Lesson video

Hello, and welcome to today's citizenship lesson.

I'm Mrs. Barry and I'll be taking you through this lesson.

We have been looking at series of lessons about digital democracy and whether it can increase political participation or not.

And this lesson focuses on how can social media be used to improve political participation? I do need to point out at the start of this lesson that does include discussion around social media and you should only participate in this lesson if you are aged 13 or over.

Please make sure you've turned off any apps or notifications that might distract you during the lesson.

And that you're in a distraction free zone so we can complete the lesson as effectively as possible.

During today's lesson, you're going to need something to write on and something to write with.

So some paper and a pen or a pencil would be really useful.

Make sure you've got those items and we can make a start.

So throughout this series of lessons, hopefully you've already covered some of the other issues related to digital democracy.

So this series of lessons started with what is digital citizenship? Can voter engagement be improved through digital participation? Can political engagement be increased using digital media? How well has digital democracy worked in other countries? And should MPs be allowed to vote electronically? The next lesson is the final lesson of this set, which looks at social media and how that might play a role in political participation.

We're going to do that to a variety of different ways.

So I'm going to start off by looking at citizens use of social media to participate in politics.

We're going to move on to how political parties use social media to engage for their voters.

And then we're going to consider data protection, and whether there's a dark side to social media campaigning and how actually it might not be everything that everyone thinks it is that it's all wonderful.

There might be more harmful side to social media.

And then we're going to use a variety of tasks to check your understanding so at the end, you've got a good comprehensive knowledge of how social media could be used to improve political participation.

So we're starting off with what is political participation? First we have to talk about social media and how it might increase it.

We need to understand what it is.

And it's the active involvement of people in political issues that aim to influence an outcome.

That might include voting in elections, helping a political campaign, contacting officials, petitioning, or protesting.

And that could be direct, so you could be trying to influence something straight away, or indirect.

So it could be something that's longer term that might a longer time.

It could be in-person or, and in particular looking at this lesson, it could be online using digital technologies such as social media.

Task one.

What I would like you to do is to think about uses of social media.

So there's a wide range of social media platforms available.

Which ones can you think of? And what do you think they could be used for? Think about our understanding of what political participation is that we've just talked through, and what this might look like digitally.

Create a mind map which lays out your ideas and keeping you a little example there just to start you off.

So for example, Facebook is a social media platform and one way it's used is for communication.

So when you're ready, pause the video, spend about five minutes, just coming up with different types of social media platforms that you know of and how they might be used, and link it if you can to political participation.

Once you've done that, you can press play and we will continue with our lesson.

Welcome back.

I'm sure you've done some really good work on that mind map thinking about the different social media platforms that are available and what they could be used for.

Just some of the ideas that I came up with or the social media platforms that perhaps are classified as the most popular ones would be things like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and obviously there's loads of others.

And I'm sure you've got plenty on that.

So looking at how they could be used, you've got communication.

And that's a very clear one for something like Facebook, people put their viewpoints across.

Same with YouTube for example, you can put videos up about what you think.

They're also used to access news or information.

So some people rely on Twitter, for example, to keep up to date with what's going on following certain organisations, for example, for news and information about them.

They're also used to share opinions, news and information.

So it doesn't have to be an organisation that has a page.

It can be an individual for example, and they can share their own views and comment perhaps on some of the issues or ideas that are put up on their social media platforms. And they're also used for example, to make connections.

So perhaps you're looking to get involved in a local club, then you could make connections through some of these social media platforms. And it vice versa really in that those clubs can put across their information and draw in new people to join their club or activity.

So there's a large variety of ways in which social media can be used that then could potentially be transferred over to political participation because all of these methods, all of these uses can be used within politics.

So within politics, you need to be able to communicate ideas you need to be able to share news and information, you need to be able to gather opinions, and also it's important to have those connections between politics and citizens, for example.

So that's a very brief overview of how those might be used but you can see they all connect into your political participation.

How has social media been used by ordinary citizens to participate in politics? Well, over the last 15 years, social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook have given ordinary people unprecedented access to politicians and to campaigns and political organising networks.

So it's even easier in today's society to be able to access politicians and campaigns than it has been historically.

Because social media allows information and images to be shared quickly and widely accessing a large number of people in a very short space of time with stories or campaigns going, what we call, they often go viral.

That's the phrase that is used.

And online petitions have been freely shared and gained signatures more easily.

And just to make your aware, 10,000 signatures means it's responded to.

