Thou shall not try to speak in the Facebook language: Students' perspectives regarding using Facebook for chemistry learning

Abstract

Facebook is the most commonly used Social Network Site (SNS) in the world. In this paper we explore students' attitudes towards the use of SNSs as a platform for learning chemistry and provide recommendations based on students' preferences regarding what should be done in the Facebook groups and what the teachers should not do (Thou shall nots) in an educational Facebook group with their students. We evaluated the extent to which students use SNSs in general and their attitudes toward the presence of a medium for learning chemistry in their SNS in particular. We found that the active Facebook groups for learning chemistry are perceived overall as a contributing experience for students' learning, and there was a positive correlation between the chemistry learning activity in the groups and the attitudes of students toward using Facebook groups for learning chemistry. Both parameters have gradually increased over the two-year study period.