Learning Through Social Networking Sites: The Critical Role of the Teacher

Learning through social networking sites – the critical role of theteacher

Noelene Callaghana* and Matt Bowerb

aNSW Department of Education, Glenwood, Australia; bMacquarie University, Ryde,Australia

(Received 6 October 2011; final version received 7 December 2011)

This comparative case study examined factors affecting behaviour and learningin social networking sites (SNS). The behaviour and learning of two classescompleting identical SNS based modules of work was observed and compared.All student contributions to the SNS were analysed, with the cognitive processdimension of the Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy used to measure the type of think-ing that students demonstrated. Key findings include the trade off between socialand learning contributions, the potential of SNSs to enhance motivation and dig-ital literacy development, and the critical role of the teaching in influencing thebehaviour and learning that transpired. Effective teacher implementation in theSNS was associated with positive teacher–student relationships, establishing a‘learning’ rather than ‘social’ attitude towards the SNS, and the online presencethat the teacher exerted.

Keywords: social networking sites; SNS; e-learning; technology; Web 2.0;online spaces; Australian secondary schools; engagement; Ning

Introduction

Social networking sites (SNSs) are no longer defined as simply a communicationaltool that ‘allows one to make new friends, renew or maintain old acquaintances andestablish romantic relationships’ (Beckenham, 2008, p. 2). SNSs are sophisticatedweb-based services that allow individuals to construct a profile, form social networks,and view and traverse information with others (Boyd & Ellison, 2007). Hence, SNSsare in fact a very complex place where individuals are required to utilize a number ofIT and social skills to form a virtual representation of themselves and interact effec-tively with others. They can be used by a large range of age groups (over the age of13 years), and can productively connect a diverse group of students whilst creatingmultiliteracies and developing cognitive capabilities (Healy, 2007).

Some research has found that SNSs are the most popular form of communica-tion amongst teenagers with ‘95% of SNS users being teenagers aged between 16and 19 years’ (Ellison, 2008, p. 81). Thus there is a possibility to draw upon thepopularity of SNSs to engage school students and utilising the online skills thatstudents already possess.

*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]

Educational Media InternationalVol. 49, No. 1, March 2012, 1–17

ISSN 0952-3987 print/ISSN 1469-5790 online� 2012 International Council for Educational Mediahttp://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09523987.2012.662621http://www.tandfonline.com

In an educational context, SNSs may bring both opportunities and limitations tothe classroom. SNSs create new opportunity for self-directed learning, supportingall levels of cognitive abilities, peer-based learning and the development of newmedia literacy, yet the role of the teacher in helping students to accomplish theseobjectives is a somewhat open question.

Background literature

Boyd and Ellison (2007) emphasise that SNSs are part of a larger suite of Internettechnologies that collectively fall under the category of Web 2.0 tools, along withblogs and wikis. In their normal context, affordances associated with SNSs includethe ability to facilitate:

• Connectivity and social rapport.• Collaborative information discovery and sharing.• Content creation.• Knowledge and information aggregation.• Content modification (Burden & Atkinson, 2008).

Overall, Web 2.0 tools encompass a variety of meanings that include an increasedemphasis on user generated content, data and content sharing and collaborative effort(Albion, 2008a). In SNSs this is achieved by their capabilities to create online groupsthat enable users to ‘Chat’ in addition to search for and critique information as wellas post and withdraw data, audio and video files (Sale & Sinis, 2008).

Currently Facebook is the world’s most used social networking site with over750 million global users (Alexa, 2011; Facebook, 2011). It is reported that femaleteenager’s access and use SNSs more frequently than do male teenagers (Ellison,2008). Ellison (2008) also found that SNS users aged between 18- and 24-years-oldspend an estimated ‘6–10 hours a week online’ (p. 91). More recently, it wasreported that of Australian Facebook users (of all ages), one of every five minutesis spent on SNSs (comStore, 2011). Thus, it can be speculated that teenagers mayspend more time online than completing homework or study.

