An exploration of using Facebook to build a virtual community of practice

Students at all levels are heavily immersed in social network sites such as Facebook and YouTube. Social networking is indeed not only playing an increasingly important role in students' social life, but also for teachers. Educators are now turning to use Web 2.0 tools to promote students' ability to assist in creating, collaborating and sharing content. Facebook is a free and most popular social network site. Its primary purpose is to provide an online communication platform for users to make new friends and interact with them. A Community of Practice (COP) is a group of people who share their knowledge, ideas and practices in a common domain or topic [1]. A virtual COP means the communication between members are using electronic channels, such as email, discuss forums, blogs and wikis, etc. Since virtual COPs encourage collaborative and sharing recourses in knowledge domain on the Web, it may be an ideal model for the online learning community. This research aims to explore the use of Facebook features to foster virtual COPs. We further intend to investigate how Facebook can enhance collaborative learning and knowledge building in this virtual COP. Two classes of sub-degree students have been chosen to participate in this study. The data will be collected quantitatively and qualitatively in nature, consisting of students' posting messages and comments on the Facebook, surveys on the students' reflective experiences using Facebook as communication and collaboration tools, and group interview with each instructor. This research will shed some lights on effective ways to promote virtual Community of Practice.