This is a voicethread presentation about the use and purpose of Walled Gardens in educational settings.
DiLenardo, Diana, The Debate on Internet Censorship in Public Schools, Fordham University School of Law, Intellectual Property, Media, and Entertainment Law Journal, October 09, 2011
COPA Commission report - discusses pros and cons of different methods of controlling content. Makes specific measurements of impact on 1st amendment rights, and privacy.
Digital Citizenship as defined by digitalcitizenship.org
is the norms of appropriate, responsible technology use. That is what
we need to learn ourselves and teach our students.
As noted in Roblyer Integrating Educational Technology into Teaching, "even in the rapid environment of technological evolution, remarkable changes in communications have come about with incredible speed." The speed of technological advances, above all, seems to be creating some of the challenge we face when educating students about Digital Citizenship.
The rapid pace of development of capabilities brings new opportunities and new risks. It's important for teachers to be aware of the evolving social media and what is popular in order to frame Digital Citizenship in the most current way possible. You can almost identify splits within the younger generation by the social networking they favor: Facebook vs Instagram and Snapchat, for instance.
Existing and interacting online is really just an extension to existing in the real world. I believe this approach makes it much easier to teach and understand the
issues of security, safety, privacy, and responsible use. Therefore, the message to students is that they should treat internet resources and interactions just as they would face-to-face interactions in their everyday life. However, even given this underlying principle, there are still unique challenges related to their online existence that must specifically be addressed.
Safety: From a very young age we teach children not to take candy from strangers yet investigative news programs have provided us with evidence that children of all ages can easily forget these lessons . This clip is from NBC's recent series "My Kid Would Never Do That" and it highlights how easy it is for kids to forget what the rules are.
Internet safety is even more challenging. It is easy to tell kids about what to do and what not to do and the reasons why. The internet is a wide open space that feels safe for teens to explore and use to communicate with friends. What we can push for is when or if a teen encounters an unsafe or upsetting situation on the internet, they will know what to do and who to talk to. It is mostly about informing kids, not about making them worry or be afraid.
Security: Young people are aware of the internet and the risks it presents. Sometimes teens don't think about security and guarding their personal information. A good discussion with teens is to make sure they understand not to give out their social security number, personal details, credit card information, or passwords to anyone on line. This lesson is learned the hard way by many adults as well. I often get a notice through the school email warning teachers not to click on a link that sends them to a site that asks for their email password so that their account can be "fixed". Some people apparently have to learn that lesson several times. It is easy to fall into that trap. Scammers have great lines and make it seem like the action is immediately necessary.
Privacy: Similar to security, teens are likely to give up privacy to gain access to social networking sites. Saferinternet.org has links to resources about recommended privacy settings for Facebook, instagram, snapchat, pinterest, and other social networking sites. Even as adults we have a tendency to give up our privacy in this way. Many of the Facebook games like Farmville require the user to grant the game access to privacy settings and other personal content. Still, many adults make the choice to use those features either for entertainment or for convenience.
Responsible Use: This may be one of the most important details of digital citizenship. How we use the internet and the resources we find there is central. This includes cyberbullying, plagiarism, improper use of copyrighted material, participating in sexting (posting or forwarding). Another aspect of this is teaching students how to determine what resources are reliable and what are not.
Special Consideration for Educators: Responsible Use: It is easy for us to think of the lessons we need to teach the kids about their activities online. We are especially concerned that they understand cheating and plagiarism. In providing this lesson, we need to be conscious of our own violations. Often teachers will download content without citing it and will make copies and distribute without permission. On these occasions we could use it as a learning example if we were to point out how we reference the information or how we were able to get permission to duplicate and distribute. We can show that it is an easy and important step to take. Privacy and Safety: When we are using digital resources to engage and evaluate students, and to communicate their progress to both the students themselves and parents, we need to remember our responsibility to the safety and privacy of that student. While there are many types of apps that are excellent tools for education, we need to be cautious that those tools are not collecting and saving private information about the users. In addition, if we are posting grades or other types of evaluations we must ensure that the information can not be accessed by unauthorized people. Federal regulations have been developed to guide educational institutions to maintain the security and privacy of student data. Those include FERPA, COPPA, CIPA, and PPRA. The full description can be found on http://tech.ed.gov/privacy/
"We must provide our schools, teachers and
students cutting-edge learning tools. And we must protect our children’s
privacy. We can and must accomplish both goals"
Secretary Arne Duncan, February 24, 2014 (tech.ed.gov)
Other Resources:
Digital Citizenship for Students:
Safer Internet UK Website: Includes videos and resources for teachers/parents to share with kids.
Training: A pretty good resource. This consists of an hour long training and quiz. You will get a certificate and access to excellent materials to use with students.
US Dept. of Education: Division of educational technology. Resources for teachers, administrators, and parents about appropriate use, privacy rights, and safety.
