An Assessment of the Extent of Facebook Use by Students at Kisii University, Kenya and Its Implication on Educational Activities

Abstract

The study purposed to assess the extent of Facebook use by fourth year Bachelor of Education students at Kisii University, Kenya and its implication on educational activities. Social networking sites allow users to establish networks with other users. This enables communication through platforms such as Facebook and Twitter among others. While these technologies have eased communication a number of problems abound such as distraction of students from their studies. This was a case study in which fourth year Bachelor of Education students were sampled. The participants consisted of 300 Bachelor of Education students 2012/2013 academic year and 5 ICT officials. Stratified random sampling was used to select 86 males and 85 females to make a sample size of 171. The response rate was 83.6% with 143 respondents returning their fully filled up questionnaires. Data were analyzed using frequencies, means and percentages and presented in tables. The study established that: 93.7% (134) of the respondents used Facebook and spent on average 115 minutes daily Facebooking. The students were found to be spending much of their time socializing online rather than using the social network for academic use. Based on these findings and conclusions, it was recommended that rather than using Facebook for socialization only; the University management and students should be encouraged to embrace it more as a teaching and learning resource as it had the potential to enhance learning.