Eclectic Technology

I found this article to be interesting because of how society currently views teenagers using social media. One could think that it is a distraction of getting school work done, but this study has proven that assumption to be wrong... in a way. I personally believe that social media can be distracting if we are laying in bed scrolling through our endless twitter or instagram feed instead of doing homework. This study has shown that if people are using social media in an academic context, then it can actually be somewhat beneficial. The group that was using twitter actually showed more engagement in the subject as well as a .5 increase in their GPA. 

This article talks about how tweeting class discussion help students become successful. There has been studies on students and how using social media has help the students more engaged towards the class.  This article is more towards teachers to help their students be more successful in their class. It also helps students be more engaged in what is going on in their classrooms.

My opinion of this article is split in half; I don’t like incorporating technology into something like a homework assignment, as technology is already a huge enough deal in society today, but because everyone in my generation is so obsessed with technology, and social media like instagram and twitter, if someone provided a way to keep their students more engaged in the class through a medium more age appropriate, and it worked, then that’s pretty genius. Being eighteen, all my friends have instagram, twitter, tumblr and snapchat. All the time, my friends pressure me into making an insta profile, as I only have a snapchat, which is enough social media for my taste. I’m obviously not the only teenager with a dislike for social media, but it’s hard to avoid. There are so many people wrapped up into it, that it becomes something they couldn’t bare to live without. And because doing homework isn’t exactly the most exciting and fun thing to do, incorporating social media into it makes it seem more entertaining and therefore of course more people are going to become engaged. So overall, even though I’d personally be more annoyed, I think the idea of incorporating twitter in the classroom was a good way to keep the students of this generation engaged.