Teachers are becoming stars these days on TikTok, that social media platform for sharing short videos. And some of them say the platform serves as a kind of virtual teaching lounge during COVID.

But is it a good thing for the teaching profession that classroom instructors are part of a site known for dance crazes, jokes and other irreverent content?

Teacher TikTok is now something of a cultural phenomenon. If you search #teachersoftiktok on TikTok, it says videos on the hashtag have more than 6 billion views. And last week a teacher who went viral on the platform appeared on the prime-time special for the presidential inauguration.

For this week’s EdSurge Podcast, we talked with two very different teachers who have gone viral on TikTok. OK, we weren’t able to get that teacher who was on national TV last week.

Brooke Rogers, who teaches at a private middle school in the San Francisco Bay Area, aims to spread joy about teaching and kind of boost the profession. In fact, she even helped start a group of teacher TikTokers called Teacher Hype House. The group even has a website, explaining that they meet up and “have fun and inspire teachers.”

Lately, some have worried that TikTok and other social media sites may actually be too hype, though. The critique, known as “toxic positivity,” is that all these happy glimpses of classrooms mask the challenges of the current moment when it comes to teaching. After all, we’re living through a pandemic.

Rogers, though, feels that it’s important to have a place to focus on the positive, even as times are tough. “I use social media to escape from my reality, so for me and my content, that's the purpose I serve,” she says. “I just want to make you smile.”

But you can find a variety of approaches among teachers using TikTok.

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Hear more on the full episode of this week’s podcast. Listen to this week’s episode on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Play Music, or wherever you listen to podcasts, or use the player on this page.