TECHNOLOGY FOR TEACHING AND LEARNING IN THE ELEMENTARY GRADES

TOPIC 8: Facebook

Facebook first announced Community Pages as a feature designed to address all the fan pages set
up around generic, non-business topics.

Facebook wanted to differentiate between bona fide Official Facebook Pages (fan pages for
businesses) and what they now call Community Pages. In Facebook’s words:

“Community Pages are a new type of Facebook Page dedicated to a topic or

experience that is owned collectively by the community connected to it. Just like
Official Pages for businesses, organizations and public figures, Community Pages
let you connect with others who share similar interests and experiences.”

Facebook Business Pages Vs. Community Pages

On first pass, the concept of Community Pages seems like a great solution to create a clear
delineation between 1) Official Pages (Facebook’s term for business fan pages)—administered and
controlled by company representatives and 2) all the fan pages created around an idea or topic.

The example Facebook uses in their blog announcement is for cooking. So, the Cooking
Community Page could prove to be a helpful source of information on a topic you’re passionate about
(although you could just as easily find the information directly on Wikipedia!) and/or a great networking
resource to identify and reach out to people who share your passion for cooking.

(Interestingly enough, when doing a search for the same Cooking Community Page Facebook
profiled in their blog announcement, I couldn’t find it using their internal search facility. I waded
through pages and pages of search results and in the end just went to Google and entered “facebook
cooking community page” (not in quotes) and the Community Page came up second!)
 This is an example of a a community page

Two Types of Community Pages

One of the many factors causing much confusion around these Community Pages is the fact
that there are TWO types of Community Pages: Facebook-administered and user-administered.

I’ll go into more detail about each below, but in a nutshell, Facebook-administered are all the
auto-generated Community Pages. User-administered are Community Pages you can set up yourself that
essentially look identical to fan pages (Official Pages), but you create them for a topic, not your business.

Facebook-administered Community Pages

Let’s tackle Facebook-administered first, as that’s what Facebook actually announced on April 19,
2010 on their blog.

Facebook automatically created 6.5 million Community Pages in mid-April. These pages were
auto-generated from users’ “Likes and Interests” and “Work and Education” sections of the personal
profile Info tab.
 Here’s an example of an auto-generated page

Given that these Community Pages were auto-generated, anything separated by commas
produced a Community Page with those keywords/phrases as the title. So there are thousands of such
pages, many of which have only one or two fans (people who Like that page).

Where Does the Content Come From?

Depending on the subject matter of each Community Page, content (including the Page photo)
gets automatically pulled in from Wikipedia. All other content is auto-populated from wall posts and
status updates made by any Facebook user containing the keywords of the Community Page.

This is where the nightmare begins for many businesses, schools and more. There are no
administrators (yet) for Community Pages and you have zero control over what shows up on the page.

Here are the Official Fan Pages of SeaWorld Florida and SeaWorld San Diego. And, here are just three
Community Pages for SeaWorld, out of hundreds. (The first two have a tab and image pulled from
Wikipedia. The third has the Wikipedia tab but no image. There are many of these Community Pages
without images).

By the way, community pages have a tab called “Related Posts.” In the below screen shot, the “Related
Posts by Friends” includes any related updates from friends OR related fan pages you have joined (liked).
Try clicking on the SeaWorld Community Page.
User-administered Community Pages

Let’s talk about the second type of Community Pages—ones you create yourself. If you have an
idea for a Community Page, setting one up is very easy. Just go to the same Create a Page section as
before, and you’ll now see a second choice on the right (see screenshot below).

When creating an Official (fan) Page, you need to first give thought to the category/subcategory
and page name, as neither can be changed after the fact. You also need to confirm you are an official
representative and have permission to create the page.

But, creating a Community Page is super-easy—give your page a name, and voila! No category to
choose, no need to verify you’re the official company rep.
 Now, initially, your new Community Page will look, feel and function exactly the same as an
Official Page. The big challenge, though, is if your Community Page becomes “very popular;” that is,
“attracting thousand of fans.” As Facebook says, you will lose all admin rights and your Community Page
will automatically be converted into a Facebook-administered, Wikipedia-type Community Page.

