Facebook Strategies For The Classroom

Strategies for the Classroom flickr photo by pshab by kevin lim - teaching & learning center 22nd February 2008

Lots of people using it daily...

So much written about it...

Everyone’s building around it...

Heck, people are cloning it!

What is Facebook?
History
Who’s Using It
Things you can do
Personal Profile
Messaging
Groups
Events
Applications
Media Sharing
News Feed
For the Classroom 1. Opportunities Promotes conversation It’s Spontaneous Integrate your stuff (RSS) Reputation as Motivator 2. Challenges Application Spam Getting Informal? What Privacy? Walled Garden 3. Questions Workshop Agenda

Facebook is a social networking site
Reinforces & expands your real-world social connections
Fosters communities of people who share interests and activities
Economical way to keep your friends updated
Discover new interests and friends
image source: http://lifegoingdigital.blogspot.com/2007/11/blog-post_27.html What is Facebook?

February 2004 Facebook created by Mark Zuckerberg and four others
Initially for Ivy League universities, then to international colleges and high schools (.edu)
Sept 2006 Opened for anyone to join Facebook’s social network
May 2007 Facebook Platform launches for user applications
image source: http://lifegoingdigital.blogspot.com/2007/11/blog-post_27.html Source: Facebook Timeline Facebook History

More than 65 million active users
Over 6 million active user groups
85% market share of U.S. university students
Over half of users return daily
Users spend an average of 20mins per day on Facebook
image source: http://lifegoingdigital.blogspot.com/2007/11/blog-post_27.html Source: Facebook Press Room Who’s Using Facebook?

Things you can do...
Personal Profile, Messaging, Groups, Events, Applications, Media Sharing, News Feed

Personal Profile

Messaging: Inbox

Messaging: Notifications

Messaging: Pages Update

Messaging: The Wall

Messaging: Poking

Facebook Groups

Facebook Events

Facebook Applications

Not exactly long tail, but short head. Only a few apps rule, with 87% of usage going to only 84 apps! Source: O’Reilly Facebook Applications

Facebook Photos

Facebook Videos

Facebook News Feed

Opportunities
Advantages of using Facebook for class

Promotes Conversations

It’s Spontaneous
The Third Place : Being a shared space not owned by neither faculty nor students may mean equal standing in power.
This motivates the user by choice (self-interest), rather than coercion .
Informality: Informal channels allow for more spontaneous interaction.
Distinguishing motivation for using Blackboard vs. Facebook
Image Source: http://mchabib.com/2006/10/05/digital-library-as-third-place/

Integrate your stuff
You can easily integrate your resources into Facebook
Posting Links, Notes, Photos, Video
Automated posting via RSS -based applications (e.g. FriendFeed)
You can even write your own Facebook platform application !

Reputation Motivation
Reputation: The willingness to help others can all work to increase one's prestige in a community.
“ Applying Games Mechanics To Functional Software ” by Amy Jo Kim
Five Game Mechanics 1. Collecting 2. Earning Points 3. Feedback 4. Exchanges 5. Customization

Challenges
Dangers of using Facebook for class

Application Spam
Plenty of Facebook applications trick users into send invitations to their friends to “unlock” features.
When a friend adds such an app, the cycle continues .
Competition between application developers to get larger user base.
Finally, Facebook decides to stop it ( 21st Feb 2008 ).
Users can block specific apps, and clear all pending requests.

Getting Informal?
Leisa Reichelt coined the term “ ambient intimacy ”
Refers to the constant sense of closeness users feel with their circle of friends through technologies that informally reveal us to each other.
Cory Doctorow called out Boyd’s Law where “Adding more users to a social network increases the probability that it will put you in an awkward social circumstance ”.

What Privacy?
The original News Feed scared Facebook users
Under users pressure , Facebook finally let users adjust what appeared in public
Facebook Beacon makes you endorse what your purchase
Not everyone aware they have to opt-out ; change privacy options
The Wall vs. Personal Message

Walled Gardens
A social network service focuses on the building and verifying of online social networks for communities of people who share interests and activities
Most traditional social networking sites are “ walled gardens ” (e.g. Facebook)
Trap user content to derive ad revenue
Can’t leave? Loss of coordination .

Takeaways
thoughts on participation

Benefits of Participation
collective intelligence - collaborative
transparent - instant gratification
non-hierarchical - democratic
potential for passion - ownership
open to public - reputation
permanence - searchable resource

Questions
let’s discuss

Kevin Lim “ Jack of all trades, Master of some.”

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Facebook Strategies For The Classroom

by Kevin Lim on Feb 22, 2008

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