Using social media to connect with community of leaner is a relatively new field considering the recent boom of computer technology was not available until very recently in the course of human history. Humans have been enjoying and relying on the idea of community ever since the beginning. In fact most animals rely on its community to continue passing on the species. Humans, the somewhat more advanced species on earth got to develop to today’s civilization with the help of community too. People pass on the wisdoms through teaching and learning. From verbal to written lesson, and today’s online technology. I am sure in the future there could be knowledge available for download directly into your brain but now we should focus on the current era, that is the things we can do to enhance the learning in a community using online resources.

Slack

Source from: Slack websites

Hypothes.is

Source from: https://guide.pressbooks.com/chapter/hypothesis-for-webbook-annotation-comments/

 

In the course we have studied multiples tools to help online learners to learn, those tools include slack, which people can use to communicate with each other both synchronously and asynchronously by commenting and calling each other; then there is also hypothes.is, which enables students to comment and annotate over a public webpage and share within each other.  It is quite unique way of communicating for it provides members of communities an opportunity to study on one article together directly over the article, making it easy to break up the articles into desired parts and study them individually. Then I would like to discuss a bit about Twitter, where the ultimate trending is happening. Well-known people and ordinary people can tweet about anything in a limited number of words, forcing them to make their point concise and precise.

The above tools all provide the bridge between people no matter which community they identify themselves in, while each of them varies in terms of the type of communication they provide. The online courses nowadays can utilize different tool to better serve the goal of the course. For some people studying side by side is the right way to go since it provides the unparalleled advantage of just being present with each other. You immediately have a sense of community even without any communication. It would be even better if you get to make a few friends that you can rely on every time you have a question and the teacher is not available. Being online with other students requires you to know the basics of using computer and you still face the problem of loneliness if you don’t interact with classmates. If those don’t seem like a problem for you then, online courses could just be as good as face-to-face, if not better. Learners can communicate with each other pretty effortlessly because you don’t need the courage to walk to them a start a conversation. You can have as long as you want to type the words you want to say to express yourselves. If you find each other click you are always allowed to meet up in real world and hang out just like you would when you meet someone in the classroom. It is quite easy to find the right friend when you can see their profile and posts online, which in normal life you will need a long and deep conversation to find out.

At the end I want to say that full online courses are still just starting to take on its meant-to-be significant role in the learning institutions. We need to tailor each course down to each individual student to best serve their learning habits, which will take much effort but efficient if implemented.