Together with my colleague Oliver Malabanan, we were the pioneers of the Social Computing course in De La Salle University. On several occasions I have taught it, the emphasis has shifted from one theme to another. On the onset I drew the course to the study of the structure and dynamics of social networks, its design and development. On one occasion I led it to look into personal relationships expanding to the borderless social spaces. The last time, I have encouraged my students to analyze the various roles of social media in our networked society, not to be indifferent of the world issues we face, and see how social media can emancipate and teach collaboration.
This term, I have the opportunity to fuse social media and education with some of the brightest students in our college, the instructional designers. These students have a strong computer science background, adept knowledge of learning models and very much immersed on the different facets of the web.
For the next two months, I hope to impart my interests on the subject matter and learn together with them.
Something we will do together in the course is microblogging personal insights in teaching and learning. My contribution is http://ed4all.tumblr.com/ .
convictionsandfreethoughts 
Social media meets Education
I greatly believe that we should maximize the capacities of social media to improve learning and teaching. This term, I’m lucky enough to be part of Social Education class which tackles the power of social media to boost students’ learning experience as well as instructors’ teaching experience. Of course, this fusion would not be a success if we don’t take into consideration the fundamental foundation or the underlying theories that supports this kind of merging between education and social media. Everyone now is connected through this new innovation and as an instructional designer it is my duty to explore its potentials in connecting people to education. Education for all, indeed.
To boost learning and teaching experience entails opening our minds to other alternative theories, not just the ones propagated by Web 2.0 or social media. We will have a discourse on what are these theories and if these theories have been pulled to its potentials.
I appreciate your views of the course. I also appreciate the fact that you are realizing that your role is more than building the learning setting but connecting the people in the learning setting. I admit, I myself is learning so much from the insights of the students. Cheers!
Hi miss! I am excited for this term and I feel that SOC-EDU is a subject very relevant to the IST course because it deals with society, media and how it is in our present situation. Media now plays a very large role in a student’s life, and in turn greatly affects how a student learns. If used properly, it can prove to be a very effective medium for learning.
It’s very easy to relate to the concepts and ideas of SOC-EDU because I myself am a 21st century learner, and I find myself giving inputs to discussions that are drawn from my very own experiences.
Education has changed a lot these days. We can’t deny the fact that technology is slowly crawling its way to influence education. With the emerging technologies today such as the web 3.0, we take education to the next level. Some of the things we can do now is to collaborate even when we’re far away through the use of cloud computing. We can edit documents real-time with the use of Google docs. Imagine what other possibilities we can create in the near future!
I think that using social media and education could be a very good combination in terms of effectiveness and practicality. The students of this age are very exposed to social media because of the many social spaces present in the internet and it is right to take advantage of that. Also as a part of this generation, I really want to see this approach blossom because I know that we can learn more easily from this style and absorb a wider variety of knowledge. We must take this chance to further improve the world of education and explore the capabilities of social media so that we can really utilize the technology that we have today. Finally, I really think that this is a great idea and that it could go a long way.
The course on social media and education has brought much interest to us its students since social media is something that has become so prevalent in our culture today; and combining it with education can mean putting a greater impact on the use of social media on education and vice versa. Social media has made it possible for people to explore their interests online. It is rapidly causing online education to emerge. Moreover, it has also been a powerful tool for advocacy at every level of education.
Social media is a powerful tool that is still capable of many more. Our present technology or strategies is not enough to fully explore its possibilities, but that does not mean it can never be. Social media has been the center for mostly everything we have now though some don’t know it yet, fusion of education and social media can be beneficial not just for us students but also for anyone who will be using it. Seeing it to fruition can be considered a goal for us IST students.
I think it would be great for us IST students to learn more with you in the next coming months especially in social media part because people today can easily access the web where they can interact and learn from each other easily thus making our skills somewhat important for today’s need in the part of education and social media.