Many researchers attempt to elucidate why today’s students flock to these sites.Some, such as Boyd (2008a), suggest that it provides teenagers with opportunities tocreate a desired profile of themselves that perhaps is not normally associated withthem in person. Many others such as DeSchryver et al. (2008a), Shaheen (2008) andVie (2008) have found that SNSs provide teenagers a ‘sense of worth’. This impliesthat teenagers can create a personal profile that may not best represent them in reallife, but presents them as a unique and ‘cool’ individual online and therefore, othersshould befriend them. It is noted that some teenagers who are unpopular at school andas a result possess very low self-esteem are thriving online due to their ‘better pre-sented’ profile and ‘coolness online’ (Boyd, 2008a, p. 129). Additionally, SNSs pro-vide teenagers with a voice that is ‘heard’ by others as well as providing them withthe opportunity to be ‘innovative’, where in traditional cases this may be difficult fora teenager to do (Ellison, 2006). Additionally, Boyd (2008b) states that many teenag-ers have turned to these tools to simply replace traditional ways of keeping a journalor telephoning a friend. This is perhaps due to teenagers thriving on their immediateaccess to the world and such behaviour is indicative of their culture’s fundamentalright to the free flow of information and expression of opinions (Leung, 2003).

2 N. Callaghan and M. Bower

International reports such as The Horizon Project have paid particular attention tohow SNSs have enhanced student engagement in the classroom through their‘relevance to teaching, learning, and creative inquiry’ (Johnson, Smith, Willis,Levine, & Haywood, 2011, p. 11). Findings from McLoughlin and Lee (2008), Bec-kenham (2008) and Ito et al. (2008) show strong student engagement occurringthrough the use of SNSs in the classroom.

Given that SNSs are the most popular form of communication amongst teenag-ers (Ellison, 2008) there is an opportunity to transfer motivation and associatedinformation and communication literacies into an educational context. Overall,SNSs permits students to participate in numerous activities. For example, ‘Flickrand YouTube facilitate the sharing of photos and videos with both “real world” and“virtual” friends, whereas Facebook, MySpace and Friendster allow users to utilisea range of multimedia elements’ (McLoughlin & Lee, 2007, p. 665). PBworks andNing have been identified as having great potential for promoting online and offlinecollaboration and for disseminating research and resources (Knobel & Lankshear,2009). Thus, SNSs may contribute to an improvement in literacy and numeracy aswell as preparing them as citizens in a global world (Murray, 2008) and may enableself-regulated learning (Vie, 2008) by exposing them to deeper learning anddeveloping higher cognitive skills (Lynch, Debuse, Lawley, & Roy, 2009).

Unfortunately, limitations surrounding the SNS expertise of teachers, perhapsdue to the Digital Divide as conceptualised by Oblinger and Oblinger (2005) andthe potential abuse of online spaces (Boyd, 2008b) may inhibit successful use ofthe tool. The Ning Network, which has been the focus of benchmark studies forArnold and Paulus (2010), Barbour and Plough (2009) and for the Horizon Project,2011 (Johnson, Smith, Willis, Levine, & Haywood, 2011), is used in this study toexamine how SNSs may enhance the learning processes in a high school teachingand learning environment. The study investigated if SNSs can be used to pedagogi-cally enhance learning of curriculum. An emerging finding from the study was therole of the teacher in contributing to the quality of the student learning experience.

Methodology

A total of 48 Year 10 (Stage 5) commerce students from a school in the westernregion of Sydney participated in the research study (24 students in each of the twoclasses). In 2011, the school had 870 students enrolled, of whom 122 students werein Year 10. Of these Year 10 students, 84% had a language background other thanEnglish (LBOTE) and the vast majority were of European background. Out of 48participants, four students were recognised as having learning difficulties. All stu-dents in this year group had their own laptop which was used in all five 60 minuteperiods daily. The two classes that participated in this study were not graded orstreamed.

Two Ning Plus versions of the Ning Network were used to conduct thisresearch. The Ning SNS enabled all registered students to work in secure environ-ment only accessible by account holders. Identical SNS tools and lesson materialspecific to ‘Stage 5 commerce: Employment issues’ was created on each class’sNing Network (see Figure 1, below).

The Ning Network contained all of the detailed class work instructions and allof the tools that students were required to use. The tools used in the first fourlessons included, but were not limited to chat, forum discussions (13 in total), blogs

Educational Media International 3

(four in total), and video and photo albums. An assessment task (e-portfolio assess-ment) complete with a marking criteria was to be completed in the fifth and finallesson. The range of tools were selected to utilise the varying ICT abilities ofstudents based on existing claims such as that by Hansford and Adlington (2008)that digital natives regularly engage with these tools, thus have already developedquite complex IT capabilities.

