Identity, Facebook and Education: Students Negotiating Identity on a Class ’ Facebook Page (original) (raw)
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Teachers, identity and Facebook: dilemmas, relationships and strategies
The institution of the school traditionally defines the roles and relationships of teachers and students. However, the introduction of the social networking site Facebook into the teacher-student dynamic has the potential to change these constructs. "Friending" students is a deceptively simple act on Facebook, when the likelihood of spillover into the real-world setting of the school is strong. To investigate the impact of teachers’ perceptions of identity on their interaction decisions with students on Facebook, as well as the strategies they develop to manage dilemmas linked to these decisions, an in-depth study was conducted of 12 teachers who had varying levels of interaction with students on Facebook. The study employed open-ended individual interviews set in the context of a guided tour by participants through their Facebook profiles, and was informed by group interviews and participant observation in an atmosphere of rapport and reciprocity, A conceptual framework weaving together Turkle’s (1999) theory of identity as multiplicity and flexibility, Altman and Taylor’s (1973) Social Penetration Theory and Livingstone’s (2008) problematization of the risk-opportunity binary was constructed. This framework formed a lens through which data collected from the individual interviews was thematically analyzed. 6 Abstract Three themes emerged that had a bearing on teachers’ interaction decisions: (1) the roles they chose to play as part of their teacher identity, (2) the level of vulnerability they felt as a result of the tension between competing forces of opportunities and risks of disclosure and privacy, and (3) the technological competence they possessed to manipulate the features of Facebook. The findings indicate that teachers selectively apply strategies in the face of anticipated and experienced dilemmas according to situations and students. It is argued that this has implications for teacher-student relationships in the real-world school setting, the integration of Web 2.0 technologies in the curriculum, and the institutional hierarchies of the school. Keywords: Facebook, teacher identity, social penetration theory, risk, opportunity, online and offline social interaction, teacher-student relationships
This paper addresses some questions which have arisen around the separation between study and social life in the author’s use of Facebook as a first-year teaching and learning tool. A frequent comment made by students who participated in the use of Facebook as a course learning tool is that contributions they made to study forums which appear on their own page’s wall can be “embarrassing” or “awkward” when read by friends who are not also students in the same course. The comment raises questions as to how the semi-public site of Facebook operating in teaching and learning modes has implications for privacy and anonymity. Students’ questions about such comments expressed a desire for their work to remain “private” (unseen by those other than the examiner or moderator), although were choosing a career in media production, publication, journalism or other writing. What is it about Facebook in particular that evokes questions of privacy? As a teaching and learning tool, Facebook provides an environment in which anonymity and the separation of different elements of one’s learning, study and social or personal lives are made more complex. What does the breakdown of context and distinction do for processes of learning? Theorising the relationship between privacy and the use of Facebook and other social networking sites as teaching and learning tools, this article presents a summary of its use in media and communications teaching, the mechanisms by which privacy questions are invoked in this context, the ways in which its use opens new and unexpected ways of thinking about pedagogy in relation to the everyday, and the factors that invoke questions as to how online social networking identity is managed by students using Facebook as a prescribed learning tool.
Facebook-Infused Identities: Learners’ Voices
International Education Studies, 2013
The National Higher Education Strategic Plan of Malaysia focuses on graduates who are innovative and knowledgeable to meet the standards and challenges of 21st century. This paper, then, explores how an innovation practice has taken place in a course entitled "Gender Identities: Malaysian Perspectives" where students scrutinize gender across Facebook "texts," as opposed to using literary texts. By using Facebook as baseline data to analyze online gender construction, students have learned the ways in which cyberspace deconstructs certain parameters of identity construction. Following this premise, this article discloses how students analyze gender identities. They analyze Facebook accounts of a male educator in United States, a female Malaysian college instructor residing in United States, and a law/politics Malaysian undergraduate. Firstly, the students revealed that identity in Facebook spaces is shown through genuine names and profile pictures; rightfully so for job, networking, and relationship purposes. Secondly, by selecting specific audiences, negotiating identities of a friend, co-worker, lover and most importantly future employee in Facebook is a difficult task. Conflicts usually occur while "masking" certain information on Facebook as they go about connecting with friends, students, parents, and prospective partners. Thirdly, societal constraints limit opposite gender's approval of friend requests. Lastly, identity construction reveals that having voices and emotions on Facebook have both positive and negative implications. Pedagogical recommendations are also presented as a result of this inclusion of Facebook in literature classrooms.
Negotiating identity and integrity on social network sites for educators
Discussion around the use of social network sites, especially amongst young people, is pervaded by sentiments heralding the decline of privacy. In this context, it is important for scholarship in this area to attend to the array of ways in which individuals are managing their information and identity-projects in these spaces in highly strategic ways, such as audience segregation. Drawing in part on empirical data collected through an ethnography of young Australian users of MySpace and Facebook, this article seeks to draw out the tension between authenticity and integrity that operates in these spaces. In doing so, I suggest that educators must be especially cognisant of the complexity occurring in the strategic management of these spaces, given the ongoing push for universities and agents within the university to engage with these spaces, along with the tension such engagement can bring to the teacher-student relationship.
