Using Facebook in education is one way to use technology to your benefit. Facebook offers many applications and room for the imagination to explore a bit. Students can use this Internet technology to perform various tasks and practice their computer skills at the same time. The Facebook feature to be discussed in this article is the use of the "Groups" feature. Described below is one option for using the "Groups' feature on Facebook.
Before using any Internet application, be sure to receive the permission from all of the students' parents. Be sure to limit the personal information of any student so as to avoid placing them in any jeopardy.
Have the students create a profile on Facebook. If they have an existing profile, you may want them to create another one specific to the needs of this class so that personal information is limited and the focus of the group is easier to maintain. Next, have the students each create a "Group" that pertains to their interests. You can specify what types of interests are considered acceptable for this project or limit them to a theme. For instance, if the focus of this project is history, then you can have the students create a group that is based on the era of history being explored. In such an instance, that would mean that a group based on the 1800's would not include a group on Mario Brothers video game.
Next, have each person join 3 groups. At this point, every student should be a member of 4 groups. Have the group leaders create a project for their group. So, for a history lesson on the 1800's, one might create a bonnet sewing group. The students would have a project of designing or creating their own bonnets and posting their progress in the group.
Using Facebook in education is a good way to get the students to interact and work together in an entirely new format. To make sure that there is a limited use of "cliques" in this project, you may want the students to make the names of their Facebook applications nothing like their own so that the activity is a bit more anonymous. You may also want to encourage the students to keep themselves anonymous to find out that they may actually have something in common with a student that they normally do not hang around with.
