Social media isn’t like most other topics. You can’t learn it by reading about it, hearing lectures, or researching scholarly work. And you can’t teach it by using those, either.

As a student I’ve had multiple communications professors try to “teach” social media in the classroom. They’ve tried to explain it with little descriptions, brief tutorials of the Twitter, YouTube, and Flickr interfaces (Facebook is pretty much a given, these days), and describing potential applications. But rarely do any of them come close to accurately describing the nature of the medium, because these professors aren’t using these services themselves. I’ve got three steps to fix this. Check below the cut for the full list.

1. Recognizing the Value

This one’s easy. Almost everyone recognizes the value of social media. Even my mother, a high school beginning nursing teacher in rural Kentucky, recognizes the importance of understanding it.

“It’s the future,” she said, “it’s more and more important every day.”

And my mom, who’s still getting the hang of PowerPoint (you’re doing good, Mom!), is even starting to incorporate some social media into her classes by using YouTube videos to present material to her classes. She’s not yet on Twitter, Facebook or even LinkedIn, but she’s working her way up. She knows it’s important for her personally as well. She thinks there should be more contact with other health science teachers in the state, and she sees social media as a convenient means to do so.

There’s no question social media is important to know–especially in the communications industry. But how do you teach it?

2. You’ve Got to Use It

Use it. It’s as simple as that. If you aren’t active on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and at least familiar with the basics of multimedia social services like Flickr, YouTube, Vimeo, etc. you simply aren’t doing your job. Whether you’re a student, a teacher, or a PR professional, you need to use it, or don’t bother trying to teach it.

Most students are Facebook. The vast majority of them are familiar with YouTube. And most of them have heard about Twitter, but few have used it. But you’d be surprised–the rest of the social media world is, for the most part, still very unknown to them. Take Twitter, for example. My university–American University in Washington, D.C.–has a Twitter account that they actually use fairly effectively. Recently, they created a Twitter list for AU students.

It has 31 people on it. Currently there are well over 10,000 students at AU. See the disconnect, here?

Most communications educators seem to agree that using social media is key to teaching it. All of my communications professors here at AU have encouraged me in my usage of social media. Emily Kinsky (@ekinsky on Twitter), Assistant Professor in communications at Pepperdine University agreed as well.

“If I didn’t invest time  into knowing and using social media, I believe I would be doing my students a disservice,” she said in a brief Twitter conversation. “Social media is not a fad. It’s a necessary tool (or group of tools) in a communicator’s toolbox. We–esp. communications faculty–must use it and know it in order to best prepare our students for their careers.”

And on top of all that, an informal poll of my Twitter followers–although obviously a bit biased–revealed that they, too, think it’s important for educators to use social media. Out of 34 respondents, they rated the importance of of using social media about 4.12 on a scale of one to five, five being extremely important.

3. Make Who You’re Teaching Use It

You are a teacher. Regardless of your profession–whether you’re a PR pro, an educator, or a college student like myself–you’re likely to have to show someone else how to use technology, and on the forefront of Web technology is social media.

Everyone wants in, but there’s a high barrier to entry for many. They might say they don’t have time. They might say they don’t get it. Maybe they don’t see the benefit. Regardless, it’s your job as a technological and social media evangelist to show them how it works.

Even in my limited internship experience in agency public relations, I’ve already encountered multiple situations where training clients on social media was necessary. It has to be done the right way, and that involves making them use it. Give them first-hand, in-person demonstrations of the various services they need to use. Show them the ropes, tell them how you use it, and give them advice on how often they should be using these tools. And then get them started. If it’s Twitter, give them a couple relevant Twitter lists they can start following, and try to focus on people you know will interact with them. If they start @ replying someone and they actually write back, it’ll suck them in and show them the value to be found in social media interaction.

Whether it’s your mother, a group of college students, or a client, these guidelines apply. There’s only one way to learn social media and that’s to use it. You have to recognize the value and be able to communicate that to your mentees. You’ve got to use it yourself, to know the ins and outs of each service so as to be a better guide. And finally you’ve got to make them use it–if they don’t start, they likely never will. It takes some prodding and some motivation, but almost everyone can find value in some social media. Be a good teacher.

Did I miss anything? Have any other advice for those looking to teach someone social media, or learn social media themselves? Post it in the comments or @ reply us on Twitter at @shamable.

Alex Priest is a junior at American University in Washington, D.C. studying Public Communications and Marketing, and minoring in Statistics. Originally from Kentucky, Alex has embraced the capital city and has strong interests in public relations, advertising, social media, social justice causes, and politics. Check out his personal blog at alexpriest.com or follow him on Twitter, @alexpriest.