The overall module used Anderson and Krathwohl’s (2001) Revised Bloom’sTaxonomy in the design of the lessons. The Anderson and Krathwohl’s Taxonomyprovides a hierarchy of cognition that classifies learning into levels that extend fromlower order thinking skills of ‘remember’, ‘understand’, and ‘apply’ to higher orderthinking skills of ‘analyse’, ‘evaluate’ and ‘create’. Some questions and tasksrequired students to use Ning tools such as the blog to demonstrate higher orderthinking skills. Other tasks used simple and common SNS tools such as ‘Chat’ toexercise lower order prerequisite tasks. The taxonomy is recognised as ‘being moreuseful as the taxonomy intersects and acts upon different types and levels ofknowledge’ (Wilson, 2006, p. 2).

Both Ning Networks were accessed over five consecutive 60 minute lessonsstemming over three weeks during Term 1. Students logged onto Ning via a linkthat was emailed to their student email. Three classroom teachers and the researcherall took part in observing students.

Both classroom teachers observed their own classes for all five lessons. In orderto increase the reliability of observations, an additional teacher also observed alllessons in both classes (10 lessons in total). The additional expert observer was apermanent executive staff member employed by the school to assist other teachersin their development of ICT lessons and pedagogies. All three observers were

Figure 1. The interface design for the two Ning Networks.


provided with identical training, structured training materials and observationframeworks.

Data was recorded in detailed observation instruments that had been designedfor the project. The instruments included information such as the period in whichthe lesson took place, the number of students present that particular lesson and thenumber of students who had a laptop with them as well as both open and closedquestions regarding student behaviours, student learning and general classroomclimate. Closed questions were measured on a five-point Likert scale from ‘stronglyagree’ to ‘strongly disagree’.

The researcher observed all online activity in real time from off-site and saved allstudent contributions to Ning electronically. All observations were recorded in anobservation journal. Particular attention was afforded to the number of postings ineach tool, the quality of work, and if student online behaviour was influenced by theactions of their peers or teacher. The researcher also marked the e-portfolio assess-ment task. Together all observers (teachers and researcher) monitored front and back-stage behaviour permitting the identification of patterns surrounding SNS use.

All work created by students were saved electronically, printed and used to sup-port observer and researcher findings. Calculations of the number of postings con-tributed by total students and by class in all tools allowed objective analysis to beconducted. Each contribution was categorised into either social or learning contribu-tions. Those considered a learning contribution were then assessed according to itslevel on Anderson and Krathwohl’s cognitive process dimension. This resulted in acomparative matrix denoting the cognitive ability of participating students whenusing particular tools. The NetLingo dictionary (NetLingo, 2010) was used to inter-pret and decipher any online acronyms posted or jargon that students posted in theircontributions to Ning.

At the completion of the fifth and final lesson, students were asked to completea five minute online Student Feedback Survey. This survey was directly linked fromtheir Ning website and comprised of five point Likert scales, closed and open endedquestions regarding student’s general use of SNSs as well as their feelings towardusing Ning.

A range of strategies were implemented to maintain continuity of findings andpromote impartiality including:

• Using predefined learning material for five lessons (lesson plans).• Using two identical Ning Networks (one per class; Class 1 and Class 2).• Recoding contributions for all participating students (student contributions to

Ning).• Using predefined observation and survey instruments.• Conducting one training session for observing teachers.• Using additional observers; traditional (teacher observers) and online in real-

time (researcher).

Triangulating researcher observations with teacher observations reduced thepotential for speculative reporting thus enhancing the reliability and validity of find-ings (Johnson & Christensen, 2008; Yin, 1994).


Table

1.Class

1andClass

2.

Total

%Com

merce

1%

Com

merce

2%

Chat

48100

24100

24100

Forum

Discussion

48100

24100

24100

GiftGiving

4696

24100

2292

Postin

gMessageson

Profile

Pages

4696

24100

2292

InvitedFriends

4594

2396

2292

After

Hours

Activity

3369

1667

1771

Profile

Colours

3165

1771

1458

Profile

Photo

2348

833

1563

Blog

2348

14

2292

e-Portfolio

Assessm

ent

1838

14

1771

Sharing

Photo/ImageFiles

1225

833

1563

Added

ExternalApplication

24

00

28

Sharing

VideosFiles

00

00

00

Typi

cal S

NS

Beha

viou

rs


Results

Overall activity

Class 2 was observed at completing more class work than Class 1. Class 1 limitedtheir activity to ‘Chat’ and forum discussions, whereas it was observed that Class 2was engaged with the conceptual challenges posed within the module by participat-ing in forum discussions and blog entries. Table 1 depicts the percentage of studentswho used each tool in each class and overall.

