The New Facebook

ENGL1123

11/21/14

The New Facebook of Education

Social media has always been a distraction in the classroom. Almost every single day a teacher catches a student on their phone on Facebook, Instagram, or Myspace. What if there was a social media site that could actually improve the classroom. In the year 2008 that social media site was invented. Edmodo is social media sites designed to progress teaching in the classroom and allow teachers not only to keep up to date with their students, but to share information and teaching strategies to other teachers around the world. I will examine the advantages and disadvantages to Edmodo as a tool in the classroom. Many believe that all social media is a distraction in the classroom no matter what its original purpose was. It will only be another way for kids to stay connected with their friends and comment on the latest post. It will only make kids that more distracted in the classroom. But in my opinion, Edmodo has improved teaching not only in the classroom but education as a whole by using social media as a plus not a minus.

Edmodo was created in 2008, by Nic Borg and Jeff O’Hara. Their intentions for Edmodo were for it to be a cyber-safe social network and as “a tool that closes the gap between how students live their lives and how they learn in school” (Holzweiss). Edmodo has been a very useful resource in the school libraries. Many Librarians say Edmodo is much better than the usual “static school library website” (Holzweiss). Librarians can use Edmodo in many different ways to make for an enjoyable school environment for their students. Many use Edmodo for research tutorial lessons, author studies, and virtual field trips. Robert Miller used Edmodo to take his classroom on a field trip back in time to the 1800. He intermingled with his students in the voices of Meriwether Lewis, William Clark, and Sacajawea as they explored the new world. After hearing about this classroom experience Kristina Holzweiss said,...