Using social media and cloud services to facilitate teaching and learning in teacher education courses

Social media is likely to facilitate learning independent of time and place. It also encourages learners to be active and supports peer and community learning. Social networking sites such as Facebook are more and more popular and are becoming a part of our daily lives. Social networks not only enhance both teacher-student and student-student interactions through synchronous and asynchronous web-based communications, they also help instructors connect with their students about assignments, upcoming events, and learning resources inside and outside the classroom. On the other hand, more and more cloud services can take an essential role in facilitating the creation of this kind of learning community. Cloud services offer many possibilities to educators, for example, sharing information and resources through cloud storage. This paper aims to investigate the potential of social media and other cloud services to foster teaching and learning in teacher education courses. Copyright © 2015 CGPublisher.