Both initially and throughout the study, teacher observations indicated that stu-dents in both classes were excited to be using Ning. Students did not encounter anyproblems locating the Ning Network, creating an account or navigating around theSNS. Immediately, students showed signs of past SNS use. There were no majordifferences between Class 1 and Class 2 in their ability to transfer these skills intothe classroom as all students were observed at using Ning without any complica-tions and without needing additional verbal instructions from their teacher.

This was re-enforced by the responses to the Student Feedback Survey as 91%of students stated that they have used a SNS in the past with 77% disclosing thatthey found Ning easy to use due to the likeness of similar functionalities on Face-book. This was further observed by the researcher as all students actively used‘Chat’ and the forum discussion immediately after initial login.

A total of 2359 contributions were made by all students. Table 2 illustrates thenumber of total contributions posted in each Ning tool during the course of theresearch study.

Table 2. Number of contributions in each Ning tool.

Total Class 1 Class 2

Chat 1,238 1,103 135Forum 458 210 248Posting Messages on Profile Pages 188 80 108Invited Friends 178 93 85Gift Giving 156 68 88Blog 79 7 72Sharing Photo/Image Files 37 6 31e-Portfolio Assessment Task 23 1 22Added External Application 2 0 2Sharing Videos Files 0 0 0

Table 3. Key difference in class activity.

Class 1 Class 2

Little activity overall A lot of activity overallChat and Forum Discussion focused Forum Discussion and Blog focusedInconsistent behaviours observed Focused and engaged behaviour observedMassive amount of Net Lingo used Minimal Net Lingo usedNo sharing of multimedia Sharing of photosSelected particular questions to complete Followed all instructionsOnly one student completed the e-portfolioassessment task

Majority of students completed the e-portfolioassessment task


Of all students, 69% logged onto Ning outside of class time to complete lessonwork with 67% and 71% of students from Class 1 and Class 2, respectively,accessing the SNS after hours. There were limited differences between students ofboth classes when accessing Ning outside the classroom, however, the researcherobserved that students accessed all of Ning’s tools except ‘Chat’ even though theycould see their peers online. Analysis of student contributions to Ning identified 55%of students working ahead whilst 45% used this time to complete unfinished tasks.

All three observers identified the main differences between the two classes asoutlined in Table 3 below.

Levels of cognition

There was great variance in the way students used the site. Students in Class 1displayed extremely social behaviours resulting in one third of participants onlyusing their time to converse in ‘Chat’ in all five lessons. The majority (96%) of stu-dents in Class 1 did not progress past forum discussions and the quality of theseresponses in this tool generally did not constitute any considerable degree of intel-lectual rigor. Further, in this class only one student completed all 13 forum discus-sions, one of the four blog entries as well as the e-portfolio assessment task. Thisresulted in students only completing tasks that required the identification or thedefining of key terms and concepts. As students (except one) did not complete theirblog or e-portfolio assessment task, only activity in the lower order levels aspresented by Anderson and Krathwohl’s Taxonomy was observed.

Contrastingly in Class 2, 71% of students used all Ning tools as required by themodule. Students developed their learning and created connections between the dif-ferent tools on Ning. In reference to Anderson and Krathwohl’s Taxonomy, 92% ofstudents were observed in applying higher order thinking skills of ‘evaluate’ and71% demonstrating ‘create’. Additionally in this class, 17 students completed all 13forum discussions, all four blogs as well as the e-portfolio assessment task. Figure 2

0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%

Create

Evaluate

Analyse

Apply

Understand

RememberAnde

rson

& K

rath

woh

l's T

axon

omy

Cognition Levels Percentage of Students

Class 1 Class 2

Figure 2. Anderson and Krathwohl (2001), cognition levels achieved in each class.


below depicts the percentage of students in each class who successfully attainingeach taxonomy level of cognition.

As stated a total of 2359 contributions were made by all students. The contribu-tions of Class 1 were primarily of a social nature (see Figure 3 below). Contribu-tions scored as ‘learning’ met the lower order levels of this taxonomy hierarchy andwere visible in contributions made to forum discussions, blogs and in the sharing ofphoto/image files. There were 31 instances where students copied the work of theirpeers and posted it as their own.

