College Student Performance Facilitated on Facebook: A Case Study

The purpose of this study was to explore the effect of using Facebook after class in college learning and whether it is a good teaching tool. The ten-week educational discussions among fifty Taiwanese college students on two Facebook discussion pages were recorded and analyzed. The researchers examined the relationship between Facebook Group participation and the academic achievement of college students. Results showed that there was a significant positive correlation between a student's online participation frequency and his GPA. The frequency of student participation in Facebook Groups could explain 15% to 19% of the variance in the grades they received for their exhibition projects. Furthermore, it was found that evaluation criteria designed by instructors can have an effect on the direction of online discussions. According to the results, we can conclude that educational discussions on Facebook can be beneficial to college students' learning. However, whether Facebook can serve as an effective teaching tool depends on how the educators use it in students' learning process.