Rather ironically, when my coauthor and I were attempting to set up an Official fan page for our
new book Facebook Marketing: An Hour A Day, we could not get past the first stage, as Facebook does
not allow their name in page titles. So, as a workaround, we were actually able to set up a Community
Page and got the name we wanted with no problem. So, for the moment, our user-administered
Community Page looks identical to an Official Page. But eventually (according to the current terms), we
could lose admin rights should the page gather thousands of fans!

How to Use Facebook Groups for Your Online Course Platform

Delivering your online course content doesn't have to require specialist platforms or complicated
plugins. You can deliver your online course using Facebook Groups!

The Pros and Cons of Using Facebook Groups for Your Online Course Platform

Pros:

 It's free (for now)!

 It's easy to set up, add and move things around
 It's an intuitive structure (nothing complicated)
 Lots of people already on Facebook
 It has the community aspect built-in and people are used to commenting
 It allows for live streaming directly in the group (and then add to course)

Cons:

 Free means that Facebook owns the platform and can pull anything at any time
 It has limited functionality
 You have to manually approve requests after-sale or opt-in
 You have to moderate (which is not good if you don't want a brand community)
 Not everyone likes or wants to be on Facebook
If you've decided that the pros far outweigh the cons, this step by step guide (combined with my
video demo above) will help you deliver the best possible learning experience with Facebook.

Step 1: Create a Social Learning Group

From the menu tabs across the top of your profile, select Create and from the drop-down menu
choose Group

Create a Facebook Group

Name Your Course and Set Privacy

You will see a pop-up box where you can name your group, and select the privacy option as
‘Closed'. Your group should be closed so that only members can see the content. If the group is
public, everyone will be able to see your content, even if they're not a member.
Selecting ‘Pin to Shortcuts' on the bottom left will give you easy access to your group by placing
a shortcut in the left-hand menu of your page.
Name and Create Your Closed Group

When choosing a name for your group you have several options.

 Your business name

 Your course name
 Your business name AND your course name
 Your course name AND your name

When you choose the name make it easy for your new students to remember.
Edit Group Settings
Start with selecting ‘Social Learning‘ from the group type options and fill in your group
description.

Social Learning gives you some cool added features that are not available in regular Facebook
groups. More on that in a moment.
Click save, and then you'll return to your group's main page. Here under the ‘… More' tab you
can find more group settings to edit.

Edit group settings

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), choose a color for mobile
(arrow 1), and customize the URL that you can then easily share with people (arrow 2)
Important: You'll need to add the Social Learning Units section before you can set up your
course content (arrow 3)
Finally, make sure only admins can add group members (not other members (arrow 4)) and set
up some questions to ask people when they request to join (arrow 5)
Questions you might ask include:

 What email address did you use when you made your payment?
 Do you promise to abide by the group rules?
 What's the password?

If you send a secret password when someone purchases your course, asking for it in the group
questions can make them check their email again and whitelist your email address. They won't
want to miss out on a thing that you send!
Don't allow other Pages to join (you want real people's names) and you want them to get group
notifications.
Allow any member of the group to post (arrow 7). If you have to approve every interaction then
engagement will be stifled and hard to encourage. When you define your group's rules, the next
step is to trust that they will abide by them and not overdo the moderation.
Remember to add your branded Facebook group cover graphic. The size for this is currently
1640 x 856 px
You can easily create a cover image in Canva and use ‘custom dimensions' to set the size first.
Here's the image I created in about 5 minutes using a Canva template, changing the background
image, and editing the text:

You can even add a link to other information, such as the course sales page, in the description of
the image. So if someone isn't a student and arrives at your group, they can click on the image
and see a link to the sales page.