Contrastingly, in Class 2 less social and more learning contributions were postedon Ning (see Figure 4). More students were observed to use higher order thinkingskills in most module contributions, which is directly opposite to Class 2.

Figure 3. Hierarchy of cognitive process levels present in contributions in each Ning Toolin Class 1.

Figure 4. Hierarchy of cognitive process levels present in contributions in each Ning Toolin Class 2.


Self-directed learning

Overall, 87% of total students reported in their Student Feedback Survey that theybelieved that Ning assisted them in contributing to their own learning, as onestudent elaborated by stating that they ‘were able to find and develop their owninformation’. However, students in Class 1 limited their online activity to ‘Chat’and to at least one forum discussion (out of 13). Forum discussions were selectedbased on ‘ease’ and although responses were related to the question, they were briefand typically consisted of ‘copy and pasted’ answers found in Google search,Yahoo Answers and the textbooks CD ROM. Only 17% of students completed allof the 13 forum discussions which interestingly, comprised of the more ‘vocal’ stu-dents whom in a traditional learning environment would not normally complete asmuch class work (observation posited by Teacher 1).

Class 2 students demonstrated proficient self-directed learning as at thecommencement of all five lessons, students arrived in class, logged onto Ning andbegan completing their work without the intervention of Teacher 2. Teacher 2 alsoreported that she often felt redundant as students took control of their learningimmediately. These students were observed by the researcher to follow the lessoninstructions and complete all tasks sequentially, resulting in completing more classwork, making more connections between tasks and producing better researched andarticulated responses than students in Class 1. In Lesson 4, Class 2 students beganusing ‘Chat’ to ask their peers questions about how to complete certain tasks andbegan using the forum discussion to compare and clarify their responses againsttheir peer’s postings. In the final lesson, Teacher 2 commented that all studentscompleted the e-portfolio assessment task autonomously.

Synthesis

In this study, the term ‘synthesis’ is used to refer to the connections that a studentmakes between various pieces of their own work and the work of others that isposted in different areas on Ning such as on two different discussion threads or inat least two different tools. Due to the differing quantities of work posted by stu-dents, vast differences between the two classes emerged.

As a result of the inactivity as recorded in the contributions in Class 1, it couldnot be determined if connections between work was made. Alternatively, in Class2, 65% of students were observed to make connections between the different toolson Ning as they linked ideas, drew on content, evaluated and created new informa-tion in their forum discussions and blogs. Synthesis consistently grew over the fivelessons in Class 2 and by the final lesson connectivity was immense and easilyobservable in the e-portfolio assessment task (an example of this is provided inFigure 5).

In Class 2 there were 15 (out of 18) students who incorporated work that theycompleted during the first four lessons into their e-portfolio assessment task.

Modes of social interaction

In this study, social rapport refers to the strength of relationships between students.All students accessed their profile page (as pictured in Figure 6) and used the ‘Chat’and forum discussion tools in varying degrees throughout the five lessons. Particular


paths were followed in the development of friendships. Students were observed totypically begin by chatting to their peers and strengthening their relationships bysending invitations to each other to be their ‘friend’. Once this was completed, thetwo students would give gifts to each other, and then converse collaborativelybefore contributing to learning tasks. Minimal NetLingo was used by Class 2 andsimilarly to Class 1, it was restricted to ‘Chat’. However, NetLingo was used toreplace words in responses and not for conversing on matters irrelevant to the taskat hand.

All but one student in Class 1 commented in their surveys that they viewedNing as more of a ‘social’ site. Developing and maintaining social rapport appearedto be the key focus of this class as gift giving was a prominent activity for all Class1 students. So prominent was this that competitions quickly arose between studentsof whom received the most gifts. It was found in their contributions that studentsreceived up to seven gifts. On average, students in Class 1 received three gifts. Theobserving teachers later commented that students became quite verbal regarding theexchange of gifts and began broadcasting that they received a gift and its sender’sidentity to the class. This encouraged additional gift giving, and motivated morestudents to invite each other to their profile page.

On the other hand, Class 2 reported that they viewed Ning more as a ‘learning’resource. Observations by teachers and the researcher concur that students extendedthemselves past ‘Chat’ and forum discussions and completed ample amounts ofwork in any one period. Interestingly, students in Class 2 spent less time establish-ing their friendship network but overall, invited more friends to their profile pages

Figure 5. Connectivity observed in a student’s e-portfolio assessment task.


