Going Outside to Play: Managing Risk in the School Social Media Environment

Abstract

The use of social media in the classroom has become a major topic of pedagogical and practical interest in the educational literature of recent years. Although much of the literature addresses young people’s online behaviour in general and the risks it exposes them to in everyday life, there is far less discussion about the need to manage the risks of digital technology use in the school environment. This chapter provides a very broad overview of some of the risks you need to manage—either in your own classroom or in your school as a whole—if you choose to take your students online and use social media as part of your school-based activities. The focus is on social media in particular rather than on digital technologies in general, and raises issues in relation to the use of externally hosted service providers. The chapter focuses on ‘what’ you need to do and ‘that’ you need to do it, but also covers some of the critical elements of things, i.e., why you need to do them. The chapter discusses professional development as well as the need to provide proper support structures, suitable risk management procedures, and an informed policy environment in your school if teachers are to experiment wisely and skill up steadily so that students can derive the much-vaunted benefits of using social media in their formal educational endeavours.