Augmenting Education Using Social Media 

2017 Ryerson Learning & Teaching Conference

Ahmed Sagarwala, MDM
@amsagarwala • Session A19

Session Objectives

• Introduce administrative and automation tools to manage online interactions
• Determine use-cases for social mediums in education
• Understand affordances of open API's
• Develop a workflow for tracking and grading
• Realize potential pitfalls of managing classrooms in open social networks

quick poll

me vs. d2l

eid100

Digital Skills & Innovation for the Global Economy

• Personal branding and reputation management
• Marketing the Ryerson University brand
• Mass Self-Communication (Castells, 2007)
• Affordances of digital mediums

60%

Check social networks

80%

Google candidates

Source: CareerBuilder, 2016

Impactful Interactions

@EID100_RU

• Exam review crossword puzzle
• Announcements (no snow days!)
• Workshop polls
• Livestream notifications
• Industry updates (hacks, inventions, articles)
• Course feedback

Do our
courses
scale?

Interaction Snapshot

• 170-180 students per semester
• ~1,750-weekly modules
• 34 Project submissions (groups of 3-6)
• Exam review: 875 tweets
• Online participation criteria: ~1,000 tweets

My Lofty goal:

To not be bogged down with course administration, so the focus can be on supporting the learning experience.

buried in course admin

What would
you automate?

What burdens you?

How does it improve your user's experience?

How can you provide it to them?

Triggers & syntax

• Capture pseudonyms using a Google Form
• Standardizing submission syntax is key
• A mention @EID100_RU triggers a workflow
• #Hashtags allow for categorization
• Grading can be done on-the-go using likes♥
• Bonus marks for retweets/shares

=IF(REGEXMATCH(C198,
   "(?i)#module[0-9]{1,2}"),
 REGEXEXTRACT(lower($C198), 
   "(?i)#module[0-9]{1,2}") & " " & B198,"")

• Search tweet text to determine if it's a #module?
• Output the module and username to cell
• Search the column to capture scores for student

Spreadsheet Kung Fu

It Works! but...

• I want multiple workflows for the same applet
• I want granular control
• I want a custom response
• I want to chain actions together

API's to the rescue!

• Application Programming Interface
• Allow several disparate systems to communicate
• Documentation guides developers through the process
• No longer stuck to someone else's system
• D2L doesn't give us an API ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

the future

CUstom code

• No reliance on 3rd-party systems
• Fully customized workflows and calls
• Personalize interactions
• Student-facing dashboard for feedback
• Automate administration
• Pre-grade and share workload
• Export CSV and import to D2L