Masterclass - Ace the Stock Market By - Ms Rishita Motwani
Register Now

Importance of Social Cohesion, Social Networking and Interaction for Education

What do you think is the importance of Interacting with people of Similar Personalities such as yourself and that of those who have viewpoints entirely different from us? Is it a beneficial or quarrelsome rising issue?

Interacting with others is the Master key to Living Life. Knowing it better leads to a Happy Life and helps in Achieving your Goals.

“Engage, Enlighten, Encourage and especially… Just be yourself! Social media is a community effort and Everyone is an asset” – Susan Cooper.

“Social Networks represent the Digital Reflection of what Humans do, We Connect and Share” by Jeremiah Owyang, Partner at Altimeter group.

 Networking is the path to building a successful career and the food for a prosperous business. Social media successfully allows us to communicate and form relationships, access and spread information, and arrive at the best decision timely and efficiently.

Scholars also say that the building of social networks contributes to an enhanced sense of community and commitment towards work and each other in a favorable educational environment.

Let’s do some talking about Social Cohesion

Several studies show that the creation of a proper social environment and proper social integration has a positive or good impact on student’s success if learning environments are Conducive and promote Social Cohesion. Enhanced social cohesion, in turn, improves communication between members, coming from different backgrounds and helping everyone achieve their individual goals succeeding together united as a whole.

Social Cohesion, if explored from an economic perspective, among people of a country leads to the development of social capital in the country which escalates the parameter of the country’s Economic Performance.

Moiseyenko (2005) states that Reciprocity and Trustworthiness are indeed at the basis of social cohesion, and higher education is in a privileged position to achieve this goal.

“Education has a positive influence on the capability of a country to become more socially cohesive.” by K.D. DAMMERS(2008) 

 Concisely this can be understood that a sense of shared identity or belonging to a particular community brings with it a feeling of responsibility among individuals for the overall growth of that society. Attachment to living place shared norms and values, style of living leads to social networking at different levels in the neighborhood, within cities of a state and at the national level. Building up a strong civil society and reducing wealth disparities are added advantages of social cohesion.

Schools play a vital role in ensuring the socialization of students through common experiences and learning. But are schools and educational institutions across the country enough?

Are Online Social Networking and Interaction for Education beneficial to our existing Educational network? What if we combine both of them and work?

In my opinion, this combination would become another powerful tool for interaction, sharing information and acquiring meaningful knowledge and training yourself with skills of your choice. Harnessing the scope of social networking for education will allow free flow of content, information and ideas between people belonging to different communities and promote online collaboration between students and teachers from different countries, encouraging them to open up and freely have fundamental discussions leading to innovations. In other words, when people from two corners of the world interact, search and research on a particular problem or topic lead to developments in the human world; this causes worldwide revolutions which provides support to mankind in their developments helping them flourish and live a better life.

Have you heard about Affinity’s Space Theory by James Paul Gee (2004) suggests, “Affinity spaces instantiate participation, collaboration, distribution, and dispersion of expertise and relatedness. Registered users share and search for knowledge which contributes to informal learning.” 

While everyone’s or organization’s motive of using social networks can be different, it is possible to benefit from all types of Social Networking for education whether it is traditional or remote, formal or informal. Informal and Formal learning are ways of interaction for education. Communities or people interested and believing in the same ideology come together and share information with each other on a smaller scale on a regular basis whereas Formal learning is made up of parameters that test your performance  and maintain a record of it for further upscaling and promotions in institutions or educational platforms. Setting up Online Affinity spaces and joining them with current Offline spaces can have a significant role in blending the native framework with a new form of competitive technology with built-in applications, productive tools, and time-saving solutions.

Social media eLearning platforms promote Connected Learning and building of Collective Intelligence

In today’s era, where brilliant minds are full of questions, curiosity and are eager to explore beyond their reach, The Online World unlatches the bolt to unhindered ‘ Universal access to all knowledge and Information’ at their fingertips.

Channeling their energy in the right direction is prerequisite at this age. If the emerging ideas are given positive feedback, appreciated, and given a chance to experiment will lead to outcomes as never before. 

So Why not give them Something Worthwhile to work and spend their time productively, learning and enhancing their knowledge, skills and bring face to face with their authentic self? Realizing your potentials and practice of setting up goals from an early age instills a sense of responsibility and commitment towards their work. In case their thoughts get sidetracked and online actions have not kept a check on , they vary from the desired which has a negative influence on their growth and development.

Online  World offers a myriad of educational opportunities that helps in the formation of groups for Interconnected learning and the coming together of people with diversified mindsets. Except this, these eLearning platforms also “taps the opportunities provided by digital media to more easily link home, school, community and peer contexts of learning; support peer and intergenerational connections based on shared interests; and create more connections with non-dominant youth, drawing from capacities of diverse communities” (Ito et al., 2013)

Learning beyond borders has resulted in increased standards of education by collecting and magnifying our knowledge base and enhancing our skillsets by the hands of masters resulting in widespread useful and purposeful education.

Social platforms have the ability to keep people connected from every part of the world and ensure proper transmission of information,  free flow of facts and figures, photos and videos, ideas, content, and so on. As a matter of fact, every sort of data, matter, or information manifested on it that goes viral is questioned, validity tested, discussed, repercussions explored and predicted, manipulated and even has contradictory viewpoints of different people in the same context.

