social media for the social sciences

Social Media for the Social Sciences

Paul Ayres

Intute: Social Sciences

intute.ac.uk/socialsciences

Before we begin

• Open your browser tohttp://alissweb2.wordpress.com

• Open another browser tab forhttp://delicious.com/cfbloke/alissweb2

• Open your email if you can, or sign up with Google Mail or Yahoo Mail

What we will cover today

• A quick introduction to a range of Social Media technologies

• Will cover: blogs, Delicious, SlideShare, podcasts, YouTube and Twitter

• Some suggestions / examples of their use by Social Scientists, Information Professionals and Intute

• How could you use them in your work?

How we will do it

• 30 mins presentation, 30 mins hands-on• Explore the links on the blog or have a go at

the exercises• There is one exercise per service• Plus an advanced exercise for each• And a blog related exercise for each• So if you start with the blog exercise and

finish them all, you may end up with something looking a little like …

A word from my sponsor …

• Intute: Social Sciences - a guide to the best of the web for education and research

• Try intute.ac.uk/socialsciences and click on a subject of interest

• Over 30,000 high quality Internet resources, selected and evaluated by specialists

• Also produce the Virtual Training Suite - over 60 Internet research skills tutorials

Blogs – what are they

• Online diary style website• Quick and easy web publishing• Offer instant communication• Regularly updated• Require little technical knowledge• A social / networking activity• Links to other online resources• Try the Guide to Using Blogs in Economics

Blogs - potential uses

• Replacing standard class web pages• Professor-written blogs which cover interesting

developments that relate to the theme of the course• Organization of in-class discussion• Organization of intensive seminars where students

have to provide weekly summaries of the readings • Requiring students to write their own blogs as part of

their grade

Henry Farrell, Crooked Timber

Blogs – potential uses

• Writing up as you go along• Floating new or embryonic ideas• Dissemination of research results• Disseminate news and service updates• Take advantage of the “invisible college”• Engaging with the public to find out what they want• Sidestepping the mainstream media for publicity• Great potential for reflection

Blogs - exercise

• Register for an account at http://wordpress.com/

• Add a new blog post http://support.wordpress.com/posts/

• Write a few lines on how you could use blogs• On the right hand side of the Edit Post

screen, add the tag alissweb2• Publish your post

Blogs - exercise

• Chat with one of your neighbours and leave a comment on their blog

• Leave a comment or question at http://alissweb2.wordpress.com

• All of the other exercises have an optional blog related element e.g. showing your Delicious bookmarks on your blog

• You can start to add to your blog by following the rest of the exercises

Delicious – what is it

• Social Bookmarking website

• Save and store bookmarks online

• Organise them with tags or keywords

• Be social – follow other bookmarkers and send / receive links

• Alas education is an overused word http://delicious.com/tag/education

Delicious – potential uses

• Keeping the same set of bookmarks if using more than one computer

• Organise collection of resources around an agreed tag – alissweb2

• One link for related resources http://delicious.com/cfbloke/alissweb2

• Social bookmarking – develop a network and share the load

• An alternative search engine… and many more from Gabriela Grosseck

Delicious - exercise

• Go to Delicious at http://delicious.com/ and register for an account

• Add your favourite Social Sciences website to your account

• Add the tag alissweb2 when bookmarking it

• Search Delicious for alissweb2

Delicious - exercise

Advanced• Add another Delicious user to your network

http://delicious.com/help/faq#network

Blog• Add your Delicious bookmarks or the

alissweb2 bookmarks to your bloghttp://support.wordpress.com/widgets/delicious-widget/

SlideShare - what is it?

• Upload PowerPoint presentations so they are freely available online

• Easily embeddable in other services e.g. blogs • Add an mp3 soundtrack / narration and sync it with

the slides• YouTube for PowerPoint• Community features such as tags, comments,

favourites, related SlideCasts etc.http://www.slideshare.net/

SlideShare - an example

SlideShare - an example

• Initially presented to 25 people at the DEE conference in 2007

• Now viewed over over 2000 times, downloaded over 60 times, embedded in 6 other websites

• Adding an audio track makes a SlideShare much more useful, making it a SlideCast

• http://www.slideshare.net/cfbloke/the-effective-use-of-blogs-in-economics-education/

SlideShare - possible uses

• Disseminating lecture material for revision purposes• Discuss lecture material using the comments feature

to aid understanding• As a student assignment assessing virtual

presentation skills• Find other presentations on your topic - save

reinventing the wheel• Building up a body of resources over time on a

particular topic• Drawing together conference / seminar materials

using a common tag or keyword

SlideShare - exercise

• Go to SlideShare at http://www.slideshare.net/• Search for cfbloke and find this presentation• Explore the SlideCast section and find one with an

audio track

Blog• Create a new blog post and embed a SlideShare

presentation in it• Guidance on how to do it is available from:

http://support.wordpress.com/slideshows/slideshare/

Podcasts – what are they?

