Social networking websites enhance the teaching and learning process,
foster collaborative learning, facilitate networking, and promote the knowledge
sharing. WhatsApp is social networking site that allows all this and increases
rapport between students and teachers.
WhatsApp is a basic social networking website that contains the features
of chatting, voice noting, sending links,
sharing links, and an ability to send messages to groups or individuals. As an instructor, you can send notifications,
create assignments, build quizzes , poll audiences, via sending the links to
the WhatsApp group. With WhatsApp students and instructors
can network in an environment that keeps the focus solely on teaching and
learning without the risk of inadvertently glimpsing into each other’s private
lives as in the case of Facebook.
WhatsApp is perfect for:
1. information
sharing. WhatsApp enables students to easily
communicate with their classmates and
instructors. When communicating with classmates, WhatsApp allows students to
ask each other questions as well as view and respond to each other’s questions; they also can share and view information. In my
experience, students are quick to respond to one another. For more difficult
questions, instructors can choose to respond directly or privately on WhatsApp,
which allows all students to view and benefit from these messages. This information
sharing ability is also useful for courses in which students need to share
links with one another.
2. group work. WhatsApp allows for the easy
creation of small student work groups.
Each group has the ability to create a team name and work within an
individualized space where they can share ideas, articles, news, and resources
with each other. This feature is especially relevant in courses with group
projects such as a research methods course in which students may need to share
empirical articles, post measures, talk about stimuli, or coordinate group face-to-face
meetings.
2. mobile notifications. Receiving mobile
notifications enhances the idea of alterness.
For example, instructors can use
this feature in the case of having to cancel class.
3. control and
visibility. Instructors can maintain a degree of
supervision by being admins to the WhatsApp group. You can determine if your
students are sharing information, if they are uploading materials to share with
one another, and if they are responding to each other’s posts or if they are
starying away from the main purpose of the class. You can delete inappropriate
posts as needed and monitor any issues that arise.
WhatsApp is a great tool that helped me in the time of the coronavirus
spread as though we were using Microsoft teams, the inconvenience of the
internet made students lost. Students began to support each other
through the WhatsApp groups, answer questions, send material, links, and
explain to each other hard or vague material. Whenever students felt they had to
contact me directly, they sent me privately. It was an enlighting experience in
which I understood that WhatsApp is highly supportive and should be used in
coordination with other educational platforms as students master using it and
they feel more connected.
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