reflection

Huang 1

Haoyu Huang

WRIT-1133

07/10/2022

Ted Talks Script

Research Question and its Importance

TikTok is a social media app that attracted many users and attention in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. I believe most of you have the app on your smartphones and probably installed it during the pandemic to keep you busy and engaged. People have shared short clip movies containing comedy, music, and lip-sinking messages using the app. I relate much with the app of choice because lots of my family and friends have it as their favorite social media platform, where I find them always recording videos or enjoying the content. My research was focused on looking at various avenues through which the TikTok app can be leveraged, and education was an area where knowledge and information can be shared in the interest of societal development. Various apps have been developed and attract a limited number of users, and TikTok has experienced an amazing surge in the number of users in a short period (Roth et al. 3). My research question was: "what particular type of interactions and relations do TikTok have that can make it relevant in teaching science topics to friends, family, and followers?" The question is essential because the accounts of persons utilizing the site tend to have followers and friends that consume the content, and the content can be science topics for learning.

TikTok app is currently in use for various reasons, but my research focused on how the platform can be leveraged for learning science topics through sharing content within the subject (Zubenko). Learning science topics and practical is a field that is important to every science student and science enthusiast that are interested in getting the content. Using the platform for educational purposes is the research focus that targets evaluating the tool's effectiveness for learning. There are important questions that helped in my research, including what benefit may TikTok bring to the users by educating science? How can TikTok use its power to change society through science? The answers to the questions are achieved just after adopting and implementing the TikTok app in learning science. The social media platform is popular and has many people using it, making it possible to target the entire population with science content that is likely to value those who learn from it. The scientific content that can be shared includes educating the public about the prevention of lifestyle diseases by proposing the best nutrition and also reasons that support adopting regular exercise as a routine to reduce lifestyle diseases. Content of that nature is valuable to the entire population, and it will act as transformative because there will be a practical nature through the short video clip that increases the emphasis.

There was a great success for the TikTok account in disseminating entertaining content and viral videos on misinformation during the COVID-19 outbreak. The same formula utilized in distributing the other content should be adopted by professionals teaching genuine science to the audience, that is to make it accessible and to make it engaging. The platform can dramatically boost awareness and educate the public on vaccinations and other vital science topics. In the case of the COVID-19 pandemic, the platform was abused to disseminate false information regarding vaccines, resulting in a lack of immunization. Misinformation could have been a major problem for the World Health Organization and health care professionals in their efforts to help public health officials control the outbreak. In the same way that false information spreads, viral videos presenting accurate and up-to-date information about vaccines, scientific aspects that matter to the general public, and even prevention strategies for chronic diseases that pose a global threat can disseminate correct information. The TikTok mobile app allows users to exchange instructional materials. Conciseness is key in any educational endeavor, but especially in science, where students can demonstrate their experiments to the world (Montag et al.). Teachers can utilize TikTok to attract their students' attention, especially for science classes where they repeat the short video clip several times, boosts the retention rate and understanding, especially in experiments (Zeng et al. 15). The users of the TikTok app are mainly people between 15 years and 40 years, and the science content will be favorable for both scholars and laypeople. My target audience for the research is the scholars, researchers, college students and the general public that are interested in learning science.

Conversation on the topic so far?

TikTok is a social media app that has been adopted in various sectors where it plays an important role in communication and interaction. Professionals, scholars and researchers have portrayed the platform as a good experience for various reasons, including communication and interaction. According to Basch et al., “TikTok has the potential, not only to convey important health information, but to address these aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic as well.” The TikTok tool was used before during the pandemic to convey health information. There have been complaints during the period on the misinformation that the social media tools used affected the vaccination activities making the work of government and healthcare providers difficult. Health information can be shared through the social media app, where the population learns from the content that influences their quality of life either positively or negatively. There is always a choice of using the social media tool for good reasons, which is creating awareness to the population and educating them about health issues like a lifestyle that brings positive outcomes. According to Bossen and Kottasz, “pre-adolescent consumers are heavier users and interact more with the TikTok SNS than adolescent consumers, including in relation to seeking out new social networks.” The author has highlighted that young people are more users of the TikTok platform, especially the pre-adolescents, and they can experience the science education content when shared in the app. The approach of having the science content and practicals on the platforms increases the chances that students can interact with similar content that matches their school work and relate with it. In educational institutions, the teachers might consider TikTok as one of the assistive technology for students to promote learning and interaction. TikTok is a tool with features that make it possible for teachers to use in the classroom.

