Group items tagged

For a wide range of topics/resources on Digital Citizenship, check out this Diigo List. All resources have been tagged and cataloged from the entries found in the Ad4dcss Diigo Group on Digital Citizenship. This just makes them easier to find when educators are preparing a workshop or focusing on a specific topic area.

Since social-media use is so multi-faceted, no single approach will apply to all situations. Some schools may opt to place an outright ban on social-media access at school as well as prohibit "friending" parents, students and other employees. Other schools may simply prohibit employees from identifying their school online. As the use of social-networking sites for educational and community communication purposes increases, schools may need to adapt to the mainstream use of such sites and recognize that a blanket prohibition simply isn't practical. Regardless, your school should take action now to safeguard against social media mishaps.

Anti-Phishing Phil™ is an engaging online game that teaches students and adults how to identify phishing URLs. The game was developed at Carnegie Mellon (in partnership with Wombat Security Technologies). Scientific evaluation has shown that Phil is more engaging than traditional training solutions and significantly more effective in terms of how well people are later able to detect phishing attacks and how long they remember what they have learned.

Several states have taken the NETS standards one to several steps further in identifying what K-12 education must achieve in terms of facilitating student proficiency in the defined skills. These efforts have, in some cases, led to standards being issued by each state for its own students to meet

This has great resources. I'm very excited to see New Jersey's focus on Career and Life Skills. However, not seeing the same focus in other states has me wishing for national standards.

Pupils given a greater degree of freedom to surf the internet at school are less vulnerable to online dangers in the long-term, inspectors say. "Managed" online systems were more successful than "locked" ones at safeguarding pupils' safety, they said. The inspectors' research was commissioned in response to a report by Dr Tanya Btron, which assessed the risks children faced when using the internet and video games.

Excellent 8-minute video from the UK's Thinkuknow education program that helps children to understand what constitutes personal information. The assembly enables children to understand that they need to be just as protective of their personal information online, as they are in the real world. It also directs where to go and what to do if children are worried about any of the issues covered.

A free-to-play "alternate reality game" from the UK commissioned by Channel 4 Education that is intended to give teenage players a personal encounter with everything from identity theft to cyber stalking. Kids (age 14-16) explore websites, search for clues, receive phone calls, chat on IM, and tackle puzzles and mini-games. Through thirteen challenges, (each lasting 10-20 minutes) and a dramatic storyline, they find out who they can trust and who they can't.

A range of research reports suggest that digital literacy should be a key part of curricular developments in both primary and secondary schools. Digital literacy is about far more than functional ICT skills: it requires support for children to access, create and communicate using ICT, as well as to be evaluative and critical about the influences and impacts of new media.

From the Elementary Teachers' Federation of Ontario (ETFO). This downloadable 246-page resource includes teacher-authors' individual or group units, modified by curriculum inquiry and peer review, and provides many links to resources.

tasks that teach students how to assess credibility of online information

Noelle, did you create these forms and doc? If so, would you be willing to share the backside spreadsheets to view, so that I could make a copy of them? Thanks

No, I did not create these. They were shared by Google's Education Trainer, Dan Russell, at a training I attended. You can access his presentation and other resources at https://sites.google.com/site/gwebsearcheducation/

Very helpful for Cyber Security and Fair Use

A commericial solution to social networking in the classroom. ConnectYard enables schools to leverage popular social media for teaching students where they live and socialize, online. The platform offers K-12 schools their own private learning communities with controlled access that are integrated with popular social networks like Facebook, which serves to make course work more social and collaborative by keeping students involved and engaged both in and outside of the classroom. Only users approved by the school are permitted to join the community and interact with other users. This eliminates a primary concern of both parents and administrators.\n\nConnectYard also provides teachers with the ability to audit student groups, walls, etc. This serves to ensure that both the interactions and information being shared are appropriate, which helps to guard against cyber bullying or posting of copyrighted materials. Thus fostering safe and secure learning communities, or Yards, that improve the student educational experience and chances for success.

Many administrators, teachers, and parents simply associate MySpace and FaceBook with the term social networking, possibly adding Twitter to the mix and generally writing off the technology as an unsafe liability. However, we all need to expand our view of what social networking can be. Kid-friendly social media also doesn't need to mean Club Penguin and Webkins.

Right now, sexting is a crime and kids can be prosecuted for distribution of pornography. And if a person is convicted of a sex crime, they have to register as a sex offender which will haunt them for years (talk about your permanent record...).\n\nIn Vermont, there is a movement to decriminalize sexting. We agree that kids shouldn't be prosecuted for essentially doing something really stupid. But we do believe it's up to parents to educate their teens about this really risky practice. Kids should know that anything they send can be redistributed in an instant to anyone and could result in tremendous humiliation and pain.\n\n

Lessons have been developed to be consistent with national student learning standards, including the ISTE Standards and the National Council of Teachers of English. Right now, lesson plans are only available for high school students but elementary and middle school curriculum is coming soon.

Effects of Cyberbullying: New research by a group of school psychologists trained in Olweus Bullying Prevention methods that they have applied to bullying in the digital environment.

Excellent video from Peggy Sheehy of SECOND LIFE fame. \n\nWhen kids at the Suffern Middle School were asked to talk about education and their future, they gave Peggy Sheehy, the SMS media specialist, an earful. Listen and learn the bits of wisdom that can be gleaned from the students, if we only dare to ask them

Students and parents are demanding Metro Nashville's public schools stop blocking access to Web sites about lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues. They complained to the American Civil Liberties Union, which on Wednesday gave Metro and Knox County schools an April 29 deadline to announce plans to open access to the non-sexual sites. A letter to the districts threatened lawsuits if they don't comply.