(having an average of four friends) and distributed up to eight gifts (on average,students received four gifts).

Importantly, none of the teacher–observers reported any incidences of misuse ofthe SNS tool and there were no reports of foul play, cyber bullying or intimidation.Additionally, no such instances were identified in any of the student contributions.

Teacher–student interactions

It was observed by the researcher that Teacher 1 did not log on to Ning and by theexpert observer that little communication between Teacher 1 and his students tookplace. As a result, students did not rely on their teacher for assistance if required.

Figure 6. An example of a students profile page (student identity hidden).


Opposite observations were found in regards to Class 2 by the observing teach-ers. Teacher 2 proved to be very nurturing and spent a great deal of time discussingclass content with her students as a group and in one-on-one situations. The adviserfurther added that Teacher 2 used (traditional) structures in her classroom whilstusing Ning permitting her students to entrust her and openly share their class workwith her as well as their peers. In one lesson, the adviser also reported that therewere up to six instances where students asked the teacher to check their workbefore it was posted online.

In terms of online presence, the two teachers displayed extremely differentlybehaviours. Teacher 1 did not log onto Ning whereas Teacher 2 did and ensuredthat all students in Class 2 were also logged on before proceeding to actively useNing herself. Teacher 2 also connected her laptop to the classroom projector anddisplayed her work to her students. She too, participated in traditional SNSbehaviours of Chatting, sending invitations and gift giving (see Figure 7).

According to Teacher 2, students were forthcoming with information and delib-erated about the content of their responses before posting them online. Numerouspostings by students in this class were well researched, constructed and presented.These students also asked for their teacher to check their work as soon as it wasposted in order to receive immediate recognition (as reported in her observation

Figure 7. Teacher 2’s profile page.


instrument). It was also observed by the researcher that when Teacher 2 wasparticipating in a particular tool, such as posting a contribution to a forum discus-sion, students were more likely to be engaged with the same task.

It was observed by the adviser that the online presence of the teacher strengthenedteacher-student relationships. As stated, Teacher 2 participated in traditional SNSbehaviours such as partaking in gift giving which in this instance signified theacknowledgement of commendable work. Teacher 2 reported that students felt privi-leged when they received such a gift and responded by calling out or making anannouncement on their profile page (as observed by the adviser and researcher). Suchactivities also prompted other students to complete their work in an attempt to captivatetheir teacher’s attention. Such behaviours were not observed nor identified in Class 1.

Discussion

This study elucidates that the use of SNSs in high school classes may lead to vary-ing learning outcomes that may not depend on the SNS itself. The vast differencesbetween the two classes which used identical instruments is essential to this studyas this depicts that the level of success of SNS learning activities can vary betweenclasses depending on the way they are implemented. Factors such as teacher–student relationships, establishing expectations, classroom implementation and thenature of online teacher intervention could facilitate a positive classroom climatethat enhanced overall student engagement and learning.

The lack of online presence of Teacher 1 may have indicated to students that theirwork would not be checked and therefore it did not need to be completed. This mayrationalise why Class 1 students made limited use of the tools in Ning as well aswhy their quality and level of learning contributions was lower. Teacher 2 loggedonto Ning and used it in real-time with her students. This appeared to contribute toher students completing more work, staying on task and displaying a higher level ofmaturity in taking ownership of their work. The pre-existing climate of the classroomappeared to also influence the students’ learning experience with SNS, with morepositive student-teacher relationships leading to more on-task learning behaviours.

The SNS activities could support a full range of levels of thinking based on thetasks and tools. In Class 1, almost all contributions posted were of a social nature(refer to Figure 2), whereas in Class 2, 97% of contributions were of a learningnature and could be categorised according to the cognitive levels of Anderson andKrathwohl’s Taxonomy (as shown in Figure 3).

The e-portfolio assessment task required students to more deeply synthesise theirunderstanding, which may have acted as an intellectual challenge to some students.This was observed particularly in Class 1 where 92% did not attempt to completethe e-portfolio assessment task and did not extend their thinking past ‘analysis’.Contrastingly, 65% of Class 2 students made clear links between content in varioustools when completing their e-portfolio assessment tasks.