According to Edwards, TikTok has “a very useful feature in the classroom, but even more so for remote learning and home-based assignments." The author/researcher has showcased that the tool can handle class work and ensure students receive learning content. Educational content, especially sciences, is important for societal change, and if a good platform is used in sharing the content increase the possibility of the public and students receiving it and benefit. TikTok is an example of a digital platform that can play a role in content sharing, but its experience must be evaluated to know if the users are getting value from it. The features that TikTok has include the ability to develop short video clips that are modified and edited to produce near-professional results that can be shared and clearly viewed for information consumption.

What I Heard in the Field

TikTok's educational content can now be shared via its mobile app. There is the possibility of different experiences for those using the tool for learning. Scientific experiments may be demonstrated by students and content makers, which is why this is so important in the field. In the same way that writing services help students manage their studies, social applications can do the same for education by making it more user-friendly and available to all users, making it easier for everyone. When teaching science, teachers can use TikTok to keep their students interested by playing the short video clip multiple times. This helps students retain and understand the material better. There is also the challenge that some students get destructed by online content as they are using their smartphones, which affects learning. Interviewing some teachers and content creators showcases the strengths and weaknesses of the TikTok tool as a learning tool. One of the teachers stated that "using TikTok tool for learning sciences makes it easy in sharing concepts and complex topics in a series of video clips that helps students learn at home and revise the content until they understand." There is a fact in the argument that "students prefer to watch entertaining videos on the internet rather than listen to their teachers lecture for long periods of time” because the information was shared by one of the students and supported by a science scholar and content creator (Edwards). Teachers can engage their pupils in a way that is more engaging to them through the use of TikTok.

Aside from being a huge hit in the entertainment sector, this show has great potential to serve as a valuable teaching resource in the scientific community. Creating a community of scientists will be a strategy that will take science to the next level because information, content, and ideas are shared to develop a pool of knowledgeable individuals that can change society in a more significant way. The challenge that will arise is that there are not enough limits on those that develop the science content or offer moderation, which makes it possible that misinformation might also be experienced. When discussing how TikTok can aid scientific students, most people suggested that the technology pushes individuals to look for shortcut methods rather than focus in class to learn in-depth. It was also stated that by demonstrating what students learn in school through video, TikTok makes it easier for them to remember the theory. My research found that most respondents favored content creators' lectures over what they learnt in class. Individuals protested against the three-minute TikTok duration limit by arguing that in that amount of time, TikTok creators are consuming content that even young people can understand.

TikTok, a popular platform for both students and scientists, has benefited the general public by allowing anyone to test out various scientific experiments at their own pace. According to the TikTok forum, the #EduTok project in India, which gathered 126.5 billion views for films on motivation, wellness, and education, has already worked with academic institutions (Edwards). You can find fantastic instructional videos practically anyplace on TikTok. In addition, well-known math and acting teachers have been included in the app and have shared positive experiences in using the tool to share various instructional content that serves diverse students, including those that learn better through visual content. It has made TikTokers into social media stars who can make even the most obscure things interesting and educational through their unique brand of humor.

I have experienced tutors on TikTok doing live videos to aid students with math difficulties like calculus and also those creators experimenting with what is already covered in class. With the help of my peers, science students and enthusiasts can learn from one another where they get the opportunity to respond to the video by tagging the content creator and writing their comments in the comment section. I can learn from their successes and mistakes. According to what I have read about the app online, some people find it educational and entertaining. On the other hand, other people find technology as a destructor to people's goals and aspirations where most people spend most of their time entertaining or covering a limited educational content instead of focusing on the reality of life and handling science content in full from books and documentaries.

TikTok, a video-making app favored by the younger generation, let users create videos for their own amusement while also helping to promote awareness about the dangers of the Covid-19 virus (Corey et al. 20). Because the app is so popular among teenagers, developers have teamed up with educational institutions to provide an engaging learning experience for those students (Bossen & Kottasz, 20). Learners are encouraged to use Tiktok as a learning tool, apply what they learn in the classroom to real-world situations, and demonstrate their understanding. Some educators have been seen to discourage the usage of Tiktok in the classroom due to their belief that it is only designed to be used for entertainment purposes, hence using it for instructional purposes may not be beneficial. Instructors can also use the software to create short movies to help kids learn. To answer my research question, I have used TikTok to find video clips that demonstrate scientific processes in action. There are live videos of experiments a teacher performs on material we study in class. Students respond to each other's comments in the video's comment sections, describing their classroom experiments and the lessons they took away from them.

