Middle school students learn how to be good ‘digital citizen’ FRANKFORT, Ind. (WLFI) – In a world full of technology one middle school is teaching students how to be good digital citizens. Tuesday’s topic is cyberbulling in the newly formed digital citizenship class at Frankfort Middle School. The class is principal Michael Kelley’s idea after seeing a news story of a father concerned about his daughter’s safety on social media sites. “He was really concerned about what was going on,” Kelley said. That story sparked an idea bring the discussion of what not to do online to the classroom. “We’re asked to take on a lot of parent responsibilities as a school, but this one is one I feel we can help parents a lot with,” Kelley said. Advisory teacher Angela Vargas teaches the class. “We’re really working on how they can build a positive digital footprint now instead of having to try to repair some bad reputation or digital footprints that they have later on,” Vargas said. Vargas said a key to making this class a success is parental involvement. Like this:
Social Media at School: Teaching Safety on the Virtual Playground These days, social media gets a pretty bad rap. It seems like every other day there is a celebrity apology or a story about a teen who commits suicide due to cyberbullying. It's true, social media can breed some pretty awful stuff. And that awful stuff is great material for the digital citizenship unit that all of my school's incoming freshmen are expected to complete. Acceptable Use Our school is unique in Philadelphia in that it's one of the few public schools with a 1:1 program that allows students to take devices home. Let's face it -- teenagers are on social media in school and out of school, even if their parents have told them they can't be, and even if the school has rules about being on phones during school hours. In my class, we start the year with the book, lol. . .OMG by Matt Ivester. Always Learning It is through these discussions that I learn about how students use social media, what their experiences have been, and what their beliefs are.
The Urgency of Digital and Media-Literacy Skills What a fantastic year that has begun – already full of so much possibility and no lack of challenges either! I am faced with the realities of my own personal beliefs that we are in an era of urgent need for digital and media literacy skills. As a result, I know that I have to make changes to my pedagogy that facilitate students acquiring the necessary skills, while still increasing their achievement. I am a big believer in the power of digital media, and the fact that our students are rapidly moving toward a full digital existence, if we aren’t already almost there yet. Digital media has opened up challenges as well. We need to look toward new objects of study and toward connecting with evolving practices and design challenges of the 21st century. After starting the school year, here is what I know so far: It really doesn’t matter how long you have been teaching, classroom management and self-regulation are always at the forefront. Differentiation is essential. Conclusions Deborah McCallum
11 Tips For Students To Manage Their Digital Footprints 11 Tips For Students To Manage Their Digital Footprints by Justin Boyle If you’ve scratched your head over suggestions to manage your “digital footprint,” you aren’t the only one. A surprisingly large percentage of people have never even heard the phrase, let alone thought about how to manage theirs responsibly. The Definition Of A Digital Footprint Simply put, a digital footprint is the record or trail left by the things you do online. Luckily for us all, most of the major sources of personal information can be tweaked so we share only certain things with the general public. If you want to show students their digital footprint (or take a peek at your own) the personal info search engine Pipl.com is a great resource. What To Tell Your Students About Monitoring Their Digital Footprints: 11 Tips 1. Let’s talk Facebook, shall we? 2. Then delete the ones you no longer use. 3. 4. 5. You may be surprised what you find. 6. 7. 8. That said, you don’t need 12. 9. 10. 11. Conclusion
Online Safety: A Teacher’s Guide to Dealing with Cyberbullying, Sexting, and Student Privacy Social media and text messages have blurred the lines between students’ school lives and private lives. While most schools take clear steps to protect students at school, more schools are beginning to consider the need to set policies that apply to students’ activities outside of school. When it comes to questionable online activities like cyberbullying and sexting, kids sometimes feel pressured to follow the crowd. Image via Flickr by Brad Flickinger. Privacy Since the birth of the Internet, adults have been worried about kids sharing too much online. On the plus side, teens are becoming increasingly aware of the need to protect themselves online. What can you do? Have students commit to following school rules. Cyberbullying Social media and text messages are vital to many students’ social lives. The best approach to protecting students against cyberbullying is to be proactive and create guidelines before problems arise. Get students involved. Sexting Inappropriate Content Now, Keep up
#Presentation #workshop - Your Digital Footprint What is digital literacy? Digital literacy is the topic that made the ETMOOC learning space so irresistible to me… I think as educators we spout off about wanting our students to be digitally literate, but not many of us (myself included) have a firm grasp about what that actually means, and quite a number of us are still attempting to become digitally literate ourselves. Whatever that means. It turns out, defining digital literacy isn’t such an easy task. The etmooc community was fortunate enough to hear Doug Belshaw speak on this topic in a recent webinar. Doug explained that digital literacy is quite ambiguous, and he doesn’t have all of the answers when it comes to defining these terms. 30 definitions of digital literacy represented in one of the first texts about the topic (from Gilster, published in 1998!!) trying to figure out what it is and how we can ensure our students are “digitally literate.” Doug shared this quote from his research (Martin, 2006): “Digital literacy is a condition, not a threshold.”