It was found that when students made larger volumes of non-social contribu-tions, students were more likely to display behaviours of synthesis (refer to Figure 5)and demonstrated higher order thinking skills (refer to Figure 2). Such activityconcurs with Burden and Atkinson’s (2008) study that students are able to activelyperform activities of sharing information, discovering information, aggregatinginformation, and modifying content when using SNSs. Given that one classachieved these outcomes and the other did not, establishing the students’ conceptu-


alisation of SNSs as a learning tool rather than a social tool may therefore be criti-cal in terms of promoting higher order thinking in SNS environments.

SNSs enabled self-directed learning. Students in Class 2 were able to log ontoNing and immediately attend to all of the tasks as instructed without any teacherintervention. These students systematically followed all instructions and were ableto work collaboratively online when required. Such behaviours were observed whenstudents used the ‘Chat’ tool asking each other for assistance. It was also observedthat those students who displayed higher levels of engagement took ownership oftheir own learning made more connections between posted data. The structuredapproach offered by the SNS enabled to work ahead on their module tasks bylogging in outside school hours.

SNSs promoted motivation and engagement. This was observed by the class-room observers that 85% of students overall remained on task during each lessonand by classroom observers whom reported that they strongly disagreed that stu-dents were disengaged. Over 2000 contributions were posted online during thecourse of the module indicating that students were motivated to collaborate in a dig-ital framework. However, Teacher 1 claimed that although the number of contribu-tions was not as high as Class 2, Class 1 students still completed more work whilstusing Ning than in a traditional classroom setting. Therefore, regardless of howestablished or structured the classroom climate is prior to SNS integration, the levelof engagement overall was found to have increased.

Students appeared to be able to effortlessly transfer their skills of using socialmedia personally into an educational context. All students were able to access anduse Ning’s tools immediately after log on without requiring teacher support. Inregards to the overall experiences of students with the Ning SNS, no differencesbetween classes were identified; all students were able to take immediate ownershipof their online space. This observation coupled with the differences in learning out-comes between the two classes indicates that technical competencies in SNSs donot necessarily result in a higher quality of student contribution or learning.

SNSs also promoted social rapport. Students were able to communicate usingmore social modes that they enjoy such as using NetLingo. Interestingly, this wasrestricted to ‘Chat’ suggesting that students acknowledged that colloquialisms wereappropriate in some but not other contexts such as the e-portfolio assessment. Gift giv-ing was also a prominent activity between students in both classes. This supports thenotion that SNSs assisted in maintaining social rapport between students and in thecreation of a positive online learning climate within the classroom, though the extentto which this supports or interferes with learning appears to depend on the instantia-tion itself.

Although this comparative study does provide evidence for how different imple-mentations of the same SNS can lead to different learning outcomes, the small scaleof this research study limits the extent to which findings can be generalised. Futureresearch could also investigate cause-and-effect relationships to determine a compre-hensive set of strategies for improving the quality of interaction and learning inSNS environments. The use of similar methodologies could investigate how toprovide effective professional development and may involve recognising and imple-menting taxonomies of learning. Such knowledge would not only empower studentsby enhancing their learning experience, but also empower teachers and educators intheir design and delivery of SNS based learning experiences. Furthermore, research


could also gauge if students with learning disabilities and learning difficulties wouldbenefit more than mainstreamed students in using SNSs.

Conclusion

This study demonstrates the critical role of the teacher in engaging effective onlinelearning in SNS environments. The quality of teacher–student relationships, the extentto which a ‘learning’ rather than ‘social’ attitude was established, and the online pres-ence that the teacher exerted in the SNS all correlated with more successful studentlearning. Positive teacher behaviors were associated with greater levels of studentmaturity and more on-task performance. There appeared to be a trade-off between theamount of social contributions that students made to the SNS and the level of thinkingthey demonstrated as measured by Anderson and Krathwohl’s (2001) RevisedBloom’s Taxonomy and the degree of synthesis they evidenced.

In an age where students are using SNSs as part of their everyday lives andteachers are often reluctant to use SNS due to fear of the unknown, this study dem-onstrates that the type and quality of learning that transpires in SNSs does notappear to be attributable to the technology. SNSs can promote greater levels ofstudent motivation and engagement, and enable students to utilize higher orderthinking skills. Utilising SNSs draws directly on students’ experience with socialnetworks and can be used to develop their technological and media literacies.However, the extent to which these outcomes are achieved in SNSs ultimatelydepends on the way the SNS learning activities are implemented by the teacher.

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