The world is online. In 2013, about 1.43 billion people worldwide are active in online communities and social networks compared to 46.6 million people in Germany. In particular, the mobile visits show a rapid growth: In Asia already 60% of the frequently visitors of online communities come from mobile devices, 46% in North-America and about 22% in Europe.
I find this infographic very useful because it shows the pattern of online community use in 2013 very clearly. I am not surprised to see that online communities are facilitated in the North America at most. Thanks Ahsen!
Here you can find really good advices to stay safe in your social networking connections. The advice for being prepared to answer questions about your social networking page or other social account in job interviews is a good one that I didn't realize before.
I do not know if a similar guide is available for Turkish teachers, but the General Teaching Council for Scotland has prepared a guidance document to help Scottish teachers with "identifying potential dangers, offering some guidance about how to avoid them and providing a context for responsible, professional use of electronic communication and social media." The guide concludes as follows:
Before posting materials online stop and ask yourself:
(1) Will the content reflect poorly on you, your school, employer or the teaching profession?
(2) Is your intention to post this material driven by personal reasons or professional reasons?
(3) Are you confident that the comment or other media in question, if accessed by others, (colleagues, parents etc) would be considered reasonable and appropriate?
This online social networking platform created by UC Irvine on which you can learn English free, use free online English lessons, chat, and find friends and penpals. Along with Livemocha, I strongly recommend this website to my students to interact with native speakers of English.
This is a commercial Online schooling site. it provides a set of courses in different disciplines ranging from Art, History, Language Arts/English, Math ,Science, Music, and Social Sciences.
I am not sure if this link is directly related to social media but this is an online conference about education and technology. Check out the link and register for free for the conference if you wish :)
"Join over 33 million teachers and students safely connecting in online classrooms, collaborating on assignments, discovering new resources, and more!"
* Edmodo is an online networking application for teachers and students.
* Think Facebook, but in a safe and controlled environment appropriate for school
edmodo is primarily a tool for within class communication, but it also provides several ways for teachers to connect with other teachers.
* Over 500,000students are using edmodo worldwide
This infographic gives information about social media,online learninh,apps with shocking percentages. At the end of the infographic a little history timeline is waiting for us to see what changed in in education with technology.
Here are some highlights... "An increased Interest in Online Learning, Paying Attention to the Digital Footprint, Internet Connectivity, Social Media in Schools, Mobile Devices for Schoolwork" and so on... It is worth to have a look!
As you may have noticed in Schlager & Fusco (2003), an online community of practice was developed for education professionals to ease their interaction. For further consideration, you can check it out.