Using the Internet to your Advantage
If you want the latest and greatest in social media, entertainment, or even just a distraction, the Internet is without a doubt your best bet. Here are 10 ways to use the internet to your advantage:
1) Build your brand with social media channels
2) Find new music on Soundcloud
3) Watch last nights TV shows on Hulu
4) Develop yourself with self-improvement blogs and videos
5) Get paid to test websites with UserTesting.com
6) Read RSS feeds of articles you like on Feedly
7) Stream live TV and movies on Netflix or Hulu Plus
8 ) Read or contribute to Wikipedia articles for free from home! http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/There…
9) Learn a new language with sites like italki.com or duolingo.com
10) Get the latest news anywhere in the world with sites like BBC, CNN, and Quartz
Source: http://www.truenorthproductions.com/blog/using-the-internet-to-your-advantage [ARTICLE END]
Social Media and Technology in Academia A professor's first year at Western Carolina University by Dawn Caple Aug 18, 2014 Digital technology is becoming more commonplace in our daily lives. With the increased presence of digital technology comes critical questions about how it shapes our social interactions and ultimately impacts learning outcomes. In this study, I focus on the use of social media and digital technologies by university faculty in their teaching practices. I specifically look at how social media and digital technologies shape learning outcomes for students enrolled in first-year composition courses taught by a group of novice faculty who are part of an intervention program designed to help them transition from traditional teaching methods to blended learning pedagogies. More specifically, I explore how novice faculty efforts to enact blended learning pedagogies using social media and other digital technologies influence students' writing development. The data used in this study come from three sources: observations taken throughout the course of the academic year, interviews with students and professors, and surveys administered to students at the beginning and end of the semester. The data analyses provided a glimpse into the digital practices that novice faculty are using in their courses. However, this study was limited by its small sample size, which increases the risk of type 2 errors and/or a lack of generalizability. This indicates that this study is situated within the larger "continuum of research" on social media use in higher education (Davidson, 2011; Lea & Ederington, 2010; Napoli & Bailey, 2013) but is not representative of a national or international population of first-year composition students across all institutions. (Davidson, 2011). Extra Notes: According to the article, the study was done in 2012 at Western Carolina University . The author, Dawn Caple , is an assistant professor of English at Western Carolina University in the United States . She did her Ph.D. in English at the University of Georgia. In 2011-2012 she was a Fulbright Research Fellow and conducted research studies on how social media was changing higher education. This is an excerpt from a study that she co-authored, that focused on how social media and digital technologies were changing higher education for students and professors (Caple, Davidson & Sawyers, 2014). Findings This section will focus on the findings that I found to be most interesting from this article. Place your mouse over the hashtag symbol in each tweet to read the full story!
During my first semester of teaching at Western Carolina University, I noticed changes in how students were blogging and posting content on social media platforms. By observing 2014 English course syllabi posted online, I began to notice differences between texts distributed by undergraduate and graduate students. The number of syllabi written by undergraduates was noticeably different from graduate course syllabuses. For example, there were about twice as many undergraduate course syllabi as graduate course syllabuses posted online during the months that I observed. Graduate instructors generally used a higher level of knowledge by including more scholarly articles not only within their course materials but also in their course websites and informational videos posted online. In contrast, most undergraduate course assignments were short form and low level. Many undergraduates wrote about their experiences in a single paragraph in their blogs, which were sometimes written using a first-person or "I" point of view. Graduate instructors typically wrote longer papers that included more information, seldom using the first-person narrative. For example, graduate professors' syllabi included detailed descriptions of class discussions as well as student responses to the individual readings. Undergraduate course syllabi very rarely included such details. In order to study social media engagement among undergraduate students and professors, I observed my associated field of study (Department of English) at the University through their blog posts, or course syllabi. Here is an example of the difference between undergraduate and graduate course syllabi that I observed: Undergraduate Course Title: Foundations of Research Methodology for English Departments MHS 551 (3 cr) Prerequisite: None Effective Fall 2014 Instructor: Michael R. Davidson, Ph.D. By observing the differences in syllabi between undergraduate and graduate courses, I began to wonder how students were using digital technologies during their first semester at Western Carolina University . Therefore, I decided to observe students' and professors' blogging practices through their class syllabus. For example, I was able to observe how professors intended to use social media, as well as how students actually used it. Some professors included links to Facebook and Twitter where students could follow their professors' courses. Other professors asked students to set up a Twitter ID before they began the course and tweet with specific hashtags throughout the semester. Two instructors even asked students to live blog discussions in class. Students who were not familiar with social media often had difficulty following some of these instructions and setting up accounts on the different social networking platforms (especially since this is usually done on their own time after class). In an attempt to address this problem, I created some sample syllabi for my future classes that included social media instructions in the English Department's writing center wiki section. These sample syllabi have been used by many professors teaching first-year composition courses at Western Carolina University since I wrote them. In addition to studying the different ways in which undergraduate and graduate students used social media in their classes, I also examined how students responded to activities that involved social media. For example, clicking on Twitter links embedded within syllabi often took students to course blogs created by their professors such as the ones linked above.
Conclusion This study is interesting because it examines the use of social media by students and professors in higher education. The findings show how students adapt to new technologies, such as blogs, social networking sites and twitter accounts, by participating more in class discussions using digital spaces. I think placing a hashtag on a syllabus has become a sign that English professors are trying to incorporate social media into their teaching. Although this study is long-term and can't tell us exactly what will happen during the next year or two, it does show that teaching methods have changed since this article was published.