When I first saw our blog assignment this week, I was racking my brain on what social media app/website I could try. As someone who grew up during The Rise of Web 2.0, there are not many platforms that I am super unfamiliar with. While looking through the top free apps on the Apple App Store, I noticed that I already frequently use or have used the main social networking apps: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, TikTok, Tumblr. etc. Scrolling through my phone, I began thinking about my fiancé and his pretty much non existent love for social media. I realized that there is only one social media app that I catch him using often, and have very minimally attempted to use in the past myself: Reddit.
So What Is Reddit?
Personally, I have always thought of Reddit as a forum page that sometimes comes up as a result when Googling. Apparently, it is much more than that. I decided to ask my fiancé (Connor) to explain to me what Reddit is and why he likes using it so much. He said (very formally- you can tell he is a lawyer and I apologize if this explanation puts you to sleep):
Reddit is an online forum posting group where people discuss topics of interest to them divided into various sub groups (subreddits) such that all discussion about certain topics is more easily locatable. It has a variety of things from pertinent information relating to various hobbies and games to purely entertaining things like funny pictures or stories. People on Reddit are generally more intelligent than they are on Facebook and you can down vote people so when they say moronic things we don’t have to see it… I like Reddit because it has content that I enjoy and it is not filled with random people posting about their lives. I don’t care about peoples lives, I care about things that are going on in the world and things I am interested in.
Alternatively, I you would like a more lively and fun explanation of how Reddit works, you can watch this Youtube video:
My Thoughts on Reddit
I first downloaded Reddit last spring when we got our puppy, Loki. I noticed that when I was googling things related to training and puppy survival 101, Reddit posts popped up frequently in my results. I created an account and found a few subreddits to follow such as r/dogtraining, r/corgi, and r/puppy101. I found it fairly easy to search and scroll through these specific pages (once I had found them through Google). A few times, I even posted asking for advice. People seemed to be fairly nice in the comment sections and were able to guide me in the right direction. Once our puppy got older and I felt like I knew what I was doing (mostly), I never opened the app again haha.
When we received this assignment, I reopened the app and attempted to utilize it more. In short, I don’t really enjoy using the app and it is really just not my style of social media fun. However, here are a few of my thoughts on the platform:
- Once you figure out how to navigate the platform, it is fairly easy to use. However, if you have NO IDEA what you are doing (like me) it is very overwhelming at first as there is A LOT going on.
- Setting up an account was super easy, and you can also read things without having an account.
- The popular posts/home page posts are determined by popularity not necessarily what you are going to be interested in reading/seeing. For me, this is a big downside as I like things to be target towards me (looking at you Tiktok + Facebook advertisements).
- There are subreddits for pretty much anything you can imagine if you want to talk about it, I guarantee someone else will too. (Side note: all this typing about Reddit and the subsections about pretty much anything has actually been proven to be useful. If you have not watched the Netflix documentary Don’t F**k with Cats, there are actually multiple scenes where internet sleuths use things such as an online forum about vacuums (see in this video @2:55mins) to find a murderer).
- Brings to light news that is not always “mainstream.”
- Open forums- there is very little moderation which could be positive or negative.
- So much content that it is overwhelming.
- High anonymity.
Reddit as an Education Tool?
Common Sense Media rates Reddit as suggested for users who are 15+. This suggestion is due to the fact that there is little filtering on Reddit and kids can easily come across lots of NSFW content that is also likely to be highly inappropriate for younger children. Teenagers do tend to use Reddit and often participate in the subreddit r/teenagers. However, this does not appear to be a super popular platform amongst youth. My cousins who are both very active on social media do not use Reddit, and it is not something that I have ever heard a student at my school mention.
I believe that Reddit could be useful for teachers and administrators as there are many subreddits related to education. However, I don’t think that using Reddit as a tool in the classroom with students of any age would be wise. There seems to be a high chance that they will come across something inappropriate. Plus, with the anonymity that exists it seems dangerous to me. It appears that others tend to agree.
I leave you with two questions:
- Have you every used Reddit before?
- Do you think that you would be comfortable incorporating it into your classroom? If so, how?
Mme.Cookie 
Brittney,
Excellent post!
Funny enough, my fiancé uses Reddit too! I never really got into it and your post confirms my reasoning as to why it isn’t really for me. However, every now and again, I find the odd thing on Reddit that is useful. I don’t have the app, so anything that comes up on Reddit is just from a Google search. I don’t think I would feel comfortable using it in the classroom. I haven’t engaged with it enough myself to feel good about incorporating it into my practice and like you said, the content kids may find on there could be problematic. I wonder if there is any way that users can put filters on the content that shows up or if there are any parental/safety settings that can be used?
Well done– I look forward to reading more of your posts this semester!
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From my quick search nothing seemed to pop up for parents being able to filter the content for safety. However, it may be possible. I do think that since that information is not super easy to find, if it is an option it must not be very easy to do haha.
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Great choice to look further into. To be honest, I don’t have a lot of experience using it other than the odd time looking for an answer to a weird question, especially surrounding my car. Although, I know that my spouse’s friends use it daily for gaming, streaming, sports discussions, finding answers to their questions, etc. I haven’t used it in the classroom before, and to be honest, don’t know if I would for my age group of students. Because it is largely unmonitored I feel as if my students or myself could get into some hot water quite rapidly. I also am not sure that I would implement a social media platform into my classroom without knowing the ins and outs of it or at least feel pretty darn comfortable with it so I would know how to steer away my kiddos from the dark side of it. Although I never really thought about using it in my classroom before, I think your post really helped make my decision.
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