Social Networking?

It's difficult to comment on something I know so little about. When I hear "social networking" I generally think of Facebook and MySpace. Clearly social networking is bigger than this. So I decided to do an internet search on education and social networking. Much of the information I received was fairly similar to the chapter in Library 2.0.

I did, however, find an interesting article by the National School Boards Association. (http://www.masternewmedia.org/learning_educational_technologies/social-networking/social-networking-in-education-survey-on-new-generation-social-creative-and-interconnected-lifestyles-NSBA-2007-1109.htm)
Not surprisingly, 96% of students with online access report using social networking sites. Now for the interesting part: 60% of students who use social networking talk about education topics online! And more than 50% talk about schoolwork. Although many school districts are leary of social networking some schools have reported using social networking sites for:

-online collaborative projects with other schools
-online pen pal and other international programs
-school-run blogs
-creation and maintenance of wikis
-staff development purposes

Students spend time at networking sites in many ways; blogging, sharing music, videos and photos. But the key task they are involved in is creating content, say the authors. It seems that this energy and involvement could be used in a positive and beneficial way in the classroom.

Students report creating detailed stories with new characters, contributing to collaborative projectsweekly or more frequently, sending suggestions to Web sites, and submitting articles to sites on a weekly basis.

The article reports that only a minority of students and parents have reported having had negative experiences with social networking. Most problems they reported were similar to those they have had with other media (television and music) or encountered in everyday life.

I think we will face an uphill battle gaining district approval for social networking in schools, although there are clearly benefits to students. Harold Rheingold made an excellent point in a related article. He said that "learning to use participatory media technologies, refining one's own ability to speak, present and communicate visually may indeed be among the most precious skills that the young generations of digital natives need to learn if you want them to be able to affect sensible change in the future."