USE OF FACEBOOK FOR ACADEMIC NETWORK LEARNING IN UNIVERSITAS TERBUKA - INDONESIA Open Access

Facebook clearly provides a social outlet for college students, a fact backed by the large membership among this peer group. Socializing, however its unintended outcomes, is part and parcel of education of the whole person. Facebook has its place in that sense, but there seems to be a lack of any compelling reason to significantly integrate it into distance education. Students could use it as a secondary information exchange outlet in a cooperative learning mode with classmates that they have invited in their space, to complete group projects, for example. The services offered through Facebook (e.g. chatting, meeting new classmates, arranging for social/academic meetings) can well be attained using the current technologies in CMSs without the risk of security breaches and other legal matters pervasive in social networking websites. The potential use of facebook for distance learning is greatest. There was a strong feeling from distance learning students that they wanted a safe, private space to communicate. They were happy for tutors to be involved because they saw this space as having a specific course purpose. The advantage over the Virtual Learning Environment is that it seems to encourage that important social interaction as well as the course based interaction. This paper discusses distance learning education and the usage of facebook, as well as the possible implementation of facebook in distance learning education courses. The traditional way of accessing and using content from the Internet is shifting to a more collaborative environment whereby individuals, especially teenagers and young adults, are using various social networking software technologies not only to create information, but in sharing it as well. Perhaps by implementing facebook in distance education courses, it may allow instructors to get to know their students better, as well as to allow for more student-to-student interactions. This paper also discusses the usage of facebook in order to extend teacher and student collaborations in creating online learning environments.