The Fragmented Educator: Social Networking Sites and Acceptable Identity Fragments

• In Event: Roundtable Session 25
  In Roundtable Session: Technology in the Lives of Teachers

Abstract

Social Networking Sites (SNS) have increasingly been used to support educational and professional endeavors. However, little research has been done to understand the relationship between educator identity and participation in SNS or to examine the implications that institutional regulation of such media may have upon educator identity. Using grounded theory, this study develops a framework for understanding how transitioning educators view their developing identities within social networking sites. The emergent theory of the study proposes that educator identity as it relates to SNS consists of a constellation of interconnected acceptable identity fragments, which are each intentional, authentic, transitional, necessarily incomplete, and socially-constructed and -responsive.

Authors

• Royce Kimmons, University of Idaho

• George Veletsianos, Royal Roads University