From TikTok to Treaty: How to Use Social Media as Learning Allies
If you are a teacher or a parent, you have probably said at some point: "Turn off your phone, that thing doesn't teach you anything." And that is understandable. Watching a teenager spend two straight hours watching dance videos or viral challenges can cause a certain amount of pedagogical despair. But what if, instead of fighting social media, we integrated it into the classroom? The stubborn reality is that TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube are already part of our students' cognitive ecosystem. The question is not whether they use them, but how we teach them to use them better. The Mistake of Open Warfare Banning phones in class is necessary to avoid distractions, but demonizing the platforms that occupy young people's leisure time is a strategic error. When we forbid without offering meaningful alternatives, the message that sinks in is: "what you like is useless and stupid." And so, instead of gaining moral authority, we lose it. The key is to make a U-...
