Social networking sites in the classroom: Unveiling new roles for teachers and new approaches to online course design

Abstract

Web 2.0 tools in general and social networking sites in particular are very popular today in everyday life. However, their use in education has not been explored. This paper reports the findings of the implementation of a web 2.0 tool namely a social networking site as a web support for a face-to-face course. The findings show that the implementation of a web-based environment in a face-to-face course can be viewed from 5 different managerial areas: (1) logistics management, (2) information/knowledge management, (3) communication management, (4) class work extension management and (5) web-based environment easiness of accessibility. The conclusions of the study show that the implementation of the web-based environment unveils new roles for teachers and new approaches to design online or blended courses.