How do you measure your social network?

Posted on | April 8, 2009 | 5 Comments

I’ve been working on a new presentation over the past several weeks/months. Until now, it’s mostly been in my head. But I’ve promised to have it ready for the One-to-One Computing Conference the end of the month in State College, PA. Also delivering keynotes will be Chris Lehman (founding principal of the Science Leadership Academy), Cole Camplese (director of education technology services for Penn State), and an old friend of mine, Kyle Peck, whose job description is far to unwieldy to list here — it seems to get longer every time I see him.

I love this picture from the conference web site

The conference is in its fifth year and is designed to help educators, teachers and administrators, prepare for one-to-one learning environments. From the conference site:

On February 8, 2006, Governor Ed Rendell announced his proposed budget that included the “Classrooms for the Future” initiative. Governor Rendell proposed that “by 2009, every public high school classroom used to teach the four core subjects will have an Internet-equipped laptop computer on every student’s desk … as well as … a multimedia technology unit at the teacher desk. What’s more, we will invest in professional development for Pennsylvania teachers and school leaders to teach them how to use the new technology that will boost the skills and knowledge of our students.”

My goal for the address is to talk about some of the qualities of our students’ outside-the-classroom information experiences, compelling characteristics of that native experience that may be significant catalysts for informal learning — and may be pedagogically valuable as we retool the classroom with networked, digital, abundant, and hyper-connected information.

One of the ideas that I am interested in is how assessment fits. I know that I lot of ideas have been shared about how assessment is an integral part of most video games (see this interview with James Paul Gee). But I wonder about our students’ communications. Is there any way that it is measured. I know that many of us measure our writing by hits or links-to. But do our students measure their Facebook pages? I posed that question a few days ago on Twitter and here are the answers I got.

Not a student, but it would have to be a clean yet wacky profile. Opinionated. Profile feed should not be filled with lame apps.
IMO (I’m 24) a good page is unique and answers all the important questions (status, good quotes, etc).
There’s also no real measure of “success”-not like a regular site where many hits=success
Just asked six 8th grade girls. Top answer – lots of pictures! Other answers – bumper stickers and frequently updated statuses.
From a teacher’s eyes, good student FB pages need evidence of deep personal interests BEYOND Halo and World of Warcraft!
I’d also like to see evidence of developing connections to experts or organizations in those areas of interest combined with…
evidence of early attempts to take action to learn more or to drive change in those areas of interest.
A profile that is constantly updated with engaging content because it keeps people coming back to see what you’ve added

This list was enlightening. Being teachers, most responded with rubrics. Even the 8th grade girls listed features they looked for. I guess the question I was trying to ask was,

“In maintaining a Facebook (Myspace, Beebo, etc.) presence, what do you strive to accomplish? What is your measure of success?”

It could be that I got the answer already. But I’d love more input. If you have the time and opportunity, ask some of your students.

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The How do you measure your social network? by 2¢ Worth, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

Category: education

Comments

Brandt Schneider posted the following on April 8, 2009 at 8:07 am.
Just added this as an additional blog prompt for today. Is there a Facebook rubric?
Reply to Brandt Schneider
Amy Strecker posted the following on April 8, 2009 at 10:15 am.
Agreeing with this comment, “A profile that is constantly updated with engaging content because it keeps people coming back to see what you’ve added” and expanding on it: I think a major measure of success is the feedback that you get from your Facebook audience. In the form of comments, “likes,” cross postings, etc your friends affirm the quality of your content through their interaction with it.
Reply to Amy Strecker
Karyn Romeis posted the following on April 8, 2009 at 6:01 pm.
Measure my network? I don’t. I wouldn’t presume to try. I reckon it’s an excess of trying to measure things about learning that got our education system into the mess it’s in. My network is a fluid concept. I include people who share my interests, but often they become valued as people. Then, even if our professional interests diverge, I keep them close, because I care about them as people. People. Not assets. We learn things from each other, no matter how widely we differ in our fields of endeavour.

Does that sound too idealistic? Sorry.
Reply to Karyn Romeis
Joe Wood posted the following on April 8, 2009 at 11:59 pm.
Interesting look at trying to figure out how to measure your (students) network. It’s an ever-changing dynamic and I don’t think you’d necessarily know for sure. I wrote a post that references a Nielsen study that you might find interesting http://www.joewoodonline.com/social-networking-replaces-email/
Reply to Joe Wood
Brandt Schneider posted the following on April 9, 2009 at 9:40 am.
Here is a thoughtful response from my student: http://classblogmeister.com/blog.php?blog_id=884137&mode=comment&blogger_id=248204
Reply to Brandt Schneider