So you can imagine how quickly and easily social media can gather interest in something to be able to gather the 10,000 signatures.

Meaning the government has to really have a look at it and consider what petition has been put forward.

One of the most recent and most famous examples we can look at in terms of a case study is this social media campaign of free school meals.

And you might recognise this football player is Marcus Rashford, and you might've heard of this, if you have been keeping up to date with the news.

In 2020, as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, school closures led to renewed focus on the issue of free school meals.

As many children eligible for free school meals were now at home.

So they couldn't access these free school meals because there are only available in schools.

So they haven't been able to access them in the school holidays.

And that had come to the attention of many, and they thought that this was not fair and not helpful in terms of reaching out to those who needed those free school meals.

And the campaign began largely taking place on social media and led by this Manchester United footballer, Marcus Rashford, putting pressure on the government to commit to funding free school meals in the school holidays for all eligible children.

The public media commentators and opposition parties began to call on the government to provide free school meals in the school holidays via a voucher scheme.

And the government committed to funding free school meals during October half term and the Christmas holidays.

And there is ongoing pressure for free school meals to be extended to all school holidays.

So currently they're working school holiday by school holiday, but they're hoping this will become something that is continuous for the future.

And that's just one example of a way that social media platforms such as Facebook has gathered momentum and gathered support for an issue that needed essentially a quick response.

We can think here about the timeliness, the fact that it was so quick, and also the number of people who got on board with this campaign in terms of influence.

And I've just got a thinking point for you.

How did the use of social media and the involvement of Marcus Rashford increase awareness and bring a national issue to the attention of the government? I'm just going to give you a few seconds to have a think about that question.

And it's really interesting because influence is such a massive thing.

If you put, for example, myself on a news show at dinner time, people might pay attention because it's news time and they're watching their T.

So they might be watching the news at that time.

But I'm not going to have the same influence as someone who is famous.

So one of the important aspects of this case study in terms of getting the information across wasn't just social media and its use, but also how social media was used and who is using it.

So it's important to remember when you have celebrities, their power and influence, so trying to make a change has a great impact.

But also by using social media, he's accessing a lot of young people who would already potentially be following him.

And so social media is a great form of communication for sharing information and for raising awareness and bringing this national issue to the attention of the government.

And once you've got enough people talking about it and you get enough signatures and then E-petition for example, and I said earlier it was 10,000 signatures needed for it to be noted.

The government do have to start to listen and consider what's going on.

I had to think further about this concept of influence in terms of some facts and figures surrounding social media.

So we're going to move on to some multiple choice questions.

So this is task two and I'm going to give you some multiple choice questions looking at these facts and figures about social media.

So number one, how many million active users do you think Facebook has? So the answer here was C.

It's 2,740 million active users.

That is a massive number of people in terms of influence and getting information across communicating and making those connections that we spoke about earlier.

Number two, what is the most used social media platform in the United Kingdom? Hopefully here you have put B, YouTube.

So YouTube.

Some people question whether it's a social media platform but it actually is in the sense that you can still communicate, get information out and across, and it's designed to influence.

So you can put videos and try and change people's views or perspectives or educate and raise awareness for example.

But YouTube is the most used social media platform in the United Kingdom.

Number three, what is the average amount of time spent on social media a day? So you might sit and work out how many minutes you think you spend on social media.

But generally the average amount for all people, what do you think the average is? And here, the answer is, it's 142 minutes, which if we break that down, that's just under two and a half hours a day which obviously is quite a lot of the time on social media.

So you can see here in terms of influence, people are spending that much time on it.

They're going to come across a lot of information in those two and a half hours.

And lastly, question four, what percentage of the world's population uses social media? So just have a think, across the world, taking into consideration access to the internet, for example, what percentage of the world's population uses social media? And the answer for this one is, A.

It's 45%.

So almost half the world's population uses social media.

And bare in mind that does include areas where there is a lack of technology, for example, but it is also including people who are under the age of, let's say, for example, nine, and perhaps don't look at the internet at all.

And certainly under the age of 13 is when you're advised or say that you shouldn't be accessing social media.

So that's a large percentage of people who were allowed to have access in the world, who are accessing social media and therefore will have this potential to be influenced by social media and what social media has to offer.

So is social media used saw platform for democracy then? We've considered the statistics and information.

And in the sense that it covers a large number of people, those people spend a lot of time on it.

There's a good range of platforms which will be applicable to different scenarios and organisations.