My definition of a podcast is …• Audio – videos are more likely to be learning

objects and vlogging does not need RSS• Regular – one audio file does not constitute a

podcast, must have a sense of regularity• Syndicated via RSS – otherwise it’s an online

audio file that has been possible for years

… other viewpoints are available!

Podcasts – potential uses

• Distance learning / self-paced learning• Advanced or supplementary material• Choice depending on learning style• Promotion of research• Topical updates related to lecture material• Replace the lecture• Student assessment and feedback• Collecting data in the field

… more from Podcasting for Learning in Universities

Podcasts – further tips

• A Bakers Dozen of Practical Podcasting Tips – less theory, more practice

• Podcasting and Audio in the Social Sciences - overview of key audio resources

• My Podcasting Life … or the Reverse Obama Effect - lessons from various podcasting experiments

• Podcasts links from Delicious - with an emphasis on podcasting in HE

Podcasts - exercise

• Go to Intute: Social Sciences http://www.intute.ac.uk/socialsciences/

• Search for podcast* and filter your results by subject• Explore some of the recommended sites and try to

find a podcast to listen toAdvanced• Go to the Podcasting for Learning in Universities

book support website at: http://www.atimod.com/podcasting/

• Click on the Podcasting Model link and explore this podcasting model

Podcasts - exercise

Blog• Create a new blog post that contains a link to

an mp3 file• Type the audio link in your blog entry as:

[audio http://linkthatendsin.mp3]• This will change the link to an embedded

audio player• More details are available from the

WordPress.com Audio support page.

YouTube – what is it?

• Number one video sharing site on the Internet, top 10 of all Internet sites

• Approx. 40% share of online video market - if it's not on YouTube, it doesn't exist?

• Ten of millions of videos are watched each and every day

• Vast majority of videos are "user generated content" - made by people like you and me

Teaching on YouTube

Not a place for learning, although we learnt a lot there"Vlogs depend upon the intimate

communication of the spoken word. Corporate videos are driven by strong images, sounds, and sentiments. This underscores how YouTube is not the level or uniform playing field people want to pretend it to be."

http://www.oculture.com/2008/04/teaching_on_youtube.html

http://www.youtube.com/mediapraxisme

A Vision of Students Today

Life beyond YouTube

• Academic Earthhttp://academicearth.org/

• TED conference http://www.ted.com/

• Open Culturehttp://www.oculture.com/

• Intute: Social Sciences search for YouTube http://www.intute.ac.uk/socialsciences/cgi-bin/search.pl?term1=youtube

YouTube – possible uses

• Distance learning• Supplementary lectures (e.g. research skills,

presentation skills)• Contextualising an issue, e.g. old news footage• Perspectives for students to examine critically (news

coverage, activist videos, TED lectures)• Screen capture (e.g. demonstrating software)• Short humour items to break up a long lecture• Student video assignment?

YouTube - exercise

• Go to YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/• Search for heaescalate and you should find a

video called There to Care• Repeat the above for the search term vision

of students today• Repeat the above for the search term

commoncraft – to get to some great videos that explain Social Media websites

YouTube - exercise

Advanced• Register for an account at

http://www.youtube.com/ and rate a video, leave a comment on it or add it as a Favourite

Blog• Create a new blog post and embed a

YouTube video in the body of the blog post• Follow the instructions from WordPress.com

on embedding YouTube videos.

Twitter - what is it?

• Asks what are you up to right now?• Limited to just 140 characters• Like the status update feature on Facebook -

and that's all• Follow people you know, those you don't,

organisations, publications• Part blog, part social networking site, and part

IM tool• http://twitter.com/

Twitter - an example

• Follow everything published from the Intute: Economics section plus blog posts

• Also follow other organisations such as the Times Higher, the Economist, HM Treasury, the FT and individual academics

• 7 things you should know about Twitter by EDUCAUSE

• http://educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7027.pdf

Twitter - possible uses

• Pointers to online resources based around a course

• Student reminders about deadlines• Breaking down barriers and getting to know

others over this "virtual water cooler"• Keeping up to date for you and students• Instant lecture feedback - are you Twittering

about this presentation?

Twitter - exercise

• Go to Twitter at http://twitter.com/ and register for an account

• Add your first Tweet (short message of 140 characters)

• Use the tag alissweb2 in your Tweet• Under Find People – try searching for Intute• Follow one of the Intute channels such as the

Intute: Economics channel at: http://twitter.com/intuteeconomics

Twitter - exercise

Advanced• Go to the Twitter Search page at:

http://search.twitter.com/advanced• Try an advanced search and filter the latest

Tweets to those that contain linksBlog• Add your Twitter feed or one of the Intute

Twitter feeds to your bloghttp://support.wordpress.com/twitter/

What’s next?

• All the links http://delicious.com/cfbloke/alissweb2

• In context in the blog http://alissweb2.wordpress.com/

• View this againhttp://www.slideshare.net/cfbloke/alissweb2

Thanks for listening

Paul Ayres

paul.ayres@bristol.ac.uk

Intute: Social Sciences

http://www.intute.ac.uk/socialsciences/

Twitter

http://twitter.com/cfbloke