By renegadescienceteacher / TikTok
At first glance, TikTok just looks like a fun application for teenagers. However, it's actually full of educational and edutainment content, which is proving a hit among the social network's young users. In fact, the #LearnOnTikTok hashtag has over 412 billion views.
At first glance, TikTok just looks like a fun application for teenagers. However, it's actually full of educational and edutainment content, which is proving a hit among the social network's young users. In fact, the #LearnOnTikTok hashtag has over 412 billion views.
It is actually one of the most popular hashtags on the app, according to a Pentos report cited by Forbes. Since the analytics company started monitoring the #LearnOnTikTok hashtag in July, the number of videos mentioning it has increased by 15%. This is faster growth than the #dance, #meme, #comedy, #makeup and #storytime hashtags over the same period.
These figures illustrate the appetite among Generation Z and Millennial web users for educational videos. These age groups alone represent 75% of TikTok users, according to the online commerce platform Shopify.
Faced with the scale of the phenomenon, many teachers are now producing educational content for the social network. For example, @maitresseadeline is a French school teacher who helps her 1.8 million subscribers "learn French easily." Meanwhile, @renegadescienceteacher is an American science educator whose popular videos are followed by 1.4 million internet users.
They all agree that their posts are not intended to replace the lessons given by their colleagues in schools. They just want young people, who spend an average 1 hour and 50 minutes on TikTok per day, to deepen and expand their knowledge thanks to the application. All while avoiding the trap of so-called fake news.
Beware of misinformation
If most of the educational videos available on TikTok are rigorous and factual, some flirt with misinformation. Subjects such as history, science and geopolitics are particularly prone to misinformation. In September, the company News Guard noted that false or misleading information circulates at alarming levels on the social network that's ultra-popular among 13-to-24-year-olds. This phenomenon is all the more worrying since TikTok is increasingly used as a search engine by young people.
Caution is therefore advised for students who would like to use TikTok as part of their studies. And much suggests that more and more of them are doing so. Nearly three out of four US students now turn to social networks as part of their studies, according to a recent survey by textbook publisher McGraw Hill. Nearly 40% of them explain that they learn their various lessons better this way.
However, the scientific community largely takes the opposite stance. In fact, scientists suggest that the use of cell phones and social networks could have a negative impact on the academic performance, concentration and mood of students. Researchers at Kent State University found that students who frequently consult their smartphones have lower grades than those who use them less, for example. "TikTok is designed to get its claws in you and just not let go," Andrew Lepp, a Kent State University professor, told Forbes. "So you might open the app with the intent of getting a little bit of guidance or insight on whatever you’re studying, but I bet a lot of people would easily slide back into their non-educational TikTok habits once the app was open."
