Lately, all the teenagers seem to be highly active and addicted to the social networking app called Instagram. It is so popular that it tops the app store most popular chat all the time. In view of the prevalent photos and videos sharing community, teachers can integrate Instagram in ELT and interact with students' updates to get them interested in English and practice more with the unique format of Instagram. So English teachers who are interested in bringing a refreshing experience to their students by using Instagram in ELT, I will tell you more about how to make good use of the "InstaFever" as an ELT tool.
What is Instagram?
It is a social networking app for sharing videos and photos from a smartphone. Users have their own profile and will receive news feed of the users they have followed. They can set their account to be public or private which means only the approved subscribers can see their new posts.Users have to upload either a photo or a video together with some texts in order to create a new post. The limit of each video is 15 seconds whereas there is no word limit.
How is Instagram different from other social media platforms?
If we look at Twitter, most of the posts are text based, in which students may not be interested and feel engaged after a long period of textbook reading in school. One thing that makes Instagram stands out is that it focuses on the visual aspect. The compulsory visual cue of each post can act as a stimulus which provide spaces for people to think and imagine what words to use to describe the photo or video.
According to study from Laundry Service, Instagram is, in average, generating a higher level of interaction than any other social media platforms. In other words, Instagram users engage more in leaving "like" and comments than they would do in other platforms. Something interesting is the fact that Facebook spent $1 billion to acquire its whole online service during the second year of its operations.
Ideas to foster ELT with Instagram
1. Informal assessment for language arts
With this medium, students will feel more relaxed to create and share their own work either by posting images or videos on Instagram on a timely basis. For example, students can post a photo of the poem they wrote or a photo as a stimulus for writing a short story as the texts. Students and visitors will comment and like on the completed task. If students set their account to be public, their work may potentially reach a boarder group of readers. Teachers can then assess the work according to the quality and the public reactions.
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| Comparison of the popularity of two poems |
2. Encourage students to do poem chanting
Teachers can either treat it as an extra-curricular activity or a piece of homework by asking your students to share a performance of a piece of short poetry. For instance, poetry competition can be hosted allowing schools in different districts to gather around and share their pieces of art.
Nowadays, teenagers value their comments and reactions from social media platforms as important as from their real community.
With the latest update of Video View Count, students are motivated to attain the highest count views among classmates. The use of some interesting and unique hashtags, such as #PoemOutLoud, can help wider spread the idea and attract more visitors to comment on students' works.
3. Recommend or even create quotes
Before looking for different sources or innovating new quotes, teachers have to get followed and be friends with their students. Updating frequently with educational and inspirational quotes, teachers can gain popularity among the school community while explaining the quotes and motivating students to achieve English Learning goals during class.
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| Inspire students even with well known motivative quote |
4. Host a Slogan Competition
Meanings and Incentive can be easily changed by different use of words. A good slogan can always stay in people's mind for a long period of time or even FOREVER! Thus, teachers can launch an ELT campaign by asking students to make a slogan and post it on Instagram. The slogan with the highest number of votes will be chosen as the main tagline to widely promote the ELT campaign.
Pre-requisite -->
Be inspiring and Be interesting to go Viral on Instagram :P
5. Get a glimpse of English learning culture across the globe
English teachers can work together on Instagram by creating common hashtags, like #instaELT such that they will be able to exchange their teaching methods and understand how actually classrooms from different countries are interacting. Teachers can utilize Instagram as a powerful search engine and archive to inspire and refresh themselves with new ideas on ELT materials.
Here is the example of ELT in Hong Kong.
Here is the example of ELT in Hong Kong.
Foreseeable Drawbacks
1. Cyber Bullying
Where there are lots of encouragement from teachers to their students to share more of their poems and slogans on Instagram, there must be haters and antagonists around who are leaving mean comments and trying to bring people down. Teenagers will easily get upset from these and lose interest in learning English with teachers. But with proper mental guidance, teachers can bring them back on track while having further English communication throughout the time.
Where there are lots of encouragement from teachers to their students to share more of their poems and slogans on Instagram, there must be haters and antagonists around who are leaving mean comments and trying to bring people down. Teenagers will easily get upset from these and lose interest in learning English with teachers. But with proper mental guidance, teachers can bring them back on track while having further English communication throughout the time.
2. Social Media Addiction
After a long time of engagement on Instagram, teacher and students might fall into a trap married with Instagram. Excessive use of Instagram might cause negative influence. The compulsive behaviours include constantly checking if there are any new update, like and comment and "stalking" others' profiles for hours. Thus, teachers have to instill knowledge on proper use of Instagram while they are having English lessons with their studentsReferences
https://www.instagram.com/neatoday/
http://www.mathgametime.com/blog/2013/06/top-10-educators-using-instagram/
http://www.steamfeed.com/instagram-beats-all/
http://personalweb.about.com/od/socialmediaaddiction/a/Social-Networking-Addiction.htm
http://www.steamfeed.com/instagram-beats-all/
http://personalweb.about.com/od/socialmediaaddiction/a/Social-Networking-Addiction.htm
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