students to explore media representations of women and to discuss how such images affect their lives. Editing students might benefit from repackaging and editing the content of Shameless Plug videos. For example, they may suggest modifications of a video that focuses too heavily on one topic. This will give editing students practice in analyzing new media projects, something they may have to do professionally one day.
This project cultivates creativity, builds on previous assignments and prepares students for future jobs. Major newspapers such as the New York Times and USA Today use similar slideshows to accompany some traditional articles.
Illustration 4: Students explore how media images affect their lives through stereotypes and misrepresentations.
Additionally, students and professors learn more about their peers and students than usual, which may foster better discussions and camaraderie.
Lim, Pellet and Pellet (2009) note that digital video technology is a strong tool that enables students to develop various skills such as research, communication and decision-making. They assert that integrating digital video technology enriches university classroom curricula, as well as enhancing authentic and meaningful pedagogical experiences.
Using Blackboard
Many instructors do not realize that they can use Blackboard for more than recording grades and attendance. Students can post assignments on the discussion board section. Public posts allow students to access assignments, offer comments and feedback.
At a bare minimum, professor may use Blackboard to provide links. For instance, during lectures on writing movie or music reviews provide links to selected reviews from publications online. In addition, post feature stories from magazines, newspapers and online publications such as Salon and Slate to provide good examples of writing.
Illustration 5: Blackboard is useful for fostering discussions on various topics
Instructors may schedule conferences on Blackboard during which students may meet at the same time to “chat” or ask questions about a topic. This is another way to interact with students outside class. Professors may prefer this type of interaction to e-mails and individual telephone calls. Furthermore, for students who are accustomed to real-time interaction on MySpace, Facebook and Yahoo, this provides yet another way to bring real-world interaction into the classroom.
Speaking volumes
To reinforce class discussions, teachers have long known the value of incorporating speakers. Former students and journalists from the community who discuss new media jobs with students may spark student interest and help them realize that the information learned in class actually applies to the real world.
Undergraduates learn best when they perceive the relevance of course content to their career goals. The “trust me” approach to education does not inspire students with a burning desire to learn, and those who do learn tend to let grades motivate them only (Fedler, 2005).
The total package
Students in any class may also use the Internet to market themselves. At the end of the semester, have students create an online portfolio that displays their work from internships and other courses.
The assignment includes posting a resume, photo essay, work samples, contact information, a blog and digital bio, which can be their Shameless Plug. Students may use any software package to create the Web site or an online site such as wix.com or webs.com, which are free and offer unique templates.
Online portfolios help students store their work in one place, which may come in handy when they begin to search for a job.
Illustration 8. Screenshot of student online portfolio
Illustration 9. Screenshot of student online portfolio
Conclusion
Professors of media courses can expect to encounter some obstacles and setbacks. Be prepared to do some encouraging at first. Students might be resentful or hesitant to participate in public forums. However, professors will find that interest usually increases throughout the semester once enrollees become more familiar with a new media teaching approach and other students in the classroom. Each class has sociable students and quiet ones so adjustment rates will vary. Expect to see some initial hesitation among the students followed by a growing comfort level.
Be prepared to work a little harder at the beginning of the semester to create Facebook and Twitter pages for each class. However, the payoff is worth the trouble. Professors will connect to students and able to have great discussions in many formats. The ultimate goal, after all, is to foster a classroom with a high level of energy and sharing, and above all, greater understanding.
A combination of these exercises will help ensure students are media literate when they graduate and are able to apply emerging lessons from social media on the job. Professors who succeed in piquing student interest while incorporating social media in the class, have accomplished volumes.
Pitfalls to avoid
As with anything else, there are a few things to avoid when adding social media to traditional courses:
Do not overlook traditional content: Students must learn the basics of good solid, writing and editing techniques in magazine and media courses. Do not sacrifice one for the other.
Do not include too many YouTube video clips. As with pure PowerPoint shows, showing a bunch of video clips is just as ineffective as lectures with no visuals, photos and video clips.
Do not rely too heavily on a social media textbook. Find a good textbook or create a course packet. Supplement textbooks with inexpensive course packets that are relevant to social media exercises.
Do not teach in a top-down format. Professors who foster a give-and-take atmosphere in a friendly environment will enjoy a free-flow exchange in which everybody talks and everybody shares. The most successful courses are collaborative rather than top-down.
Do not be afraid to ask for suggestions and ideas about new media. Students often know more about social media than faculty. Allow students to suggest helpful Web sites and be prepared to take notes.
Work Samples
Shameless Plug Videos
Student Web portfolios
Feature Story
References
Felder, Richard and Brent, Rebecca. 2005. Death by PowerPoint. Chem. Engr. Education 39: 28-29, <www.ncsu.edu/felder-public/Columns/PowerPoint.pdf> (accessed May 1, 2010)
Felder Richard and Brent, Rebecca. 2003. Learning by Doing, Chem. Engr. Education, 37, 282-283, <www.ncsu.edu/felder-public/Columns/Active.pdf>. (accessed May 1, 2010)
Biagi, Shirley. 2007. Media impact: An introduction to mass media eighth edition. Thomson. Wadsworth: Belmont, CA.
Kaplan, Andreas and Haenlein, Michael. 2010. Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of social media, Business Horizons, 53(1), 59-68.
Lim, Jon, Pellet Heidi and Pellet, Henschel. 2009. Integrating digital video technology in the classroom. Journal of Physical Education, Recreation and Dance.
< http://www.aahperd.org/publications/journals/joperd/abstract_integrating-digital-video.cfm > (accessed May 2, 2010)
Tang, Jian and Zhang, Ping. 2010. Media selection preferences of us college students: empirical evidence and a proposed research model. Proceedings of China Summer Workshop on Information Management. June 2010, Wuhan, China
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