Social media is a network of apps built to facilitate social interactions worldwide. Various apps and sites contribute towards building optimised platforms that have evolved to offer a balance between entertainment and information. Every industry, including the education industry, benefits from various technological advancements. The impact of social media on education has helped students to be exposed to a new world of learning by connecting to people globally.
Evolution of Social Media
Since its evolution in 1844, social media has changed and optimised itself tremendously and continues to do so. It began as a means of electronic exchange of information between people and has grown into a virtual place for unions and reunions in recent years. Not only this, social media has become a dynamic and stellar platform for offering study materials and other educational resources. The 21st-century virtual tool is also utilised for retail and marketing purposes to reach diverse amounts of audiences across the globe. People worldwide can connect, share information, and promote themselves or their brands through social media apps.
Initially, YouTube, Whatsapp and Facebook were the most prominent and highly used social media apps by people all over the world. But with time, Instagram, Telegram, and LinkedIn also gained popularity. During the covid-19 lockdown, when the world was forced to shift to online mode, various other apps such as Zoom, G meet, and Ms Teams gained immense popularity in the business and educational sectors. These apps offer various features varying from social interactions to top information sharing. They keep rolling out new features based on audience needs to increase their popularity. These features benefit people on a large scale since it is personalised to target people from all sectors, including businesses, entertainment and education.
Although educational institutions had never been a big fan of allowing students to spend more time on social sites or smart devices, changing needs caused them to integrate technological revolutions and hence, usage of social media apps into their teaching methodology.
Benefits of Mobile Apps in Education for Students
Access to any information from anywhere at any time makes the learning process convenient and easy. In these changing times, access to information is at the fingertips through mobile phones.
A mobile phone might make lots of your tasks easy for you and also saves a lot of time. Visiting the library and selecting books, data collection is no more a challenge.
Similarly, the trend in education is changing there is a digitalization wave into education. E-Learning is the new need for the students. E-Learning mobile apps are getting popular day by day and that is due to its uniqueness of making learning fun for students.
Let us explore some best advantages of using educational apps and identify the importance of educational mobile in today’s Era:
- Modern learning techniques:
Educational mobile Apps directly target the psychology of the students which helps students to understand and grab the information from a different perspective. The app makes them understand the concepts by giving them challenging tasks, puzzles, and educational games. The audio-Visual form of education is been liked by most of the students. This newness in the universe of learning makes them excited and eager to learn.
- 24/7 Access:
Educational Mobile applications are accessible anywhere anytime. It is not time-bound. Study when you feel to study is the concept it follows. - Effective parent – student – teacher communication:
Educational mobile Apps are also helping teachers to keep appropriate track of student performance and report due to its special automated grading, attendance feature. Not only teachers but parents are also able to connect with teachers easily through an app where they can share the queries and concerns anytime and anywhere.
- Comprehensive and systematic approach:
Education Apps helps students to analyze what they have been taught and what is the source of it which makes them curious to know more but in a systematic way where they know how, when and what to explore. This overall process helps the students to learn practically and not theoretically. - Saves time:
Students save a lot of time through educational apps. No need to travel so it saves traveling time. Getting references, class notes is easy just download it so it also saves time. Features like instant updates, Portability, unlimited learning, etc. Saves a lot of time.
- Cost-effective:
The Educational apps are cost-effective and you wide range of payment options which allow the student to pay in installments or maybe per class.
Students have started accepting the digitalization of education and learning and soon this will change the entire education system in India.
Disadvantages of Social Media for Students
Social media is very beneficial and offers a lot of exposure to students. Sometimes they use social media without any control or noticing its adverse effects. Like everything in the world, social media also has its drawbacks that should be considered to make social media more sustainable and user-friendly. Some of these disadvantages are:
1. Addiction to Social Media
When the youth uses social media platforms for an uncontrolled period and cannot stop themselves from using such applications, then they get addicted to them, and such addiction can lead to profound negative implications on their mental as well as physical health. The attention of any student gets diverted once they get extra attached to social media, and the focus on study gets completely lost. After a lot of studies, it can be observed that students tend to waste a lot of time on social media and stop doing the essential tasks that they should do in their curricular life.
2. Social Media has adverse effects on socialization
It is a common observation that social media helps students socialize with their peers and teachers much better. It is also true that sometimes a particular individual gets so engrossed in social media that they forget about anything else in the world and isolate themselves. This act of self-isolation by any student hampers their relationship with their family members and their relatives. In many cases, it is seen that students even stop going outside their houses and stop interacting with anyone in their classroom.
3. Social Media can lead to cyberbullying
Cyberbullying is a significant and increasing threat in modern society and is considered a cybercrime. The platforms of social media can act as a common breeding ground for people that involve themselves in the act of cyberbullying. One of the features of social media is that it can enable anyone to have an anonymous identity. The reason for the availability of such a feature is because of security reasons, but folks have started using it in a negative sense. These cyberbullies attack other people by sending inappropriate messages, commenting hateful and racial slurs on the pictures posted by other people, and in many different forms. The people create fake accounts of themselves and trouble other people just for the sake of fun. It is entirely immoral and can generate a lot of mental trauma. Students and younger folks are these cyberbullies’ prime targets because they are easily negatively affected. The effects of cyberbullying can be very long-lasting, like anxiety attacks, clinical depression, and various severe mental problems.
4. Social Media has a lot of inappropriate content
Social media platforms allow everyone to have free speech, which is a great thing to have in this modern world, but in many instances, this free speech can be harmful. It is a fact that social media is a rich source of entertainment, but a lot of content available on social media to be accessed by young students is not appropriate at all, and it exceeds moral boundaries. A large quantity of lewd and obscene content is available on social media that anyone can easily access, which is inappropriate for any student to see. Also, many people use social media platforms like Twitter and Instagram to spread hatred and prejudice toward others and influence young people to commit horrendous activities. Students and young individuals using social media can intentionally or unintentionally be a part of such things, which can affect their future in many ways. The presence of pornography is the biggest threat that consumes a lot of young users and makes them very addicted to social media for all the wrong reasons. This consumption of inappropriate things on all these platforms present today makes students mentally unstable, and they lose the sense of right and wrong. Such content can also cause the inability to sleep and other serious consequences.
5. Social Media can cause serious health concerns for students
It is commonly said that “Health is Wealth.” For a student being healthy is a topmost priority, whether mental or physical health. One should always stay perfect because any opportunity or academic responsibility can strike at any time in a student’s life. The use of social media in any student’s life should be minimal and based on extracting only positive results from social media platforms, but it is not the case which is seen chiefly. It is observed that students and young individuals get engrossed in social media and start using it all the time for all the wrong reasons. Students spend all day and night sitting in front of screens of their computers or holding mobile phones in their hands, wasting a lot of time that should be utilized for other beneficial activities. This heavy usage of social media platforms gets the students addicted and makes them forget about everything else. The addition of social media hampers the mental stability of a student, and one stops losing all focus on studies. It also makes the students lazy as it does not involve any physical activities. It is also observed that in many cases, students start sacrificing their sleep and get major bouts of sleeping disorders.
Conclusion
Social media has revolutionized education by enhancing communication, collaboration, and access to resources. It provides students and educators with platforms for sharing knowledge, participating in discussions, and accessing diverse viewpoints. However, it also presents challenges, including distractions and misinformation. Balancing the benefits and drawbacks is crucial to harness social media’s potential effectively, ensuring it supports educational goals while mitigating its risks. By integrating social media thoughtfully, educators can create a more dynamic and interactive learning environment that prepares students for a connected world.
By: A.Adhil Mohamed
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