You could conclude that it is a useful platform for democracy because within democracy, you need to access citizens, you need to put across information, you need to gather support, and all the other things within democracy that allows it to run effectively.

And so social media can be an effective part of that potentially.

How have political parties used social media to engage with voters? Well, they've done this in a numerous variety of ways.

So political parties including the Conservatives and Labour Party, the Scottish National Party, and the Liberal Democrats and Green Party, all use social media to raise awareness about their policies and encourage voters to support them.

They do that by creating short videos including clips of their politicians, by sharing information about their values and policies, and by drawing attention to the flaws of their opponents.

They're not only putting across positive information about their own views, they're also trying to pick apart their opponents and say what they think should be done better.

Social media teams try to make their content interesting and engaging so that it gets their message across and is also likely to be shared across social media.

Because one of the most influential things about social media is that you can share it.

So if you like something, you can share it to other people and then it's accessed by even more.

And so the goal really of posting something on social media is to make it something someone wants to share because then it spreads quicker and to a board a range of people.

Now we're going to look at an example of a political party using Twitter.

And this is the Conservative Party.

And it's just a 20 second clip that they put up on Twitter in the run-up to the 2019 general election where they did win an 80 seat majority.

Probably watch this.

I just want you to think, what is the message of the clip? Why do you think it's effective? And if you can, can you come up with three reasons why you think it's effective? So why is this effective? It's a very short clip so it's likely to be watched and shared by lots of people.

It's visually engaging and includes an energetic soundtrack.

And it also has clear messages of the Conservative's policy promises, for example, get Brexit done, which was a massive part of the manifesto they had in 2019.

It's really important that we understand that when we're looking for information on political issues that we can't rely on short clips.

It's really important to find out and investigate as much information as you possibly can on political issues.

And although the short clips are really influential and excellent in terms of showing us how political parties use social media such as Twitter, we do need to be conscious of our own responsibilities to be informed and make informed decisions.

An example of the government using YouTube is this.

Statistically, as we said, YouTube has the most active users and the government has its own pages on YouTube where it uploads media as an information source.

So you can see some pictures here directly from that page about the Corona virus pandemic.

So at the moment, one of the main campaigns that they're leading is about the virus and getting injections to aid the recovery process that the United Kingdom is in in terms of stopping the spread of COVID-19.

So they are using YouTube at the moment to have an impact and influence people on that issue.

This is an example of the government using Twitter.

And this tweet is an example of how government signposts its users to services on the government website.

This particular tweet was aimed at raising awareness of people's right to protect them from discrimination.

And it was done at the international day of people with disability.

And just a quick think point, how effective do you think this would be? Well, as we discussed earlier, Twitter has a massive number of users.

We spend 142 minutes on average a day looking at social media.

And so if you're scrolling through and you're looking at this sort of information, and some of it's going to go in and so the effectiveness in terms of this particular tweet depends on how many people viewed it.

But we can safely assume that there was a significant number and they've used an attractive, bright, bold colour so you're not going to miss it.

So it's just an example here of the government using Twitter.

Now when we talk about the government using social media, we have to consider issues such as data protection.

And I want us to consider, is there a problem with social media campaigning? Political parties, like businesses, use targeted advertising to appeal to their target audiences.

Targeted advertising is the placing of adverts on websites based on a person's demographics.

Things like where they live, their age, and so on.

Buying history or digital behaviours like social media follows.

This is not illegal but it does show how people's data is being used to persuade them to vote a certain way without them necessarily realising this is happening.

There was a really famous case study that we're going to have a look at Cambridge Analytica.

And Cambridge Analytica was a British political consultancy firm that was involved in hundreds of election campaigns globally.

In 2018, it was discovered that they had used the Facebook app, "This is your digital life" to acquire the data of 87 million Facebook users.

Only 270,000 Facebook users use the app, but this gave Cambridge Analytica access to the data of all the users, friends, networks, even though the user's friends had not given permission for this to happen.

This data was used by Cambridge Analytica to target different groups of people during election campaigns, including during the 2016 in EU referendum.

As a result of the scandal, Facebook banned Cambridge Analytica from advertising on its platform and the company ceased operations in 2018.

This links us to one of our human rights as outlined in the universal declaration of human rights in 1948.

It says, "No one shall be subjected "to arbitrary interference "with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, "nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation.

"Everyone has the right to the protection of the law "against such interference or attacks." And here you really need to think about this.

