Social media has taken the world by storm over the recent years. From business to education its impact on the modern day world is all pervasive and it has indeed been a boon to every sector it has touched. Education has benefited immensely from the active as well as passive influences of social media.
As you read each of these areas -- picture how you can teach your team something valuable in your new startup or your company? How can you provide the context of culture to your employees, teach the new innovation of your product or service, and even how you can teach your employees to teach each other?
Today social media can be actually utilized in the classroom to make education easier for students. Here is how popular social media platform, Instagram can be used to boost the learning experience of a class.
Creating attractive visual aids.
This is of extreme use, especially when it comes to the younger crowd. It can help the educators create stunning visual aids. It is a common knowledge that people, especially children are attracted to bright colors, interesting visuals[1] and exciting action. It also helps them process, comprehend and retain the information better. Instagram can be put to use in making exciting visuals and picture stories for classroom teaching. Better visual aids can go a long way in helping students understand and work on their lessons.
Building study circles.
With the help of Instagram educational institutions can create vibrant communities and study circles to help students aid each other in their education. Not only does this foster a sense of belonging, it also teaches students important values such as team spirit and sharing. It also makes the process of sharing of information easier and faster.
With the help of Instagram students can now share all the pertinent notes, discussions and reading recommendations on their subject in real time. This is excellent in helping students prepare for their academics.
Information at the tip of fingertips.
With the use of proper hashtags students can upload and access any information they want at any hour of the day. This makes all the necessary information available to the students at the tip of their fingers whenever they want. This eliminates the need for stressing out over odd hours because the student cannot access the essential information or help until office hours resume.
This is particularly helpful for those students who are night owls are preferring to do their preparation late at nights
Fosters bonding among students and team members.
Given that the real purpose of social media is to engage in bonding and development of kinship among people, Instagram can be utilized to foster bonding among students. In this world where bullying and harassment taking lives is the harsh reality plaguing the society and mental health[2] issues are taking a toll on people’s lives, a sense of bonding is of utmost help.
While students are spending their time chasing grades, with the help of Instagram they can make friends as well and improve their grades together. It gives every person a platform to reach out to someone and connect. This can turn complete strangers into friends and make the journey easier.
Fun activities.
Instagram gives the students the opportunity of engaging in fun co-curricular activities. For example, students can be asked to create imaginary Instagram stories for scientific or historical figures or fictional characters they have come across in their syllabus. This gives a boost to their creativity while teaching them their subject matter in a fun and interesting way. This makes education way more engaging and encourages the students to handle their syllabus in a more efficient and interesting manner.
Engaging in scientific curiosity
Scientific minds can make use of Instagram to spread their love of science from their classrooms and labs itself. While some can choose to Instagram picture of their stunning experiments and scientific creations, others can exhibit their group achievements and show the world the excitement that science holds.
Moreover, an entire class of students can compare the results of their experiments, be it the germination of a seed or a resistance test on an electrical circuit. While this may induce a healthy competition, it is also unadulterated excitement.
Inspire the love for creation.
To fill the lack of a traditional muse, Instagram might be just the right inspiration that can push students to fall in love with creation. A photo series can not only speak volumes, it can also inspire people to create their own work of art, poetry, writing and so much more. This can be especially instrumental in the education of special children to induce better expression.
Attracting students.
Not only does Instagram makes classroom education much more interesting, it is also a great opportunity to reach out to people outside the class too. It provides a vivid idea of the student life and classroom teaching of the particular subject and the university.
This can be instrumental in aiding students applying for college[3] to choose the right university as they can easily get a glimpse of the life. This helps an educational institution attract the right students depending on the kind of environment they have to offer.
Instagram is a powerful social media platform and its multi-faceted utility is yet to be explored well enough in the sphere of education. With its aid it is possible to improve the entire scenario of education as well as making it more enjoyable for students as well as teachers.
As more and more educational institutions are beginning to harness the power of social media we see a wave of change in the entire scope of education around the world.