COMPARISON ESSAY & REFLECTION ESSAY
INTRODUCTION
In this essay comparison of two journal articles which will include will be discussed. The first article is selected from source Hong, Y. & Gardner, L. (2019) Undergraduates' perception and engagement in Facebook Learning groups. British Journal of Educational Technology. 50 (4), pp.1831-1845 and the second article is from the source which is selected from the reference list of Article 1, Ainin, S., Naqshbandi, M. M., Moghavvemi, S., & Jaafar, N. I. (2015). Facebook usage, socialization and academic performance. Computers & Education, 83, 64–73.
MAIN BODY
For the comparison, the first selected article is about the undergraduate's engagement in the environment of Facebook learning. The author in the article majorly focused on the student’s engagement level while using the most popular social media platform Facebook. In article 1, Hong and Gardner (2019), stated these days social media platforms are very popular, especially among the students in which Facebook is the most popular one. It is used for studying various subjects and the author mentioned three kinds of engagement levels of the students. These engagement levels are categorised according to profile type namely; minimally engagement, moderately engaged and highly engaged (which is based on student's active time at Facebook).
In article 2 selected from the reference list of article Hong and Gardner (2019) named Facebook usage, socialization and academic performance. Ainin et al., (2015), in the article, stated the impact of the use of Facebook social media platform on the academic performance of students. The article also analysed whether socialisation controls the usage of Facebook. The author has presented research on 1165 students from Malaysian universities through questionnaire survey method and found out the composition of "Socially Accepted" was found to have an impact on Facebook use, whereas "Acculturation" was not significantly associated with use. The results found a positive correlation between students' academic achievement and Facebook use, sense that the added they use it, the improved they distinguish their performance.
As per the views of Hong and Gardner (2019), the main theme of the article is an assessment of the SNS (social network services) in the context of higher education, the implication of SNS and gender perspective towards interaction with teachers. The article explored the influence of the identified four elements in moderating students' learning rendezvous and insight on social network services; these are privacy, trust, self-efficacy and presence of the teaching members. In the theme, the implication of SNS has shown Facebook can be utilised as a helpful modern learning tool. And as per the gender perspective, male students are apparent the significance of having steady communication with educators Second article by Ainin et al., (2015), focused on the main themes of socialisation, Facebook usage intensity and the impact of Facebook on academic performance. This article concludes that social acceptance is the only variable of socialisation that significantly predicts the usage of Facebook intensity however; acculturation was not an initiative to be important.
Both Hong and Gardner (2019) and Ainin et al., (2015) articles have similarities in analysing the student's engagement in Facebook learning. The first article is selected from source Hong, Y. & Gardner, L. (2019) Undergraduates' perception and engagement in Facebook Learning groups. British Journal of Educational Technology. 50 (4), pp.1831-1845 and the second article is from the source which is selected from the reference list of Article 1, Ainin, S., Naqshbandi, M. M., Moghavvemi, S., & Jaafar, N. I. (2015). Facebook usage, socialization and academic performance. Computers & Education, 83, 64–73. As both articles conclude most of the groups of undergraduates join the Facebook group for the purpose of learning. Furthermore, even though both the study did not focus on gender differences, the superior amount of female participants required further analysis of the data. There was no important difference in the conclusion of women and men apart from the occurrence of preparation centres. However, both the articles differ in some incidents. The findings of article 1 by Hong and Gardner (2019) can be simply utilised for designing an effective strategy for learning through Facebook. It can be said that the findings of the article are extremely functional for increasing and improving the student's outcomes of learning. It is, in addition, helpful in catering for the requirements of the student's education. However, an article by Ainin et al., (2015) finds out the usage of Facebook intensity significantly predicts the performance of academics which contradicts the past research studies presenting high usage of Facebook in learning lowers the performance in academics.
Both the articles are well structured. The introduction part has been presented very cleverly and the abstract section clearly defines the purpose of the research along with the findings. The main body of the articles Hong and Gardner (2019) and Ainin et al., (2015) are categorised according to the various themes which effectively shows the good research conducted using secondary data research method. The conclusion section in both articles 1 and 2 by Hong and Gardner (2019) and Ainin et al., (2015) smartly presented the findings of the study. This shows that the articles are well-structured and well organised and presents the information to the learner or reader with effective good quality sourced information using secondary and primary data collection method.
CONCLUSION
The essay concludes comparison of two articles given by Hong and Gardner (2019) and Ainin et al., (2015) based on their similarities and differences. In the article, Hong and Gardner (2019) author majorly focused on the student’s engagement level while using the most popular social media platform Facebook and article Ainin et al., (2015) author stated the impact of the use of Facebook social media platform on the academic performance of the student. Both articles are having similarities in analysing the student's engagement in Facebook learning. As both articles conclude most of the groups of undergraduates join the Facebook group for the purpose of learning. It can be said that both the articles are well-structured and well organised and presents the information to the learner or reader with effective good quality sourced information using secondary and primary data collection method.
REFERENCES
Ainin, S., Naqshbandi, M. M., Moghavvemi, S., & Jaafar, N. I. (2015). Facebook usage, socialization and academic performance. Computers & Education, 83, 64–73.
Hong, Y. & Gardner, L. (2019) Undergraduates’ perception and engagement in Facebook Learning groups. British Journal of Educational Technology. 50 (4), pp.1831-1845.
