Social Media & Identity

The Lesson

Social Media & Identity

Outcomes:

• SW respond to questions relating to how social media can shape identity.
• SW discuss with their peers and instructor how social media can shape identity, identifying a number of factors that can contribute to the creation of identity and persona through social media.
• SW understand how one’s choices in creating a social media profile can impact the persona that they create online.
• SW create a criteria for the factors that can contribute to the creation of a person’s online persona.
• SW use this criteria in order to establish their own online identity for the class, then justify their choices within a rhetorical context about how it will shape their identity.

Lesson:

1. Students will have come to class having watched and answered questions for “How Social Media Shapes Identity”. Students will spend the first 10-15 minutes of class discussing how they responded to questions.
2. Instructor will guide a lesson on the creation of identity through social media through analyzing a Twitter account.
   1. The account students will analyze with the instructor is at the discretion of the instructor, but should obviously be somebody who students are familiar with. It might be an influencer, a prominent member of the academic institution, a political figure, etc.
   2. Instructor will ask students for feedback on how the individuals would judge this person based on a number of aspects of their Twitter account: what they post, how often, original content versus “re-Tweeted” content, who they follow, number of follows, biography, image, type of discourse, etc.
3. After this, students will break off into groups of 3-4 and work together to establish a heuristic for what a person should take into consideration when creating a social media page that will be used in primarily academic and professional settings.
   1. Students should have autonomy here, but the instructor should reinforce with students what they reviewed together.
   2. Informal class discussions based on student needs. Instructor might ask: what of these criteria are within control of the individual? Not within their control? How might they attempt to control these variables in order to shape their online identity?
4. Students will present the criteria/heuristic they came up with informally to the class.
5. Instructor will assign assessment (to be completed in or outside of class upon instructor discretion).

Assessment (see handout for full details):

Students will create a Twitter account for the class that they will use through the duration of the class to communicate with peers, share ideas, and to establish an academic online identity. Students will take into consideration the heuristic and criterion discussed during class. Then, students will write a short explanation (2-3 paragraphs) that justifies the choices they have made in their creation of their Twitter profile. Instructors might consider having students share their profiles and justifications on a discussion board so that other students can see their profiles.

Lesson Materials