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Vanessa Lane Professor Padgett ENGL 1102 April 6, 2014 Social Media: The Effects on Education Social media is any website or application that is used for social networking and allows people to communicate to one another. In 1997, the first ever social media site was created. This site was called sixdegrees.com and was created by Andrew Weinreich. This site started a trend that many different social media sites soon followed. There are countless different sites out and in use today. Some of the top sites in use today include Facebook, Tumblr, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and LinkedIn. These sites have millions of users and get millions of visits a day. Social media has given people a way to talk, meet, share, and play games with others. It has revolutionized the way we communicate and interact with people. Socializing is completing different from the way it used to be 20 years ago. Not only has it changed the way we socialize but it has also changed the way children learn. With social media always at our fingertips; via computers, smart phones, and tablets; things are always easily accessible. Social media has changed the way children are educated for the better by making things faster and more accessible and encouraging student engagement as well as for the worst by causing distractions and shortcuts. Theres no surprise that its affecting

our education; its everywhere. Many people believe that social media is all bad when it comes to education but I believe that it has some benefits as well. Being able to access social media practically anytime and anywhere can cause many distractions, especially in the classroom. I know for me when Im in class, I can easily get distracted by social media. If the teacher is being boring, or is talking about something I already know or, Im just totally uninterested then I will willingly get distracted by my phone. I will go on all my social media apps and check them and see whats going on. I dont think I get as distracted in class by my phone as some people do. I only do it when I know I dont necessarily need to pay attention. I know some people just get distracted by it because its there and cant go through a whole class without seeing whats going on the internet. Spending excessive time on Facebook was the most common factor which kept the students from using the site. They stated that the use of Facebook was too time-consuming and distracting.(Turan 140) Turan did a study on why some students dont use social networks. One of the main reasons stated was because it was so distracting. Academic failure was stated as another reason for not using Facebook. Two of the students remarked that they failed their exams when they used Facebook. One student reported, Last year I had final exams, and I played Facebook games until morning. I went to my exams with two hours of sleep, and I regretted that very much.(Turan 140) Not only is social media a distraction inside the classroom but also outside of the classroom. It can distract students from doing homework assignments or studying for tests. I know for me that I get very easily distracted by social media when Im doing homework, especially if its something thats going take me a while to do. So since social media is always at our fingertips it
Comment [AP2]: Okay, this seems antithetical to your argument. Comment [AP1]: Okay so this is going to be about the importance of using social media in the class room.

is a very easy distraction for students inside and outside of the classroom. This is one of the major downfalls to social media when it comes to education. Another downfall to social media in relation to education is how easy it is for students to find shortcuts through it. What I mean by shortcuts is an easy way around something. Shortcuts include: easy access to information that may be unreliable, easy answers to math problems without doing any work, and language shortcuts with slang, abbreviations, acronyms, etc. Growing up in a technological era, high school students may be unaware they are using language shortcuts in the classroom.(usnews.com)Many of my teachers have mentioned in class about language shortcuts. Many students will use these shortcuts in their emails to their professors. It is very unprofessional and it looks really bad. If someone was applying for a job and used language shortcuts as though there were texting they wouldnt even be considered for the job; no matter how qualified they may be. Shortcuts dont seem like that big of a problem but they have long term consequences. Using shortcuts doesnt allow the student to really learn and grow. From personal experience, I know I have used shortcuts to get around doing my math homework. I would look up the answer to the problems instead of really working them out. Yes this did mean my homework was done in a much shorter time but I didnt learn from it. When I tried actually doing one of the problems I didnt know what I was doing because I had no practice working it out. While theses downfalls are pretty significant but I believe social media can be beneficial to education as well. One of the benefits of social media on education is the how easy it is to access different things quickly. The manner in which Facebook operates can greatly increase the speed by which users obtain new information. This helps them to solve problems in a more efcient way, which may in turn help to improve the learning performance of students.(Jong 202) You can