Can our right to privacy be protected fully when we share so much online? As was shown in the Cambridge Analytica case study, our information online is actually connected to lots of different things.

And we have to be really careful when we put our information online, that we select the right options, and often there'll be privacy options or if you sign up to a mailing list, then it will give you the option do you want to share this with third parties? And so we have to be really careful about what options we select and also what information we're willing to put online.

So it's a real consideration.

There's a responsibility from us as online users, but also to companies and social media platforms to help protect the information that we do put online.

My final task for you is to bring this all together.

And we're looking at social media.

Is it useful or is it harmful? So a question I have for you for this task is, is social media mainly a force for good in terms of reinvigorating democracy? Or does it pose harm to the democratic process? You need to give a justified reason for your answer and use different bits of evidence we've discussed throughout this lesson Now where you might choose to start this could be, in my view digital methods are mainly a force for good or mainly pose a danger to the democratic process because.

So choose one side of the argument or the other and use as much information as you can to justify.

And a really good thing to do to really justify your answer is to consider the opposite side of the argument and argue why that's not better than your argument.

So give that a go, see how you get on.

Press pause, spend about five, 10 minutes on this, and when you've written your response, you can press play and we will look at some feedback.

So well done for giving that written task a go and I'm sure you've got a lovely paragraph or two or three even on this question of, is social media mainly a force for good in terms of reinvigorating democracy or does it pose harm to the democratic process? And this is an evaluation.

So what I've done rather than write an answer that wouldn't be the same as yours because everyone writes differently, I've put the key points that we've covered in this lesson you could use for either side of the argument.

And as I talk to you through these points, you can look through your written response and see you've got in there and perhaps add on anything that you didn't have that you think supports your argument.

So we've got this idea that social media is a force for good and there's three key points that we can pull out from this lesson about social media being a force for good in terms of reinvigorating democracy.

Firstly, it reaches large numbers of people and statistically, we looked at those figures.

So it was 45% of the population can access and do access social media.

So anything done politically through democratic processes can reach 45% of the population.

It gets information out in a timely manner.

So if you have something that needs to go out in the next 10 minutes because it's really important, then you can do that.

Whereas historically it would be in, for example, tomorrow's newspaper.

Social media allows you to get information out as and when you need it.

And then lastly, we did the case study of free school meals.

And that just showed influence.

And that was the key word I spoke to you about in this lesson.

The fact that Marcus Rashford had influence, he used social media's platform and he used the influence strategies within social media to get that campaign out to many different people and get something done by the government.

So in those senses, it can be a force for good.

And it is a way that the democratic process could be reinvigorated and engage greater numbers than perhaps it does now.

However, on the other side, we do have to consider that social media can be quite harmful, and also it doesn't necessarily reach all groups within society.

And 55% of people can't be reached via social media because 55% of people aren't using social media.

It does allow for misinformation or fraud or over simplification of complex idea.

So we looked at that 20 second clip that the Conservative Party puts out on Twitter, but that really gave very little information.

It just tried to show the best points of what they wanted to put across.

And so we have to remember that we have got to look at all the information.

Although social media is really good at bringing the issue to your attention, you then have to delve deeper and find more detail about what it is they're trying to put across.

And then we also did that case study and considered the right to privacy in Cambridge Analytica.

And thinking about what information we've put out there, how it's used and how other people can access that information in potentially a harmful way.

Well done for completing that lesson today, looking at how social media could be used to improve political participation.

We started the lesson looking at citizens use of social media, thinking about all the different forms of social media that we know of and how they might be used to enable people to participate in politics.

And we looked at the case study of Marcus Rashford.

We looked at political party use of social media to engage voters, considering different examples of YouTube and Twitter and where it's been used, and how it's been used.

We have looked also at data protection and if there is a dark side to social media campaigning considering the Cambridge Analytica case study, and having a look around those real issues about how we can protect privacy, considering the Universal Declaration of Human Rights definition of what our privacy should be.

And then we've completed a range of activities thinking about checking our understanding, particularly at the end there, evaluating social media in terms of its usefulness or actually looking at whether it's actually quite harmful in terms of what it could do to political participation.

So well done for completing that.

And it was really good work today.

If you'd like to share your work with Oak National, then you are more than welcome to ask your parent or carer to do so on Instagram, Facebook or Twitter tagging in @OakNational and #LearnwithOak.

And there's one last thing for you to do and that is to complete your exit quiz now.

So well done for your work and it's been lovely teaching you another citizenship lesson.

I look forward to teaching you another one soon.