Talk:Social Media

Seminars

How might we teach social media?

A Creative Research Discussion Group at the University of Canberra at 12 noon, on 23 March, in the Teaching Commons of UC. The aim of the session is to discuss how teachers and assessors at UC might consider social media topics, how we think people go about learning it, how or if at all we might teach it, and how or if at all we would offer assessment and certification towards it.

Hopefully this discussion will inform the developments of the Social Media page on Wikiversity, perhaps as a shared space for those attempting to teach it and learn about it.

Notes from this session were posted to http://meetingwords.com/UCCreativeSM . If some one could format and summarize them at the conclusion, move the notes over to this talk page, that would be awesome. --LauraHale 01:29, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Posted By Leigh Blackall at 3/15/2011 01:51:00 PM and shared to the TALO egroup for pre event discussion. Keey points and references from that discussion copied below:

Open comments

Alex Hayes said

Very tempted to say 'just use it ' or " we are already using it" however, I am well aware that the integrity of the subject is perhaps coined in a deeper subset of ensuing questions such as;

• How can we influence social media providers to consider educational context ?
• What open source platforms can educational organisations affordably take hold of, manage and engage learners as social media hosting and/or interaction spaces ?
• What are the risks inherent for using paid spaces over that of the supposed free-ranging supposition?

...It reminds of what museums are for...here's what your looking at......here is what you are experiencing....here is what we are telling you occurred and is occurring in absence of the "real" thing.....here are the things to do ....point by point...step by step......

The relational aesthete places the audience within the process of completion of the picture. Social media places educators as simply another user agitating others to think for themselves amongst the blinding obvious interrogations for the unseen algorithms of interaction.

We are the machine.

rgrozdinac said

How does one teach or assess something that's emergent? Did what we taught/assessed even 4 years ago do the job? Is it still relevant?

Here, Tweeting Is a Class Requirement

Nancy White said

One phrase that has stirred useful conversations about the use of social media is "tech + social has fundamentally changed what it means to be together." Unpack that in the context of teaching and learning? Think about the practices before you dive into the policies? Before you dive into the tech practices? ... Hm, also have you looked at other offerings for inspiration? Here is one from a cool group Applications Now Open! Darim Online Social Media Boot Camp for Educators

Chris Harvey said

I can introduce you to hundreds of social media experts, just a quick glance at my twitter followers would show you that.

• Social media for learning

There's something strangely recursive about using social media for learning about social media for learning.

Derick Chirnside said

Maybe you are the wrong person to do these sessions Leigh. To a fish, water does not exist. Just lead a small field trip to the world of Social Media.

Botts said

Chris makes a good point that many people are social media experts but perhaps only when it comes to using that media in its "usual" guise. i think many professional educators are still unaware of the potential for social media to revolutionise the way education is done. a move from teacher centric and even student centric approaches to one where the experience is immersive and pervasive. whatever you do and wherever you go - there is learning.

Leigh Blackall said

Not sure about the fish analogy. Or the native and immigrant if you like. Take TV for example. After 50 years, almost everyone I know has barely a critical concept on it, certainly not the ability to read and decode it. 6 years into social/ist media, we're all blind, and chris has a following of one eyed kings.

Janet Hawtin said

Pam offers a counterpoint: On limiting learning and impairing comprehension with mobile technologies

• Does this collaborative experience have ways for different people and ideas to 'win' ?
• Is there room and process for constructive conflict resolution?
• Are the processes and results able to be seen and learned from?
• Are there sometimes when more courage and adventure, or stronger negotiation are possible if the moment is not public? What is a useful record then?
• How do the participants follow common threads or points of useful difference?
• Are there external bodies of work which provide a historical perspective or precedent?
• Are there precedents for how to organise this family of information?
• Are there people or groups who could offer an informed audience as peers or mentors for this work?
• Who owns the work; is it licensed so the work can be built on and shared by participants, or others?
• How do you fail?
• How do you pass?
• How do funding, reporting, or organisational governance shape the experience?
• Are there not-negotiable rules for this kind of work?

How do the tools chosen impact the answers to the social questions? For example:

• Accessibility of tools and work?
• How does the tool enable group ownership or editing of threads of work?
• How would you usefully fork the work?
• Will the formats and hosting for the work mean it is useful (viewable, editable, publically accessible) in the future?
• Power sources, phones, GPS, wearable hardware, editable software, soldering iron, LEDs, knitting needles, band saw, kiln, loom, aerials, microscopes, transport, other sensory tools might be more about experience than about the record of the work, how does it all mesh?

Barbara Dieu said

• The Internet’s Unholy Marriage to Capitalism
• Universality (The Movie)
• From Counterculture to Cyberculture: Stewart Brand, the Whole Earth Network, and the Rise of Digital Utopianism - (Leigh comments: Bee, regarding your reference to the book Counterculture to Cyberculture, it reminded me of the documentary, The Net: The Unibomber, LSD and The Internet)
• The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires

There is something strangely disturbing in the whole notion of educators having to learn to bring things together, reflect, socialize and interact not only with their students but also their peers.

