Digital Ethnography on Students’ Authentic Engagement in Social Media Platforms during the Global Online Experiment

Abstract

Accepted: 28 Sep. 2021 This article investigates the culture of the student online community of pre-service teachers relative to their engagement in social media at a state university in the Philippines. It analyzes students’ engagement to facilitate authentic learning within the bounds of social media platforms during the COVID-19 pandemic. The author used a digital ethnographic design to investigate the use of social media as an emerging technology to supplement pre-service teachers’ authentic learning during COVID-19. The deductive thematic analysis, which was anchored in the lens of constructivism and social media engagement theory, revealed that the use of emerging technologies such as Facebook expands students’ cognitive, behavioral, and emotional engagement in the online community. Although students have difficulty identifying unofficial reports, they expressed a positive response to using social media to supplement pedagogical platforms amid the crisis. The study recommends conducting an empirical investigation into the responsiveness of Facebook as an emergency platform to supplement pedagogy during the global online experiment.