DML Central | Taking Control of Your Digital Identity A friend told me I was “going rogue” when I leased a slice of off-campus server to host The Social Media Classroom for my UC Berkeley and Stanford courses. The social affordances for the learning management systems at both institutions did not fulfill my needs for sophisticated forum, blog, wiki, and chat tools in courses about social media that used social media intensively as part of the curriculum. It cost me $50/year for a server that enabled me to install the SMC, MediaWiki, WordPress, and other online publishing platforms. When I taught Digital Journalism at Stanford, I soon learned to ask other instructors about particularly tech-savvy students before I started the course each year. For journalists, it’s clear that some knowledge of how to manage your own online publishing platform has become an essential professional skill. Fortunately, Groom pointed me to Reclaim Hosting, which offered domain name, server, and support services for educational uses at a cost of $25/year.
Digital Literacy | Communication Learning | Media Education | Skills Communication What is Digital Citizenship? Creating awareness of what students are creating and doing online. GUEST COLUMN | by Melissa Davis Digital citizenship is a hot topic amongst educators and district leaders these days. In the last few years, many districts, specifically those who’ve implemented 1-to-1 or BYOD policies, are being increasingly mandated to incorporate digital citizenship lessons into their curricula. But what exactly is digital citizenship? As an educator how are you supposed to combine all of the potential lessons around teaching a student how to use technology appropriately and be a responsible, safe, digital citizen on the internet, into one class? As one of the founders of a social, e-portfolio tool for students, I first heard the term digital citizenship three ago at an ISTE conference. So needless to say, as I said, ‘Yes, of course our platform can be used to teach digital citizenship’, I needed to completely understand what this meant. Digital Commerce – Buying and selling goods online safely. Related
Cornell University - Digital Literacy Resource Digital Literacy Home Welcome to the Microsoft Digital Literacy curriculum. Whether you are new to computing or have some experience, Digital Literacy will help you develop a fundamental understanding of computers. The courses help you learn the essential skills to begin computing with confidence, be more productive at home and at work, stay safe online, use technology to complement your lifestyle, and consider careers where you can put your skills to work. Use the menu below to see the Digital Literacy curricula and courses available in your preferred language. After you select a language, click “go”, and the offers available will appear in a new dropdown box. The Microsoft Digital Literacy curriculum has three levels. The Basic curriculum features a course called A First Course Toward Digital Literacy. The Standard curriculum is available in four versions. Version 4 uses examples and simulations from Windows 8 and Microsoft Office 2013.
What is Digital Literacy? | LINCS Community Colleagues, Below is the introduction to an article I have just written for my Adult Literacy Education blog, Last year the print and digital magazine, TEACH, the largest national education publication in Canada, asked readers “What Does Digital Literacy mean to you?” In the June 13th, 2012 English version of the magazine, two responses were published. I wrote the first one, in the contexts of digital literacy for older youth and adult learners, and in the context of myself as a learner. Is digital literacy really literacy? To read more, and contribute your thoughts, reply to the blog article at You could also copy your reply here. David J. djrosen123@gmail.com