Social Media for Language Teaching and Learning

Social Media, the so-called Social Network as referred to in the relationship among users, are rapidly growing types of digital media. They emerge in various forms to bring people together as communities: Blogs (e.g., WordPress), Social Networks (e.g., Facebook), Microblogs (e.g. Twitter), Wikis (e.g. Wikipedia), Video Podcasts, Discussion Forums, and RSS Feeds as examples.

There are three types of learning environments apart from formal education due to the new communication technologies: Distance Learning, Online Learning and ELearning. Distance learning creators are trying to design the existing course to overcome the matter of “distance”, i.e. time and place. There were inconsistencies of the terms, Online Learning (so called Blended Learning), and E-learning. The difference between them is that online learning seems to get connected to the learners through the social media on the Internet, while E-learning (or e-learning) covers both electronic media used on the campus and off the campus. The content of these educational tools are purposefully crafted as instructional media, and in most cases, evaluation is needed to fulfill the course assignment.

Social Media create a new community where teachers and students do not have to communicate by means of the traditional face-to-face classroom environment. The brand-new changing way of teaching-learning environment definitely brings about impacts. The impacts of Social Media for teaching and learning are reflected by the teaching-learning styles, teacher-student roles, and affective-attitudinal effects.

There are many online applications for teachers settled in the websites that can be used for our language teaching and learning process in the classroom. Animoto, Edublogs and Edmodo are the examples of online applications. They provide functions in different ways. Students can easily create and share their own beautiful videos with Animoto. The app allows students to select a theme, music, images or videos, add captions and/or two lines of text, and within minutes a slick video is created. Edublogs is a WordPress blogging platform designed with teachers in mind. The students can share everything in their blogs about education.

Edmodo is regarded as a social networking site for teachers and students. It provides a free and secure social learning space for a class to connect and collaborate. Teachers and students can post messages, discuss topics, assign and grade class work, and share digital content such as links, pictures, videos, documents and presentations.

In short, the growing interest in social media has led educators to examine its use for academic practice. With respect to the traditional classroom environment, faculty and instructional designers have successfully utilized social media technologies for various types of academic activities that include collaborative learning, inquiry-based learning and reflective learning. Social media in distance learning environments allowed for increased collaboration, communication, and interaction through blogging, document sharing, networking, tweeting, and social bookmarking.