Vicki Davis has written another excellent article “Robert Scoble has too many friends” about Social Networking. I have left her a comment on that post.

I have been witnessing my daughter’s use, as a college freshman, of Facebook. I am thankful that she has added me as a friend and allows me a little insight into her social networking.

It has been incredible to witness how she is communicating with friends and acquaintances and navigating college life.
Before the first day in August, she already knew most students who would be sitting in class with her. I was amazed at the speed that news traveled about who was taking which class and which professor at what time last week, when spring registration started last week.

I see kids encouraging each other in their classes, reminding themselves of deadlines and term papers, giving leads about job applications, etc.

An “overachiever” in one of her classes has created a facebook group in order to upload and share his class notes

My daughter has stayed in touch with her friends who went on to different colleges across the country and are planning reunions during the semester break when they come home for the holidays.

I agree with you that the “good little boys and girls” who do not use Social Network places will be left out of the conversation.

So not only will the ones, not on Facebook and MySpace, be left out of the conversation, not meet, be in the loop, and get to know the they rest of the gang (networking part), they will also not know about the “social” part. Who is hanging out with whom? When is everybody meeting and where? These questions are not that different than the for the students from twenty years ago, but where they go to get their answers has surely changed.

Since I teach at an elementary school level, my thoughts turn as always to the younger crowd.

Although High Schoolers are migrating towards Facebook , which seems more geared towards College Students and Graduates, my guess is that the majority of elementary school students are not found on Facebook . They are running to create their pages on MySpace as moths gravitate toward the light. Some of them are doing this on their own, while others are signing up with the help and consent of their parents. Now, we are talking about kids between the ages of 10-13. Officially you are supposed to be 14 to be able to create an account with MySpace.

It is one of those instances, where you know that the children are going to “do it anyway”, no matter what the rules are. The best approach, in my opinion, is yo teach them to be safe in any social network environment. So the next best thing would be, since we can’t (and wouldn’t) all sign-up for MySpace accounts and hang out there, is to create our own Social Network site, where these younger students can try out their wings in a safe and controlled environment.

I have created a Ning site for our school and would really like to work with the 4th-6th graders. Thanks to an blog post from Steve Hagardonm, I e-mailed the people from Ning and requested to have the ads removed from the site. Within a few hours I received an e-mail from the Ning team granting my request. Thank you!!

Now I am a little stumped. How will I proceed? Do I create usernames for ALL the 4th-6th graders? Do I pilot this at our school with just a few volunteer students, as an after school activities? Should I have a parent assembly first in order to speak to them about Social Network sites that their children are already or are going to be confronted and involved in in the near future? What will be the best approach? The majority of our parent community is afraid of, does not know or understands social networking technology. They seem to pretend it is not there or flat our prohibit the use of it by their children. I know they will be a hard case to work on in order to make them understand that we need to prepare their children for a different networking world than they grew up with.

I know that a few of you have already ventured into the Social Network arena with elementary school students. I would appreciate any insight and advice. What are your thoughts on helping our younger students grow / ease into the world of MySpace and Facebook type of networks?

Posted: 8. December, 2007 at 9:28 am. Filed under: Uncategorized.
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