Teaching and Learning with Cyberspace Media: Issues and Challenges

Cyberspace media like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, and Blackboard are being increasingly embraced by institutions of all sizes and types to promote their products and services to their customers and to serve their customers once the customers buy into the products or services. Academic institutions have implemented Blackboard to make teaching by instructors and learning by students more efficient and effective. In spite of the fact that most students regularly use popular cyberspace media like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube etc., their use for teaching and learning remains limited. This paper explores the opportunities available to use these media over and beyond Blackboard. An existing conceptual model has been improved to understand the interaction among Technology (an IT tool), Students, Professors, and Course contents. Furthermore, 3-M (Megaphone, Magnet, and Monitor) framework has been utilized to articulate how some teaching and learning goals can be effectively achieved with cyberspace media.