Unit 7 Blog Post
Unit 7 Blog Post Assignment: Digital citizenship includes modeling appropriate communication skills and being a productive digital citizen. Locate an article or blog post online written about the importance of digital citizenship, including perhaps a topic of controversy surrounding the use of technology in schools. Your blog post should include:
- Summary of the article/post content, include author/publication/blog information.
- Key points of the article, how the article/post influences your thinking about your future role as an ed leader, how you will be able to use the information shared in your future role, what further information you will seek as a result of reading the article/post.
- Include a hyperlink to the article/post in your blog post.
- Provide thoughtful comments on at least two of your classmates' blog posts submitted earlier in the week.
I've been talking with a colleague for a while now about the need and importance of developing a Digital Citizenship program that can be taught all throughout the grade levels in our school district- starting in elementary school and continuing all throughout our student's high school career. The need for it is evident- so many people take to the internet to connect worlds together, and to either freely air their opinion in overtly brash manners and/or share too much information which ultimately can compromise an individual's safety and privacy. I was happy to read that fellow blogger, Todd Flory, wrote about the importance of teaching Digital Citizenship at an early age in his blog Kidblog where he lays out the reasons for needing to teach to it, and several tips on successfully implementing such a goal. Ultimately, when kids are taught at an early age about the importance of digital citizenship, they can maintain integrity in their work through thoughtful citations, care in their grammar and spelling, respectful responses, and knowing how much information is safe to share. When this is done, a foundation will be set for them that they can continue to develop as they navigate the powerful world of online sources of communication.
Often times, schools/teachers tell students,
“Students here is your digital device, and here are your logins and passwords.
Be careful.”
However, in the intricate weaving of the internet, children need to be taught more than this. They need to know the importance of not sharing too much personal information, they need to be taught proper uses of grammar and spelling and proper ways to cite sources and images, and they most definitely need to practice at an early age how to respond to other peoples posts and comments, especially ones that they disagree with. For example, teachers should reinforce that when students comment on other peoples work, they should do so as if that person were present in their classroom. They should find commonalities and write on that, and then share their perspective and different experiences that may explain their disagreement. This is an art that must be practiced at a very early age, especially in this day and age where people often use extremely harsh words while remaining anonymous that ultimately can lead to unnecessary frustration and distress.
This article reinforced to me the need to begin to teach digital citizenship at a very early age to students in our district, and I appreciate that it gave online tools to do so though Kidblog. As a possible future administrator, it will be a worthy cause to discover ways in which teaching and protecting our students can come about through researching curriculums that address such needs. Reading through the Kidblog has helped me begin to discover methods to do just that.
I completely agree with all of us. I know you and I both teach at the high school level, so it's easy to think students should be taught digital citizenship tips at a young age and to not revisit it later. But this is equally, if not more, important and should take priority. Students often think that what they do online does not carry any weight and that when something is deleted, it really is gone forever. We know this is not the case, and educating students this way from the minute they have access to technology is crucial. This is a lifelong skill that will carry them into adulthood. The internet is only getting more powerful, and soon, I will venture, it will be our only source of information. Teaching the skills to safely access and post is important like any other skill.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing your ideas!
Yes, I love this article and blog! I feel this is an area that we neglect so much in education. We simply provide them the technology but don't teach them to appropriately use it. I also feel this is an area that administration needs to work on. They give us the resources but don't provide us with the know how. Both of these things affect the use of technology. From both the students and the teacher. It is not only teaching them, but also teaching and training the staff. Often staff ages range by many years and some are very tech savvy, while others are not. We need to make sure we are supporting them so that they can help support our students. This also goes into the buy in with staff. We need to show them why it is important to be knowledgeable in technology!
ReplyDeleteGreat point about teaching students how to be online Silvia. Erica also makes a valid point about the assumption we make as high school teachers. The digital citizenship education of a child should span K-12. There are important things they need to understand as a younger student, like privacy and passwords, and then appropriate interactions, when they're in their middle and high school years. Online academic conversations can be a powerful learning experience for students but if they're left without instruction or guidance, the results can be all over the place. One strategy I've found to be super helpful in my own classes is something I stole from an online course I took...discussion board response strategies (link below!). So the students make their initial post, but when commenting on a classmate, must use one of the strategies. This helps to avoid responses that are too short or don't add value to the discussion.
ReplyDeleteHow to reply in a discussion board: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1m0fbrhGAc2XlrEKQoOs-X7FJdq9hpApkqApielC3RYM/edit?usp=sharing
I agree also! We need to be proactive as educators to engage our students in safe use for social media. They need to recognize the importance of citizenship both online and offline. They also need to be able to recognize the importance of recognizing the dangers that exist throughout social media. Let's face it, social media is not going away, if anything it will continue to grow and become an integral part of life. The future workforce will be required to use it and future employers will use it to determine who they want to hire. As educators we need to teach our students how to use it and how to protect themselves while doing so!
ReplyDelete