With the passage of time more and more social networking sites (SNSs) are emerging online making it easier to use, navigate and connect with the outside world. Their usage does not require a lot of knowledge and experience about working on the internet because of the ingrained format and pre-installed applications with various supporting tools making it simpler to operate and work with and the process for accessing and working remains similar for each and everyone on that particular platform worldwide.

Social Interaction not only helps to connect with people whether, for business, education, or commercial purposes, it also eases out the awkwardness and makes the process of making friends easier, and enhances the experience of learning together. Not only this, it helps reawaken old friends and find long-lost relatives.

Motivating students and giving them the right kind of atmosphere to nurture and interact on SNSs allow two-way transfer of education, bring teachers and institutes in limelight and help to develop positive attributes in students and higher acceptance of new and non-self. However, augmented reality supported digitalization and digital literacy has their own pros and cons.

On such platforms, with hidden identities, millions or even billions of individuals are present from all ages. In real life, dangerous and malicious people exist. To avoid risks and threats they pose To social networking environments proper security measures should be taken into account.

The use of social networks informal learning environments remains lower than in informal learning (Chen and Bryer, 2012). Examples of the use of social networking sites formally are the pages that educational institutions create on digital media which contains information about the institution’s whereabouts, their academic records, and for sharing important announcements like vacancies available, updated news etc. Another example is of educational course management through eLearning platforms.

Both formal and informal platforms are not safe due to practices like fake and theft of accounts, social malware, phishing, similar name fraud, mobile applications and cyberbullying and cyber hacking. It is suggested that we use Institutional platforms for conducting examinations and secure connections for sharing confidential information.

” Educational Networking” ,a term we are now well familiar with, is in frequent use nowadays. Educators and advocates all over India believe that –  The New Digital Literacy will promote the development of knowledge, transferable, technical and social skills of value required in formal and informal learning.

More we get involved in the Participatory and Ecological culture of social services on eLearning platforms we tend to become competent with the outsiders in terms of knowledge and skills. This happens because we have access to sources beyond the limits of our educational institutions. We become better managers, confident and successful individuals possessing enriched and fluent interpersonal communication skills. 

What are your views on the above statements? Am I right?

Regarding academic career and performance and achievement quotient, all I can acknowledge is that it varies from student to student i.e. how they deal with the subject content matter and how they accomplish or finish tasks on time assigned to them by their teachers.

Some other benefits of social networking sites are development of creativity, collaborations for educands, building up professional networks, free advertisement and ease of communication. No issued or prescribed syllabus, vast pool of knowledge and skills to choose from, plenty of time in hand to dive deep in and learn at one’s own potential and risk is a supreme attribute or quality of educational networking. Actively participating in online activities makes you sharp, clear and well defined as well.

Meanwhile, finding good friends and forming everlasting relationships through social media is like receiving a present for a lifetime. Networking, sharing and friendships beyond boundaries instills in us not only the concept of helping others time and again but also teaches us how to cherish a helping hand offered to you in return in times of need. Promoting global issues and partnership at global levels also is an outcome of intelligent networking.

Some demerits regarding social cohesion include lack of concentration among students due to time to time distractions on social networking sites, negligence in learning and retaining information due to easy access through the internet and features available to correct grammar and spellings. Indulgence beyond a required extent in the virtual world has its own harmful effects and you start getting used to public attention and false manifestations.

Most detrimental or deleterious effect on an individual’s life takes place when an invasion of privacy occurs. People share important and classified information, interests and plans to be executed, work related documents, ongoing activities in their life through such platforms. Their real-life records get stored within these sites and get reflected to others while communicating through them. In lack of appropriate safety measures, leak of information takes place resulting in data and money loss related issues and public disclosure of private facts leads to personal harm as well. Implementing tighter security controls against cyber threats is necessary to safeguard confidential and intellectual properties as well as shield your personal interests from strangers and the unknown.

I would like to conclude by saying – An envisioned approach and balanced use of Educational Networking is required to make the most of it. Students and teachers have already started to look outside the walls of classrooms and have shifted to virtual workspaces to meet the exceeding educational demands of their students. It’s our responsibility to protect their hard work and keep their personal life different from their professional life.

How useful was this post?

Click on a star to rate it!

Average rating 4.5 / 5. Vote count: 6

No votes so far! Be the first to rate this post.

Inform Your Friend Too
Share on facebook
Share on twitter
Share on linkedin
Share on whatsapp
Share on pinterest
Neha Sardana

Neha Sardana

Neha Sardana, has completed her M.Tech. in Nanotechnology (Majors) and Biotechnology (Minors) from the Centre for Converging Technologies, University of Rajasthan, Jaipur. She has taken research projects in the same discipline during her tenure at college as well as her final internship, at the Institute of Nanoscience and Technology, Mohali. Her research work has always been related to nano-therapeutics and synthesizing nano-drug delivery systems. She has also worked in MNIT Jaipur as a research intern. She wants to be an integral part of nanoscience and bio-medicine carried out within any organization. Content writing and editing is an important part of writing review and research papers. You have to be well versed, creative and know-how and what to write. SkillsRediscovery is helping me to upgrade my writing skills and also providing me this opportunity to learn new and write blogs regarding this context and much more.
Specially Recommended Blogs For You