10 Effective Ways To Engage Pupils Through Facebook

Facebook is the most popular social network in the world.  People of all ages love using it to connect with friends and share experiences.  As the site gets more and more popular, the uses of it are widening; it is in fact, becoming a fantastic learning tool.  My students love Facebook, so I wanted to find ways to tap in to this to engage them in learning.

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Here’s 10 ways to use Facebook in the classroom:

1) Use it to begin a biography of a historical character. I made a printable template which you can download here: Facebook profile . Here is an example my students did when studying World War 2:

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2) Ask your students to do status updates of historical events. ‘Fakebook‘ is a brilliant, free tool to do this. Here is a video tutorial on how to use the website:

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3) Facebook supports work on character description brilliantly. Imagine a fictional character’s Facebook page and what it would look like. Ask your pupils:

What would the character look like in their profile picture?
Who would their friends be?
What would they write on their timelines?
What would their ‘about’ section have in it?
What pages/posts would they like?

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4) Use Facebook to explain and then create timelines. A fan page could be created for an event/country etc. and a timeline of events could be made. Here is an example of part of a timeline for Titanic:

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5) In PSHE lessons, use Facebook to help pupils explore feelings and friendships. An example would be to play a ‘reactions game’ where children say how they would feel in different scenarios.

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6) Go live on school trip or event. This is such a great opportunity for speaking and listening. After the trip, students could share their videos and evaluate a partners’ video.

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7) Review books or other items on Facebook. This is great for giving pupils a real audience and purpose to write.

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8) Encourage your class to create a class group in which resources can be shared and support and discussion can happen with ease.

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9) Ask your students to research using the Facebook search function. There is some great content but also a lot of opinion. What a fantastic opportunity to discuss reliable sources!

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10) Signpost to your students, educational games that can be played through Facebook. Click here for a great list. The competitive edge that social media creates will motivate your students. Why not have a class competition?

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Have you got any ideas for how Facebook could be used in the classroom? Comment below with your thoughts.