Undergraduates’ perception and engagement in Facebook learning groups

Abstract

This study presents and evaluates the educational potentials that Social Network Services (SNS) offer to students in the higher education context. The first aim of this study is to explore students’ perceptions of Facebook Learning Groups (ie, Facebook Groups that were created for learning purposes), and the learning and affective benefits that SNS offer to students. This study further explores the influence of four identified factors (ie, self‐efficacy, privacy, trust and presence of teaching members) in moderating students’ perception and learning engagements on SNS. Findings from an online survey demonstrate the usefulness of these learning groups. Trust and presence of teaching members were also indicated to have significant influences in affecting students’ perception and engagement in Facebook Learning Groups.

The Role of Existing Regulation and Discretion in Harmonising Non-Financial Disclosure

“…This indicates that there are students with strong preferences for and against social learning. This is in line with the findings of Hong and Gardner (2019), who found that junior students prefer to interact on a social media platform while more mature students prefer the LMS. The results from Question 9 confirmed that privacy was not a major concern for most students (only 5 agreed and strongly agreed) when deciding to participate in a social learning group (Hong & Gardner, 2019).…”

“…To this effect, student views about engagement within the module were obtained through a questionnaire. The questions were based on literature and were adapted from the questionnaires of Hong and Gardner (2019) and Stanley and Zhang (2018). The questionnaire, which consisted of closed-and open-ended questions, was administered to the students through a Google Form link.…”

“…These exchanges should not only be seen as learner-learner interactions, but also as learner-facilitator interactions (Deng et al, 2020). They can be formally managed by the facilitator through the creation of discussion forums within the LMS or the creation of social media groups such as a Facebook Learning Group (Hong & Gardner, 2019). Students can also create spaces themselves by building student-directed communities through informal study groups using communication platforms such as WhatsApp or Google Hangouts (Peters & Romero, 2019).…”

“…Social interaction benefits students in several ways. It increases a student's self-esteem and motivates them to do better in their studies while increasing their overall satisfaction with the university experience (Hong & Gardner, 2019).…”

Can Social Media Promote Social Presence and Attitude in Efl Classes?

“…In this respect, as well as offering a wide range of topics in terms of entertainment, being a social media tool, it can be suggested that Facebook also keeps the potential for learning and gathering information from different fields and promotes collaborative learning (Menzies, Petrie & Zarb, 2017). This can be considered as a suggestion that Facebook can be used as a complementary tool (Hong & Gardner, 2019). This is also supported in other research which suggest that Facebook enables users to discuss on a subject that they are interested in by giving them an endless space and sharing opportunity which ultimately results in supporting students in their learning and can be used for educational activities (Luke, 2019;Ware, Kern, & Warschauer, 2016).…”