Teacher Identity and Selective Strategies for Mediating Interactions with Students on Facebook
This paper focuses on the implications of teachers‟ use of social networking sites like Facebook to mediate communication with their students in informal contexts. It discusses the implications of teacher selection of Facebook menu options for teacher identity and interaction with students. Earlier work on identity, social penetration, and risk and opportunity in online settings (Turkle, 1995; Altman and Taylor, 1973; Livingstone, 2008) is drawn on to develop a conceptual framework for analysing teacher strategies to control intimacy levels with their students. This paper draws on a study involving 12 secondary school teachers and their decisions regarding interactions with students on Facebook. It suggests that teacher selectivity of menu options, whilst enabling teachers to manage the dilemmas of merging their personal and professional identities in online social network environments like Facebook, also has the potential to generate „walled intimacies‟ whereby some students have access to teachers and others do not. Keywords: Adolescents, teacher-student relationship, mediated intimacy, identity, Social Penetration theory, risk and opportunity
This paper addresses some questions which have arisen around the separation between study and social life in the author's use of Facebook as a first-year teaching and learning tool. A frequent comment made by students who participated in the use of Facebook as a course learning tool is that contributions they made to study forums which appear on their own page's wall can be "embarrassing" or "awkward" when read by friends who are not also students in the same course. The comment raises questions as to how the semi-public site of Facebook operating in teaching and learning modes has implications for privacy and anonymity. Students' questions about such comments expressed a desire for their work to remain "private" (unseen by those other than the examiner or moderator), although were choosing a career in media production, publication, journalism or other writing. What is it about Facebook in particular that evokes questions of privacy? As a teaching and learning tool, Facebook provides an environment in which anonymity and the separation of different elements of one's learning, study and social or personal lives are made more complex. What does the breakdown of context and distinction do for processes of learning? Theorising the relationship between privacy and the use of Facebook and other social networking sites as teaching and learning tools, this article presents a summary of its use in media and communications teaching, the mechanisms by which privacy questions are invoked in this context, the ways in which its use opens new and unexpected ways of thinking about pedagogy in relation to the everyday, and the factors that invoke questions as to how online social networking identity is managed by students using Facebook as a prescribed learning tool.
Facebook in the classroom: blended audiences and multiple front-stages
International Journal of Social Media and Interactive Learning Environments, 2014
In New Zealand, the use of social media for educational purposes is being encouraged (Ministry of Education, 2013). Yet, while educators focus on the educational advantages of using social media, there is little research available on the effects on students. This paper explores the way a small group of senior students from one New Zealand secondary school negotiated their identities on a class' Facebook page. This qualitative study uses Goffman's dramaturgical metaphor and poststructuralist conceptualisations of discourses and fluidity of identity. The findings offer an insight into the tensions faced by this group of students as they negotiated their identity presentations to blended audiences when the boundaries between public and private are blurred. The students' identity performance and participation on the page was influenced by power differentials, the structure of the page, and an awareness of audience. This has implications for the way educators use social media in classrooms.
This article situates current theoretical, rhetorical, and ethical analyses of the net’s most prominent social networking sites, MySpace and Facebook. It also discusses the implications of bringing these web sites into the classroom, comparing how students, teachers, and administrators use (and abuse) these spaces. Both MySpace and Facebook privilege a discourse based on the construction and representation of an identity. Rather than assert unique identities, these sites ask users to label and classify themselves according to many criteria, including age, religion, political leanings, hobbies, and interests. Users can then list others who share these labels or interests and request to “add them as friends.” MySpace and Facebook emphasize categories and aspects of popular culture that teenagers find important. They remediate the traditions of high school for the Web and by doing so greatly extend their reach. Many writing instructors wonder how these sites can be used to teach writing. How users represent themselves online could help students understand postmodern logics of identity construction and political engagement. However, there are dangers for teachers who create their own profiles and add their students as “friends.” Like chat and email, these forums undercut concepts of more conventional rhetorical spaces. They both contribute to and undermine student and faculty ethos, although students may not appreciate that their profiles might have a lasting negative impact. Despite the public nature of most profiles, users often denounce these “invasions” as blatant violations of their privacy. Perhaps teachers and scholars should work to protect the integrity of these spaces.
2014
While Facebook, the world’s most popular Social Networking Site (SNS), has been warmly welcomed by many commentators and practitioners within the educational community, its effects, impacts and implications arguably remain insufficiently understood. Through the provision of an anecdotal and experiential account of the authors ’ attempt to introduce Facebook into an existing Peer Assisted Study Sessions (PASS) student peer mentoring program at Victoria University (VU) in Melbourne, this paper aims to explore and thereby explicate some of the issues inevitably arising in relation to the adoption and utilisation of social networking technologies in educational settings. While the authors ’ experiences of their own ‘Facebook experiment ’ were somewhat ambiguous and ambivalent, this paper is intended to contribute to the ever-expanding body of literature concerned with the use of Facebook in education and to thereby assist in improving educators ’ requisite understanding of both the pote...
Social Networking Platforms and Classroom Culture
Polish Journal of Educational Studies, 2021
This article investigates how social networks affect classroom culture in secondary schools. It combines personal reflections from us as professionals, who have worked in schools and in universities in a range of different countries and contexts, with the use of research written over the last decade into this area. Stylistically this article is a conceptual article - it has a strong reflective element and its purpose within the wider academic and professional community is to generate discussion among professionals rather than to find definitive conclusions. Classroom culture is commonly divided into four dimensions: group attitudes and behaviours toward learning, group attitudes and behaviours towards interaction with peers, teacher attitudes and behaviours towards students and instruction, and parental behaviours towards children and the teacher. This framework underpins this article. Even though social networks play an important part in young students’ lives globally, most studies into the usage of social networks for education have been conducted at the level of higher education and only a few studies focus on school level. This paper therefore focuses on school level usage and possibilities. The paper concludes that whatever our views on social media, the reality is that Facebook and its many counterparts are part of current culture and are already being used by many teachers globally as learning tools. Given that they can have both negative and positive impacts on classroom culture and are becoming an inevitable part of many young students’ lives, schools have limited options. The first one is to ban social networks to make sure that there are no consequences, and this is the case in a wide range of systems and jurisdictions. However, other approaches, which can be a frequently found globally, include a managed approach to Facebook – with course, class or even teacher pages – often entirely separate to the individual teacher’s personal page.