Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is one that has provided students with unfiltered access to what is taking place half a world away via social media and the internet.

Students can now see the effects of war on those their own age in real time as Ukranians use cell phones to show what is taking place in their country — mostly unfettered from any type of propaganda.

Elise Knable, an audio, radio, video education instructor at Caesar Rodney High School in Camden, said there certainly has been great interest in the goings-on since Russia’s army attacked Ukraine last week.

“In my junior/senior classes, many students have been talking a lot about the war taking place in Ukraine as I walk in from hall duty to start class,” Ms. Knable said. “In their discussions, there are a lot of questions and concerns that arise about the situation, understanding what is going on and why it is happening.

“The discussion of the fact social media is playing the war before our eyes has also taken place and students have related it to previous wars they have learned about and how unlike many before, we are watching as a world while things are taking place.”

Ms. Knable said that has led to her class having conversations about the importance of empowering themselves with knowledge through their own research and learning about the war.

She said they have talked a lot about misinformation and how it is easily spread on social media when there isn’t the time taken to check facts and content.

“The students mentioned an example of someone posting a meme about the war that said ‘Ghenghis Kahn is invading China now,’ and they talked about how friends were believing it,” said Ms. Knable. “One student said, ‘If you don’t remember history from school and you believe everything without checking information, it becomes an issue.’”

She said her class is also comparing information from multiple sources to make sure it is reported fairly and that the knowledge they get from doing so can help them to understand better and even have educated conversations with others based on knowledge and fact, not speculation.

That also ties into the idea of understanding the history of the war and how that can better help students to comprehend what is going on.

“Another important thing we have discussed, especially as a school with a military base population, is about being considerate of others that might have family in Ukraine or Europe or in the military when they talk about the conflict,” Ms. Knable said.

“The discussion connects to the idea of empathy and understanding. We do not know how everyone feels about what is happening, and there may be individuals around us that are worried, fearful, stressed, far beyond concerns of the ‘what could happen’ because of their ties to family or the military.”

Variety of sources

Jay McCormick teaches AP Comparative Government at Caesar Rodney, a course that studies and compares six different governments across the world, one being Russia.

“One of the course topics we worked on at the beginning of the semester was charismatic legitimacy,” he said. “So we’ve talked about how people like Putin view these types of things as a way to build legitimacy. (Russia) has gone through a lot of inflation; the devaluing of their currency was a problem. They had been suffering losses in Chechnya, which questioned the military’s ability to maintain control. So they’ve had a series of defeats in a number of areas that made it look like Russia wasn’t as powerful as it was before. Now Putin is trying to get the people in Russia on his side.”

Mr. McCormick said his students are not really voicing any concerns over safety or expressing any major fears, but are mostly trying to understand why the invasion is happening. Along with class discussions, he has encouraged his students to read a wide variety of sources to stay informed.

“The acceleration of Putin’s actions have really brought a spotlight on authoritarian regimes and the growth and audacity of the tactics that those regimes are willing to take,” he said. “When I first started teaching the class many years ago, the authoritarian regimes with this level of audacity were more military coups, which now is not necessarily the case. So that’s something that’s a little different now.”

Spurring discussion

Matt Lindell, who teaches social studies and Advanced Placement classes at Cape Henlopen High School, talked about the differences of what is taking place in the Ukraine the past week over prior conflicts.

“We have not necessarily talked about the role of social media in this recent conflict; however, student access to social media has brought out a lot of questions from my students regarding the invasion, which has added to our class discussion,” Mr. Lindell said.

“I think accessibility to this information and the experiences of people their age involved in the conflict, which can be found on social media, is a good thing as it brings more perspective and awareness to the world around them.

“It also has created curiosity where I have had students saying, ‘I read an article on this topic based on something that they saw on social media being reported...’, which leads to questions, more learning, and more questions.”

Mr. Lindell and his students are also having discussions on the reliability of sources in regard to social media.

Jinx Oxlaj, 14, a ninth-grade student at Delaware State University’s Early College High School, and said she’s been getting much of her news about the situation from TikTok, but vets her sources by comparing videos to daily news stories.

“If a post doesn’t have some kind of source, that’s a red flag that it’s not credible,” she said. “But I think that is harder for younger people to discover what is real and what isn’t because they don’t even understand what could or couldn’t be credible.”

Jinx said when she has to write research papers for class, she and her classmates practice citing reliable sources for information, and she’s glad she’s paid attention to those lessons. However, she is frustrated that her skills haven’t been put to the test in real-time while trying to learn about Russia’s invasion.

“I think it’s kind of stupid that we’re in school learning about history, but not about the history that is being made in this moment,” she said. “It’s impactful, whether you’re Ukrainian and you are genuinely feeling this war through losses and through watching actual physical damage or you’re in the U.S. or Canada, watching the war or the effects it may have economically. I feel like it’s important to learn about it in some sense, so you actually understand what’s going on.”

Technology reliance

The accessibility of information through social media, as well as the reliance on social media is something that teachers must consider, according to Dr. Randi Pro, social studies teacher at Hodgson Vo-Tech in Newark.

“We, as teachers, have to almost pry the phones out of their hands during class time. It isn’t like how it was when I was a student,” Dr. Pro said. “We did have the internet to do some basic searches, but we never had real-time information in our hands like my students have today.”

Dr. Pro said she has since tried incorporating technology and social media into her curriculum in a limited capacity in an attempt to relate to her student’s and their reliability on social networks.

Like Mr. Lindell, Dr. Pro has also discussed the Ukrainian conflict with her students, including regular presentations of CNN 10, a digital news show that discusses both domestic and world events in an adaptive fit for the classroom.

“Over the past few weeks, they have covered the situation in Ukraine and students have definitely been paying attention,” Dr. Pro said.

“Students have had mixed reactions to Russia’s invasion. Some have felt that the U.S. needs to intervene on a more aggressive level, while others feel that it is not our country’s fight, and we should not get involved.”

Jinx said she’s seen a lot of kids her age making jokes online about the conflict or sharing memes, which she thinks is due, in-part, to desensitization.

“A lot of people my age don’t conceptualize that these are real people who are being killed, who are being displaced from this war, and they’re watching this in real-time,” she said. “Our history books talk about the way so many people have died, whether they were beheaded or brutally murdered, and it all becomes just another day in history.”

Jinx added that while her mother has engaged with conversation about the current events,  she thinks many of her peers don’t have parents  who are explaining it well.

“My friends and I had a long discussion about it on the bus and what was going on, why people are worried about it and what could happen, and I know that a big reason why I’m able to answer these questions is because my mother has always given me at least a little bit of insight of what’s happening,” she said.

“Our school isn’t really talking about it so you kind of have to educate yourself and your friends on it. And in some cases it makes kids feel like it’s OK to joke about it because there aren’t any adults talking to them about it.”