access anything from class assignments to notes to helpful information. Since social media is always up and running students can easily go on to talk to fellow students about class and other things related. As several studies have pointed out, these possibilities have led to social networks increasingly embedding themselves in student learning processes, with particular reference to cooperative and collaborative work.(Cabero 166) Since social media is so quick and accessible it can be easily used as a platform for group work. It makes it easy for students to plan a project, share work, and assign roles all remotely yet still collaboratively. Social media can also help students get quick access to tutoring. If someone isnt able to meet with a tutor in person for whatever the reason maybe, then they can go onto a social media site to get help from someone available. When there is twenty-four hour access to sites that are quick and easy to use the educational possibilities are endless. Being quick and easily accessible isnt the only benefit of social media. Another benefit is the encouragement of student engagement. While social media can be very distracting, if used in the right way then it can encourage students to participate inside and outside of the classroom. The generation of students we are teaching today was raised in the context of digital technologies, in a world of communication and wide availability of information. According to, these so called digital natives have different patterns of work, attention and learning preferences. Therefore, the traditional teaching methods should be adapted to the needs of this new Internet generation, offering support for social and collaborative learning. (Popescu 199-200)

Many people think that our generation is the dumbest generation because we are so attached to technology. But in reality we just have a different way of learning than generations past. The use of social media in the classroom would be a great way to teach our generation of students in a new way. Since social media is such a big part of our lives and holds a lot of our attention, what better way to teach us then through something with most of our interest? While there is little research focusing on the relation- ship between social media and student engagement in higher education, a number of studies have found relationships between technology use and engagement. For instance, King and Robinson (2009) found that college students who used electronic voting systems reported they were more likely to answer questions in their math course. Annetta et al. (2009) observed that students who played an educational game designed to teach genetics concepts were more engaged in their work than a control group.(Junco 120) Bringing social media into the classroom would only be helpful. Students are already distracted by it so if teachers used it to their advantage then the distraction would be no longer. Integrating social media into education would be a very useful way to get students more engaged in learning. In conclusion, our generation is very connected to social media. It can hinder our education in many ways but contrary to popular belief, it can benefit it as well. Many people think our generation is the dumbest generation because of how connected we always are. While there are quite a few downfalls such as the shortcuts it creates and the distractions it causes, there are also many benefits such as quick and always accessible as well as encouraging student engagement. The use of social media will only continue to grow and maybe it will start growing in the classroom as well.

Vanessa, I like a lot of the issues you bring to the table. It is clear that you have researched your topic very well, and I think you do a good job engaging these sources and including your own thoughtful opinion. I do feel that you arent really taking a stance on the issue as firmly as you need to. I think you are advocating for social media use in the classroom, but Im not sure. You need a much more clear and focused thesis and every paragraph should be dedicated to supporting that one precise thesis. What is your purpose here? Im not sure. Who is your ideal audience? What sort of effect do you hope to achieve on that audience? You should be an active participant of the conversation (arguing) as opposed to being a passive reporter. Otherwise, really good work here. I really enjoyed reading it.
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Work Cited

Cabero, Julio, and Vernica Marn. Educational Possibilities Of Social Networks And Group Work. University Students' Perceptions. Comunicar 21.42 (2014): 165-172. Communication & Mass Media Complete. Web. 26 Feb. 2014.

Jong, Bin-Shyan; Chien-Hung Lai, Yen-Teh Hsia, Tsong-Wuu Lin, Yu-Syuan Liao. An Exploration Of The Potential Educational Value Of Facebook. Computers In Human Behavior 32.(2014): 201-211. Academic Search Complete. Web. 26 Feb. 2014.

Lytle, Ryan. "How Slang Affects Students in the Classroom." US News. U.S.News & World Report, 13 June 2011. Web. 08 Apr. 2014. <http://www.usnews.com/education/highschools/articles/2011/06/13/how-slang-affects-students-in-the-classroom>.

Popescu, Elvira. Providing Collaborative Learning Support With Social Media In An Integrated Environment. World Wide Web 17.2 (2014): 199-212. Academic Search Complete. Web. 26 Feb. 2014.

Junco, R., G. Heiberger, and E. Loken. The Effect of Twitter on College Student Engagement and Grades. Www.ferris.edu. Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2010. Web. <http://www.ferris.edu/htmls/administration/president/sparc/meetings/docs/StudentEngagement Article.pdf>

Turan, Zeynep, Hasan Tinmaz, and Yuksel Goktas. The Reasons For Non-Use Of Social Networking Websites By University Students. Comunicar 21.41 (2013): 137-145. Communication & Mass Media Complete. Web. 26 Feb. 2014.