How to Make eLearning Work with Facebook Groups
People with similar interests can communicate with one another through Facebook Groups. You can form a group for anything: sports organizations, a reading club or a family get-together for example.
In April 2019, Facebook Groups announced a social learning tool that allows any group administrator to format information into structured units, allowing them to create and deliver courses to members.
The Pros and Cons of Using Facebook Groups for E-Learning
Pros:
- It's free
- We don't need to provide special access or login information and passwords because everyone has a Facebook profile or has access to one.
- Facebook mentorship choices, for example, it allow us to assist women with accountability within the group, which is spurred by Facebook mentorship options.
- We can use Facebook live or pre-recorded videos to arrange our learning materials and distribution, as well as uploading pdfs, files, word documents, and excel spreadsheets to aid in the learning process.
- Members can have up to 50 individuals on an audio or video conference using the chat options, which allow groups to have up to 250 person sub-chat rooms.
- You can use a bot to help with communication and course delivery. You can even sell courses using Facebook group.
- Facebook groups can also be a great place to connect with other students who are studying for a standardized exam, such as a Facebook group for MCAT prep.
Cons:
- Concerns about privacy. Some kids may be concerned about the site's sharing of personal information.
- Free implies that Facebook controls the platform and has the authority to remove anything at any moment.
- It has a limited feature set. A robust learning management system is needed for training programs.
- Social media can be a time suck. Anyone with a Facebook account understands that what was supposed to be a quick glance at friends' activities can quickly turn into an hour-long journey down the rabbit hole.
- It can take a long time to regulate.
So how to make eLearning work with Facebook Groups?
1. Project-Based Groups
Facebook Groups are great for forming teams and keeping them in touch on a regular basis for both small and major things. Online students don't have to worry about sharing their ideas with everyone; instead, they can choose a few like-minded friends. There are three levels of privacy on Facebook: open, closed, and secret.
2. Choosing Facebook’s group name
The first thing people notice is the name of your Facebook group. As a result, make sure you choose a name for your learners that is straightforward, distinctive, and easy to remember.
You have various options when it comes to naming your group:
- Your company's name
- The title of your course
- Your company's name AND the title of your course
- The title of your course AND your full name
3. Change the group's settings
Start by choosing 'Social Learning' from the list of group types and providing a facebook group description.
You get some amazing extra features with Social Learning that you don't get with normal Facebook groups.
After you save, you'll be taken back to the main page of your group. More group options can be edited under the '... More' tab.
You can also connect your group to your Facebook page (good for seeing your group insights and allowing an assistant to moderate the group on your behalf).
4. Create Units For Your Social Learning Group
Start by selecting Unit Settings from the Units menu item (located on the left-hand side of the desktop). We recommend making Units the default landing tab when you offer your students their personalized URL so that they land there first.
Create your first unit right now. You might begin with the one that covers regulations and housekeeping so that your new students are prepared.
5. Add Facebook Group Posts with Content
You'll need to fill a Unit with content after you've constructed it. You create this, in the same manner, you would any other Facebook post (video, text, links, photographs, etc. ), with the addition of a Quiz option in Units.
And whether it’s a funny meme or an inspirational video, Facebook Groups offers a forum for tutors and online learners to deposit morale-boosting media. What’s more, the sense of inclusion and community within the group can work wonders for worker satisfaction.
You can also attach content to Units directly from Discussion posts. For example, after delivering a livestream, we frequently add it to a relevant Unit.
6. Create a video-based pinned 'Welcome' post.
Welcome post for facebook group is important for the new members who join your group. With your welcome video, thank your students for joining and informing them that they've landed at the right place. You can even use a live stream to deliver your greeting and then pin the post in your group. Tell them where they may access the information to direct them to the learning units.
7. Participation and Online Presence
Data collected by EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Research, sampling 36,950 students from 126 U.S. universities, showed that 97% of students who use Facebook reported actively engaging on the site daily (Smith & Caruso, 2010).
Instructors of asynchronous online courses could tap into this pre-established daily interaction and apply continuous and consistent exposure to their content by implementing discussion boards in a Facebook group.
Posts and comments made by instructors and student peers are seen every time a student visits their Facebook, with the option of also receiving an immediate notification on their phone after a comment is posted.
This results in the students being involved in the discussions and reviewing content more often throughout the day or week.
Students who would normally only log into their Blackboard course a few times per week to intentionally check discussion boards can now be connected with the course every time they pick up their phone or tablet.
Instructors could also encourage students to use the "like" feature to acknowledge they've read an announcement or to show agreement with a comment.
8. Get Feedback & Testimonials
To improve your course, you'll need to seek feedback. This can be easily added to the relevant Units section and sent as a request.
Because not everyone will be able to see what's in the group, email reminders are a great way to ensure no one is forgotten.
- Make it a rule to tag one or two members as they graduate, or make it a rule to tag each student as they finish the course.
- Share a poll or survey link in the group at regular intervals.
Your request for feedback will not receive a response from every member of the group. Remember that you can directly message people with inquiries and receive comments this way.
Request permission to use positive testimonials and comments on your sites and emails. You have a fantastic opportunity to advertise to your pupils.
Send learning materials to your Facebook group members’ email directly
So far we have seen how to make learning easier through the Facebook group with the Unit feature.
However, you can also send the courses and learning materials to your group members email directly.
It may be a question that how to get the members emails? Yes, it’s easy. We have a detailed guideline of this on the article titled How To Collect Unlimited Leads From Facebook Group
You can also send the emails to your Facebook group members using different email marketing autoresponders.