• The Secret to Digital Sanity - (Chris Harvey comments: I read that article "The Secret to Digital Sanity". I think we've covered how to manage information with tags and filter your streams etc and information overload/noise ratio topics but I didn't like the religious propaganda and product placement in that article.)

James Neill said

1. I think the topic/method etc. is a winner - the challenge I suspect is to integrate any offerings into existing institution degrees so that such a unit has sufficient enrolments and institutional buy-in. There are many courses in which these units could be electives, but perhaps they can also form part of a minor, major and/or be compulsory units within particular degrees.
2. These could be combined face to face and online units?

PS Apologies for the creative research seminar today. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 22:50, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Notes from the session

The University of Canberra does not have units taught specifically about social media. Some units have modules about social media, but not the unit.

Leigh thought about setting up a unit specifically teaching about social media. He got feedback back on this. Should universities be teaching about social media when it is still emerging?

One person has tried to incorporate social media into lessons on marketing.

How do learners understand how to connect things up?

Some one taught contemporary issues in marketing. She had an assignment and class on this topic. One class was about social media. The social media part was the favorite part of that class.

In the marketing class, students are shown good and bad examples of social media. Students have an asisgnment to create a marketing campaign for a company. This happens over the winter term.

Why wouldn't social media not be included in existing units? Because existing modules are too condensed as it is.

In an entrepeneur class, students said that they used Facebook to get their news.

University of Canberra approach to social media is ad hoc.

Work places have to provide a safe work place and social media needs to be taken into account.

Social media has many purposes.

Should the university teach social media? The sector is rightly or wrongly looking to the university to teach about that. Academics are being asked to offer comments by big media more so than they were five years ago.

There are a lot of job opprtunities to do social media. You could make a lot of money if trained right. It undermines the ability to get academics to teach this.

Companies are realizing that you have to feed the beast. Companies need employees who are able to keep things fresh. Employeers want people who are facile in creation.

You don't want to be micromanaging a social media manager.

40% of sport first year students thought it would be good to have a class about social media.

Marketing, management and planning students last year had to undertake 1 out of 3 promotional event creation. Most of them used social media activities.

Social media is in the innovative practices section for ACT Health.

The University said that it needs to be specific to the department. They cannot have a generic social media course open to all departments.

How do you be generic but help apply it to the specific area?

Social media can be taught as a how to but it needs to be integrated into a why you do these. The internet is a form of promotion, distribution and interaction. You need to learn how to manage.

TAFEs are beginning to address the reality of social media.

Need to do market analsysis: What are other Australian universities doing in terms of teaching classes about social media? How does the University of Canberra compare?

Work integrated learning is important.

Workshops

13 Dec 2010

The University of Canberra, Research Education Program hosted a social media workshop from 9:30-3:00, repeated on 21 of Dec. This workshop covered a number of areas, from a general over view, discussion about web presence, creating accounts on Google (Blogger) and Wikipedia, editing Wikipedia profile pages, creating blogs, using RSS, and social bookmarking.

Feedback

Participants, please offer feedback to this workshop here:

This was a great workshop. First because it gave us a good overview of the social media landscape. Second, because it also practically showed us how to do it. I am looking forward to apply everything I have learned not only for my personal communications, but also for the organisations I work for. Thanks so much for taking the time to show us and help us negotiate entry to this part of the public sphere.

Apart from agreeing with the above comments!! This workshop has reinforced and consolidated my developing ideas in regards to the future of teaching and learning. Additionally the importance of a more public image that faculty should have when looking forward to the future. Thanks Leigh!! I too am looking forward to the next session!! Ciao for now Diane 137.92.97.111 23:54, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Development meetings

Social Media in organisations

Laura Hale and Leigh Blackall met to discuss the development of a course within UCNISS to help sporting organisations manage social media use with their athletes and employees. An additional challenge is to applicable to a wider audience as well. We agreed that the development of modules for existing coursework, (lecture series, complimented workshops, ), and end of semester social media conference, would be a practical approach to development where outside interests are invited to participate along with existing students.

Content ideas

• Duty of care - hands off or hands on approach to athlete or employee PR policy and procedure
• Marketing and ROI on employee/athlete use fo social media
• Collect examples of employee/athlete use of social media to promote their sport (Hamish and Dave from Equestrean Australia. Canoeing Australia... young All Blacks fans becoming afficial embedded media)
• Develop a survey for organisations, across levels - org objectives, personal use, professioanl practice.
• Policies and procedures that cover intensions above

Actions

• Laura to review the Social Media page on Wikiversity
• Leigh and Laura to find links to examples of fans, employees and athletes using social media
• Leigh and Laura to structure the Wikiversity page into the modules for offer in formal units and for informal participation

Future study Levels

Level 2

This level is under development.. it will include content along the lines of the following:

• Use hosting providers to set up independent social media services
• Plan and prepare for locally hosted social software projects and services
• Implement and manage locally hosted social software projects and services
• Critically evaluate issues between popular services, independently hosted services, and local and independent hosted services

Level 3

This level is under development, but will include content along the following..

• Research, develop and implement a social media project
• Publish research on a social media development
• Provide consultation services for social media use or development