Big Idea

The big idea is to create a community of scholars and professors in the field of science on TikTok and create contents of useful or educational information of science to students and the general public. The fact that TikTok can be used as both an educational platform and a social networking site makes it a valuable educational resource. People connect with one another, access the content, and, in the process, discover new communities of like-minded individuals. With more than 500 million daily active users, TikTok has surpassed other well-known social media platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest, and Snapchat in terms of popularity. Even though it sheds light on many of the themes that will shape education in the future, TikTok has several obvious drawbacks. The site's maximum video duration is about 60 seconds, making it hard to get a comprehensive education or more in-depth instruction on the platform, especially science practical that can last up to 2 hours. However, the built-in feature of TikTok could solve this drawback, once you have showed interest to a certain topic, or you have watched a few videos with the same tags, or of the same category, such as science, or daily health advices, the app would start showing more content of that certain topic when scrolling down. Also, by subscribing to content maker, the app would show more content of that creator and content of similar creators, in this case, science. The desire to become famous on TikTok is understandably strong for many young individuals, and this urge can become destructive in using the tool for science learning since more energy and effort is directed to creating content for the entire audience. Generation Z (the youngest now in secondary school) makes up most of TikTok's user base, which has immediate ramifications for education.

However, in this case, 90% of British youngsters own a smartphone by age 11, despite many schools imposing a complete ban on cell phone use in the classroom due to the perception that it causes obstruction (Montag et al.). Phones in the classroom are a concern for everyone, including teachers and parents. Students' use of cell phones has increased long-standing difficulties in schools, such as cyberbullying and cheating. However, smart phones had proven themselves to be incredibly useful in classrooms to enhance students engagement to class martials, with one of the most successful examples being “kahoot!”. Social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are particularly implicated in these issues. However, the TikTok blend of pleasure and education is winning over some individuals, unlike the persistent criticism of the apps above. There is much acceptance concerning the use of TikTok in sharing educational content like science, but the obstruction issue is there, but moderation is needed, especially in schools and workplaces. As a result, youngsters can have fun making videos without dealing with the challenges of publicly sharing their work. Parents have expressed concern over video content being shared with a wider audience or privacy settings not being properly enforced. Even the most advanced privacy settings may not provide complete protection from prying eyes.

Despite the value that TikTok might bring in sharing science education content, the challenges come with privacy and the audience that students and science enthusiasts share content with. TikTok is a global platform, and content is shared by students, especially those under 18, who might fall into the wrong hands and use the account to bully young students, resulting in a negative outcome in using the tool. TikTok's videography features have inspired some professors to create TikTok-based homework that students can only see in their classrooms. Students develop content that displays their mastery of ideas to encourage peer-to-peer teaching. Teachers have presented many creative media- and science-based tasks using TikTok in the classroom. According to Edwards, “the additional instructor in Eastvale, California, proposed to use a TikTok clip for a lesson comparing and contrasting ancient trade routes and a different project associated with significant industrial revolution innovations.” Teacher-created science clips that students may watch over and over are perhaps the strategic way of using TikTok in education. Some professors have embraced the flipped classroom philosophy by creating their own video clips to demonstrate difficult concepts or to communicate specific assignment instructions with their students. Students gain from this strategy since they don't have to worry about scribbling down every word in their notes. A video version of key points is instead available for limitless use. This method of using TikTok avoids any problems that can arise from students using the app.

Those who have effectively incorporated the platform into their workflow take steps to minimize distraction. TikTok use is restricted to a specific amount of time, and students are only allowed to use the site while logged in. Because they see little use in fighting social media, they use its power to improve educational outcomes instead of focusing on the negative aspects of technology. Even the most vigilant teachers cannot prevent the misuse of social media. Many students make films during school hours that have nothing to do with their studies. In fact, videos set in high school restrooms are a distinct genre and might contribute to poor performance of the students or even receive online bullying through their posts. Despite the fact that it is amusing, administrators and parents are striving to discourage this TikTok tool because of the serious risk of privacy violations it presents. There are several advantages to social media, including the fact that it's free and accessible to everyone. Since many school restroom videos are filmed in open areas, other students' identities may be revealed without their knowledge if their videos are posted online. Because of the ease with which these films might go viral, this poses a huge risk to people's privacy. There is the need to consider caution in using the TikTok tool for learning, and this comprises of educating the young population about the danger of accessing explicit content from the platform. Science is a broad field that requires a good platform to share information to reach the desired audience. TikTok is a digital platform that has gained more users in a short time and can play a significant role in sharing science content to a different audience. There is always a challenge in every technology that is adopted in the educational setting, and these demands using a tool for the best purpose that it can offer. TikTok has the feature of developing short video clips, allowing editing to make them clear and precise, and this approach promotes learning.

Generation Z, which is known to be interested in technology, will find the tool essential for their trials and experience how they will get the content delivered to them. There is always the opportunity of trying something new, and TikTok has showcased its value during the Covid-19 period, where it facilitated interaction and cultural awareness that can make it also work for educational purposes. TikTok is a tool to watch and implement in the educational setting and also in the general population in learning science since it promotes quick learning and tries to limit the challenges that come with it to make sure there is the value by the end of getting the delivered content.

References

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