Online Mini Course Focuses on Social Media for STEM Educators

  • By Kevin Hudson
  • 06/25/13

Science, technology, engineering, and math teachers who are seeking instruction in how to use social media in their teaching can now enroll in a free, online mini-course offered by the New Media Consortium.

The mini-course, which opened for enrollment this week as part of the ISTE 2013 conference in San Antonio, TX, is called Applications of Social Media for STEMx Teaching and will take place in a Facebook community page, which features albums containing slideshows of relevant learning resources and videos to help participants with a series of four activities, including:

  • Review three social media platforms and create a concept visualization that outlines the features of these platforms that you would like to use;
  • Of the three social platforms reviewed, select one and create a test account/page/community for experimentation;
  • Review the social media (test account/page/community) you created and showcase (via a format of your choice) a few ways to integrate ideas or concepts from this tool for implementation into your environment; and
  • Draft a comprehensive social media strategy for your STEMx environment.

Samantha Adams Becker, NMC senior director of communications, and Holly Ludgate, NMC senior director of program development, will lead the mini-course.

"We are incredibly excited for this opportunity to curate and share content with STEMx educators from around the world about the benefits of social media," said Ludgate in a release. "This mini-course embodies the essence of social media and open content by giving access to any interested educators wanting free professional develop in this emerging field."

The course is offered through the HP Catalyst Academy, a federated network of mini-courses designed for STEMx education professionals who are seeking professional development. The HP Catalyst Academy is a partnership between HP's Office of Sustainability and Social Innovation, the NMC, and the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE).

About the Author

Kevin Hudson is a freelance journalist based in Portland, Oregon. He can be reached at [email protected].

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