Should TikTok Be Used in Classrooms?

         TikTok is a social media platform that allows users to make content and show other people their creations. There are also consumers who don’t make any content and who only watch what other people do. To go on, social media platforms have had a history of being addictive and distracting. These traits are able to pull in anyone and not let them go. This brings the question of whether the schools will be able to control this and morph the addictiveness of TikTok to something that truly empowers the students.

In the podcast titled “Should TikTok be Used in Schools?” Phil Cook, an educational influencer and high school chemistry teacher, states that TikTok is helpful and should be in the school curriculum, however, Adrian Dingle, a chemistry teacher and educational consultant, states the vise versa.

Physics teachers such as Adrian Dingle agree that TikTok should not be part of the learning curriculum of schools. He first states that TikTok pulls out the seriousness of the scientific inquiry. TikTok is an app where most or all the content on the platform is designed to pull teens and consumers with surprising content. Content such as this may include the “Skibbidy Toilet” character, who is a head that is sticking out of a toilet, and “Tung Tung Sahur” who is an AI-created character that is a tree that looks like a human. These examples are all “memes” that content creators make. However, this kind of content is normalized in the TikTok community, which is why many consumers call it the “playground of social media.” This ties to Dingle stating that "social media in general, TikTok as well, is the opposite of dignity and decorum.”

He next states that TikTok is making the journey to struggle disappear. TikTok was made to make the consumer stay on their app as long as possible, which means that the companies design their platform to create mindless content. This will make the consumer “brain-dead” and start to “doom scroll.” If all the answers are shown, then the struggle to get to the answer will be irrelevant. Learning happens when you are thinking to get to an answer, so this is why Dingle states that “the only way to understand anything is by failing at it first.” Lastly, Dingle believes many students will not like chemistry, and that is acceptable, however it is a waste of time to revolutionize the way to teach chemistry if the students aren’t going to focus on what the teacher is saying. To summarize, Dingle states that having TikTok as a tool in school will not be helpful because it will take away the seriousness of the science inquiry and the struggle to find the answer will be irrelevant.

Phil Cook, another chemistry teacher, argues that TikTok should be able to be used as a helpful tool in schools. Having a teacher present how to do a procedure in front of the class has issues such as safety and materials. This is because the students are in front of the procedure so if something goes wrong, then they will get hurt and if someone doesn’t catch a key detail, then they will not be able to redo the experiment. Cook states that having this tool will be able to cut back on the amount of materials that schools will need to provide because it is a video. This also brings the advantage of being able to rewind the video to re-watch the experiment to be sure that you are doing the procedures correctly. This will help low-budget schools by letting them use fewer materials. Furthermore, if the teacher allows the students to post the videos that they take and if they receive good feedback, then the students will feel happy. With this new pride achieved the students will be more curious and will get hooked into the subject. Finally, some people may admit that children will not be able to focus on the work because TikTok is made to suck in the consumer, however, it is the student's role to hold on to the discipline to not watch unnecessary videos. This will also build the skill of self-control, which is really important in life.

I, as a believer of TikTok not being of any use to this society, believe that it should not be allowed into the school curriculum. I agree with Dingle that TikTok will lessen the seriousness of the inquiry, however I do not agree with the statement where teachers are not supposed to help or reach out to students that do not like the subject. I think that this completely contradicts the core meaning and value of a teacher. I believe that teachers are supposed to support their students in any way that is possible to help them reach success. If a student acts like they don’t like a subject because they think it's boring, it is up to the teacher to make the class more interesting. To go on, Dingle states that students will not like the change, but I believe that this is a very weak statement because more than half the American population consistently uses this application. Going back to the example, if TikTok is implemented into the school where the student is bored, then it may be able to spark an interest. Teachers should act like each student is going to be the next genius of the world and should never give up on them. In the end, TikTok is a very controversial platform that has many positives and negatives. I dislike the idea of this platform. However, it still has a chance to prove that it is able to be used for good.