What is the first thing that comes to your mind when anyone talks about social media? Entertainment? Definitely, entertainment is one of the major driving factor for the billions of active social media users. But let me tell you there’s more to social media.
How many times do you use social media to get the contact details on Facebook Page/profile, or get the directions to your favourite restaurant? So, it’s a trusted platform for getting contact details or business information.
While getting these details on Facebook (or Instagram), you may have seen the slideshow of your favourite garments or jewellery or shoes or any other thing that you have recently browsed on the E-commerce portal. By now you would have known that I’m referring to Social Media Ads.
How frequently do you chat with your friends on WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger or replied to your friends’ Instagram stories, or commented on Snapchat? Almost daily, right? This implies that Social Media is a medium of communication.
You may open your Twitter account on your mobile and you see a lot of tweets related to latest news which is a trending topic on Twitter. Hence, social media is a source of news too.
If you’re a student or a teacher, you may have joined various Facebook groups related to education and you keep on getting notifications related to education.
Social media has wonderfully left behind the stone-age techniques of physically visiting the store to get further details, or advertising or reading newspapers.
Let’s walk through some of the impacts of social media on Education. 
Evolution of Flipped Classroom Model
In today’s era, apart from these above-mentioned areas (news source, entertainment, contact details, etc.), utmost importance is given to the field of Education in Social media. Social media connects the dots between students, teachers and technology. Thanks to the new LMS (Learning Management Systems) such as Blackboard, Moodle, WebCT, etc. Professors are armed with these popular LMS, with the help of which they can easily integrate with various social media channels. This has led to the evolution of the flipped classroom model where students watch online lectures, get involved in the classroom discussions, carry out homework with the guidance of mentors.
Use of Social Media in Schools/Universities
Some universities/colleges create podcasts and video blogs which are created by the faculty, students. These podcasts are then shared via social media channels. Many of the universities have their own Facebook page where they can make announcements related to fees, courses, etc. They also create events on the page and which is sent to a wide number of audience to popularize the event and mark the attendance of the schools/college events.
Blogs as Important Study Resource
Universities/schools maintain a blog to make important announcements/notifications. They can also be used to share important study materials, which can be shared on various social media channels.
Get in Touch With Experts
With social media, you get to know who the experts in the particular niche are. Once you start following these experts, you gain useful content from them. Gradually, you start to assimilate insightful content from these experts, which proves to be a great learning curve for you. Apart from passively learning their content, you can directly approach these experts and get your queries resolved.
A Stem to a Passive Profession
You may be a professor at some college or a teacher in a high school, or a tutor. Social media channels such as Vimeo or YouTube can ignite an urge within you to start a passive profession of becoming an online coach/tutor.
All you need is a digital portfolio which includes all your work. Social media channels will definitely help you stay ahead in the race if you rightly promote your digital portfolio.
Having said all these positive impacts of social media on Education, there are some of the negative impacts as well.
These are listed below:
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Social media is not always the trusted source of information
You may stumble upon any information in your Facebook Newsfeed or on any other social media platform. But it may not always be a trustworthy information. Many students make use of social media for keeping themselves updated about the notifications/announcements. You need to re-check on the information and then forward/share the information further.
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Over-use of Social media
Students who overuse social media, often face reduced academic performance. Constantly checking Social media notifications may lead to distractions in studies.
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Decline of face-to-face interactions
It has been observed that those who are too much involved in social media, they spend less time in socializing the people personally.
What is Bottom line?
Although there are ample of benefits of social media, but there are some negative impacts as well. It completely depends on the individual how to make effective use of social media on education. If rightly used, it’s the best tool for learning.
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