Robin Skelley

Visionary Leadership in Instructional Technology

FRIT 7232
Spring 2014

Pearce, N., Learmonth, S. (2013). Learning beyond the classroom: evaluating the use of Pinterest
in learning and teaching in an introductory anthropology class. Journal of Interactive
Media in Education, Autumn 2013. Retrieved from www-jime.open.ac.uk/jime/index

This article details a case study that used the website Pinterest as an educational resource
in introductory anthropology classes. The introduction details the use of digital media in the
classroom over the past 10 years. The authors note that this study is based off an early project
done by C-SAP that recorded how students and teachers used YouTube in the classroom. The
researches involved in the study noted that students were independently interacting with each
other using various forms of social media to develop their own understanding and knowledge
(p. 2).
The article goes on to explain how Pinterest works and how educators have already
started using it in the classroom. The authors then describe the media developed for the study.
Electronic boards were created using Pinterest for each week of the 10 week anthropology class.
The article notes that the only data recorded by the site comes from registered users, so
students could view the boards without creating an account, which made collecting data
challenging. The researchers decided to use focus groups along with quantitative data that was
available from the site in order to evaluate the study. Two focus groups were created from two
classes with the teacher of each class acting as the moderator.
The data collected from the site shows that students were interacting with the boards and
sharing the information presented on the boards. The comments from the focus group were
mostly positive; students found it an interesting way to group and store information. However,

some commented that there had been too much information shared on the boards and they did
not get a chance to read all the information provided.
The article concludes that there is evidence that Pinterest was used by students to
develop their understanding (pg. 10). The authors suggest that there are some issues that need
more research, including the effectiveness of the site on student achievement and critical
thinking, as well as what barriers exist with sharing resources among classmates.
I found this article to be an interesting evaluation of the educational use of a website that
I visit often in my personal life. I feel that the authors did an excellent job of describing the use
of social media in the classroom over the past decade. They also provided a good explanation to
the reader what Pinterest does and how teachers and students already use it.
However, I believe that the authors could have done a better job discussing how their
research was collected. It is unclear if all the students in the two classes could view the boards or
if it was only the students in the focus groups. I also think that the data the collected is not
enough to make a conclusion about the effectiveness of the study. The researchers are only sure
that a minimum of 8% of the course cohort had interacted with Pinterest accounts (pg. 6). I
feel that the groups were too small to get an accurate measure of how the students were using the
boards.
Overall, I believe that this article is a good introduction to the use of Pinterest in the
classroom. Even though I believe that there needed to be more data collected, the information is
enough to convince me that Pinterest is a positive tool to use in the classroom. Though I dont
currently teach, I feel that using Pinterest is an excellent way to collect new ideas for training and
other projects.