My Relationship With Social Media
Facebook profile picture
image source: personal photo
Welcome! My name is Kate. I teach middle school special education but have also taught high school special education and general education classes. I have been a teacher for 13 years and a lot has changed over the course of my career. When I started my first teaching job in 2011, people were somewhat resistant to students having their own devices to use in each class. At my first job, I taught a media and technology class to high school freshmen. It was a great introduction to how technology can be used as a tool in the classroom during a time when some teachers believed it to be a distraction. Today, especially after the pandemic, technology is talked about more than ever. The mindset regarding using apps, social media, and computers has changed to include these tools in our teaching.
I'm excited to learn more about social media and how to utilize it in the classroom. As a teacher, I have never used it in my classroom. I am not able to do that now, as it is against the rules at my current school and would cause privacy issues for my students. However, I would not be opposed to using social media if I begin working at a public middle school or high school again.
My relationship with social media is mostly about sharing pictures or events on Instagram. I travel a lot and enjoy posting photos and updates about what I'm experiencing on my trips. I sometimes post day-to-day experiences that are humorous or interesting. Additionally, I work for a non-profit organization,
Girls Rock! Chicago, and use Instagram to make connections with local businesses and organizations. Sometimes I find potential community partners or donors by browsing through my feed or searching using key words like "community partner" or "donation program." I've found several organizations to partner with us in this way.
Instagram profile
image source: personal photo
When I was in college, I used Facebook much more than I do today. Facebook was brand new when I started college and I saw it as a way to connect with my friends after high school graduation. I rarely use Facebook today. I don't find any value in posting daily updates or sharing links. I will only post something if it is a major update or if I am advertising an event for Girls! Rock. I don't have a personal Twitter and I rarely used the one I made to build a professional network. I also don't use SnapChat, TikTok, or YouTube (unless showing a video at school for a lesson). I did have a LinkedIn but made it private as I am not currently looking for a job.
The only other social media apps I use are sharing economy networks and social shopping networks. I don't really leave reviews unless I have to (Airbnb) and prefer not to interact with others on these websites or apps. I have been using Airbnb less and staying at hotels more often due to not wanting to interact with hosts. I use Uber and Spothero fairly often because of the convenience factor. Although Instagram is mostly for sharing media, I've bought clothes and other products through links posted by companies or influencers.
image source: personal photo
Airbnb profile
All of my accounts are on private and I don't add people on social media accounts that I don't know personally. Overall, I'd say that I use social media to make life easier (Uber, Airbnb, Spothero) and share information and media with friends and family (Instagram and Facebook). I'm looking forward to finding new ways to use social media, specifically for educational purposes.
Thank you for your post!
ReplyDeleteTo all who work as special education teacher, I always to first say "thank you".
I went substituting today in a 3rd grade class and put the question to students, asking them whether using social media would be helpful and what they thought the pros and cons might be. I was surprised at how mature the kids were. While agreeing that using social media for educational purposes was a great idea, they were also fast at detecting that one of the disadvantages of using social media was the distraction it potentially afforded them which is above and beyond the kind of distrations that other educational media provided.
Thank you
Great to meet you, Kate. Thank you for the introduction to who you are as an educator, a person, and your relationship with social media. I particularly liked your final paragraph in which you stated that you use social media to make life easier and connect with family and friends. Knowing the "why" behind a particular tool makes it easier to want to spend time with it.
ReplyDeleteHi, Kate! Nice to "meet" a fellow teacher. I agree with you that technology and social media has changed so much in my years as a teacher. I work with second graders, and they are always talking about Tiktok and Youtube, way more than social media was talked about when I first started teaching. Does your school have its own social media accounts? Ours does, and parents are able to opt-out if they do not want their child's picture shared. We are allowed to create our own classroom accounts, but I find it too difficult to keep up with which students are on the "do not post" list.
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DeleteHi Maddie,
DeleteWe do not have our own social media accounts. I work at a school that is associated with a hospital, so that would be violating HIPPA. I would love to work with social media accounts in the classroom at my next position, if allowed.
Hi Kate, at a school where I taught, we did not have social media pages in our classroom until after the pandemic began. We thought it was necessary to create them as the majority of parents used Facebook, and it was the only way to keep in contact with them. This school had a small budget and did not have one-to-one devices like the last school I taught at. I could see why many schools would not want to utilize social media because of privacy concerns. We had a few students at my last school opt out of pictures being taken of their children, which did make it a bit difficult to keep track of and keep them out of earshot when taking pictures, while at the same time being careful not to hurt their feelings if they noticed us trying not to include them in the picture. I have never used Airbnb, but I would definitely do the same as you and book a hotel in order to avoid interacting with a host.
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