Facebook in Class: The Instructor's Influence on Engagement and Language Play in Online Social Media Forums

Abstract

Social media engagement strategies are deliberate, collaborative, and dynamic attempts to persuade participation. In the educational context, added participation emanating from instructor-led engagement strategies may increase opportunity for language practice and consequential language acquisition, altogether offsetting negative consequences from passive online student behavior. This study attempts to understand how engagement strategies influence social media participation. A between-samples research design was implemented to compare participation between an English as a foreign language (EFL) class Facebook group with instructor-led social media engagement strategies (n=24) to a comparison group without the instructor’s presence (n=26). Social media participation metrics included entry count, words per entry, comment count, words per comment, and use of language play elements, including emojis, pauses (...), and exclamations (!!!) per 100 words. Language play through social media text entails colloquialisms, emojis, pauses, and acronyms to elicit emotion and dialogue from others, therefore considered a valuable participation metric. Findings show that both designs are conducive to pragmatic training and second language (L2) writing practice, yet, instructor-interactions led to sharp increases in comments, words per comment, and use of language play. With instructor-led engagement strategies, students increased their opportunity for language practice and developed a sense of community in the form of more extended dialogues. Further, educators learn new methods in implementing social media in the classroom. The current results lead to positive outcomes in online, distance, and blended learning environments, showing that the instructor's strategic participation produces more meaningful discussions, and consequently, active learning among students.