Step 2: Add & Organize Your Course Content

Edit Unit Settings
When you click on the Units menu item (left-hand side on desktop), you'll see an option for Unit
Settings, so start there.
I suggest making Units the default landing tab, so that when you give your students your custom
url, they'll land there first.
Edit unit settings

Create Units For Your Social Learning Group

Now create your first unit. You can make your first one that contains rules and housekeeping, so
your new course members know what to expect.
Add Content Posts to Your Facebook Group
Once you've added a Unit, you need to add your content into it. You do this the same way you
create any post on Facebook (video, text, links, images, etc), there's even an additional Quiz
option in Units.
Add Post Content from Discussions
You can also add content directly from your Discussion posts into Units. For example, after we
deliver a livestream, we often add that to a related Unit.
 Add Post to
Unit

Organize Your Content and Units

Continue adding in your content and moving it into units. Remember these don't have to be huge,
they can be each step that you're teaching your students and the resources they need to complete
the related activities.
Organize and reorder posts in units

If you don't put the units in the correct order, or you suddenly remember something you can re-
order your units as you can see from the screenshots.
Move units up and down

We found it beneficial to name our units Day 1, Day 2 etc. You might prefer to number them, or
call them step one, step two… Or Module one.
Whatever naming convention you choose make sure it's intuitive for your customers to follow.
Create a Pinned ‘Welcome' Post with Video
Your welcome video should thank your students for joining and reassure them that they're in the
right place. If you prefer, you can deliver your welcome via a live stream and then pin it. Guide
them towards the learning units by telling them where they can access the content.
Welcome video

Step 3: Add Students

Direct your students to your Facebook social learning group by including the link in your first
post-sale email. Follow up with a 24 hour reminder in case the person orders late, or misses the
first email.
Facebook will notify you that you have new members. Manually check and approve your
members. If you want to save the responses, you need to screenshot the answers and save them
to a folder on your desktop.
Step 4: Encourage Interaction and Success
Welcome new students regularly. If your course is selling well you may have to welcome
students two or three times a day.

Welcome new
members

We encourage members of the 10-Day Online Course Challenge to respond to our welcome by
leaving us a gif comment. This is fun, and gets your members engaging in your community.
You'll find as your group starts to thrive, you'll need to moderate daily. You'll also have
questions to answer, and people you'll want to tag.

 Encourage new members to introduce themselves and state if they would like an accountability
partner.
 If you're an international group you will want to ask them to add their time zone.
 Praise & shout outs will help your members get to the next stage. You can use phrases like
“Congratulations” and “You've got this” and Facebook adds balloons and other encouraging
visuals.

As well as your course content, you will keep the group fresh by adding videos, articles from
your blog, resource suggestions and examples of good practice.
You can add events to remind your members to attend live training or special “hotseats”. Our
experience has indicated individual events are better understood than having one event with all
the dates and times.
Remember to add time zones for your events. Not everyone will be on your time zone, and not
everyone will check with Date And Time. Make it as easy as possible for your members to see
the event and their timezone.

Step 5: Get Feedback & Testimonials

You will need to ask for feedback to improve your course. This is easily added as a request in the
relevant Units section and in emails. Remember not everyone will see what's in the group, so
email reminders are a good way of ensuring no student gets left behind.

 Post a poll or survey link at regular intervals in the group.

 Tag one or two members when they graduate or make it a rule that you will tag each student as
they complete the course.

Not all members of the group will reply to your feedback request in the group. Remember you
can message people directly with questions and gain feedback this way.
Ask permission to share positive feedback and testimonials on sales pages and emails. This is a
great opportunity for you to promote your students.
Finally, you can take it to the next level by inviting your course graduates to complete an
interview that you'll publish on your blog. This gives them a great opportunity to talk about their
experience, and you can link back to their website and highlight their success.

Best Practices for Your Social Learning Facebook Group

 Don't make it your only course platform! Move to a dedicated course solution as soon as
possible.
 Welcome and moderate your group on a daily basis.
 Livestream to stoke up engagement and answer questions
 You can make this an entry-level ‘free' version and upsell to a paid on platform like Teachable.

APPLICATION

Form groups with 5 members each. Following the steps given in using facebook group as an online
platform for lesson, create your group page and put the content. One of the members will act as the
teacher and the others will be the learners.