Facebook in the K12 Classroom

Connecting Facebook use to the Classroom

Over the last week, I had a number of opportunities to connect with teachers and have some dialogue about about using Facebook to support learning. Yes, Facebook is a social environment, but it has a huge untapped potential in the areas of engagement, community, sharing, current issues and writing.

I thought I would share this list of activities some of our teachers see as effective uses of Facebook within the learning environment. Many of these are already beginning to happen in our classrooms!

conversational writing (French in this case)
sharing of poetry writing
collaborative math homework support groups – students helping students with teacher support
peer review of student created movie trailers
short blog style writing posts with opportunity for peer review
creating a shared student art gallery
discussion of global issues
math/science challenge questions
use of class groups to provide frequent feedback and positive encouragement (linked to our recent PD session with Dr. D. Reeves)
use of teacher fan pages to connect with students re class schedules, homework assignments, test dates etc.
school/department pages as another way to connect readers to key events, related news items, promote new library offerings
a forum to discuss digital citizenship, online safety and prevention of bullying
analyse sample situations in terms of digital citizenship and character development goals

Congratulations to these teachers for their forward thinking about using the power of social media tools in new and powerful ways. I look forward to working with teachers and school Digital Citizenship committee to plan our journey forward.

~ Mark

3 thoughts on “Facebook in the K12 Classroom”

Pingback: Creating a Facebook group for your K12 class « ~ Mark's Musings ~

Thanks for sharing this list of ways to use social networking, specifically, Facebook in the classroom. I find the math homework support group to be an interesting idea. I also thought that the math/ science challenge application to be a great idea as well.

Thanks for the post. Keep pushing for teachers to think outside the box when it comes to social media. They need some encouragement to innovate and adapt to the environment our students live in.
Many of my students have appreciated the use of my FB “fan page” for homework and class discussions.