Ad4dcss/Digital Citizenship

The image was blurred and the voice distorted, but the words spoken by a young Ohio woman are haunting. She had sent nude pictures of herself to a boyfriend. When they broke up, he sent them to other high school girls. The girls were harassing her, calling her a slut and a whore. She was miserable and depressed, afraid even to go to school.

To parents, it's even more frightening than the huge monthly bills teens run up on their cell phones. To prosecutors, it's yet another way that technology has complicated their jobs.

On April 22, the Stop Bullying Now! Campaign will host a webcast on cyberbullying. The webcast will help participants learn about best practices in cyberbullying prevention and intervention and how to lend support when bullying occurs. The webcast, held from 3:00 to 4:30 pm EST, will feature experts such as Susan Limber, PhD, MLS, from Clemson University, who will provide current information on the use of cyber technologies and the emerging phenomenon of cyberbuylling among youth.

Story of a FaceBook account that was hijacked. The criminal promptly changed all of he log-in information, impersonated the account owner, and sent requests to all of his friends for money. He claimed he was in London and his wallet had been stolen so he needed people to wire him money, ASAP.

Did you know that 42% of kids have been bullied while online? Did you know that 35% of kids have been threatened online? Did you know that Palo Alto is home to the most popular Social Networking site in the world, Facebook? Did you know that the Palo Alto School District DOES NOT have a cyber-bullying policy? Surprised? Me too.

The worrying extent of the use of technology to bully school and college staff was revealed today with the release of survey results by the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL) and Teacher Support Network. One in seven respondents said they had experienced cyberbullying and almost one in five said they knew of colleagues who had become victims.

From Patti Afgatson, Olweus Bullying Prevention expert and author of Bullying in the Digital World

A U.S. judge on Monday barred a Pennsylvania prosecutor from filing child pornography charges against three teenage girls caught with sexually suggestive pictures of themselves on their cell phones.

A St. Petersburg teacher is accused of sending pornographic pictures of herself to a 14-year-old boy. Police say 32-year-old Christy Lynn Martin admitted she used a cell phone to exchange naked pictures with the boy last weekend.

This is a positive step forward if the focus is going to be on how digital technologies can transform teaching and learning, and if students are encouraged to think critically about the media-ecosystem they inhabit.

Surgeons 'Tweet' From Operating Room During Brain Surgery

Net Savvy Parenting in the New Year: Five Things You Need to Know. Sound advice from Anne Collier of NetFamily News

New book by Mike Ribble (Author of Digital Citizenship in the Schools). You want your children to enjoy all the benefits a technological society has to offer, but at the same time, you want them to stay safe and act as responsible members of society. Raising a Digital Child is your guide. Inside, you will learn about many of the newest and most popular technologies, in parent-friendly language, along with discussions of the risks each might harbor and the types of behaviors that every child should learn in order to become a good citizen in this new digital world.

Make sure to track Santa!!

An online bullying survey was completed by 216 students - 93.7 percent were freshmen- enrolled in the University Experience classes at Kansas State University. The goal of the survey was to determine if bullying behavior followed students from high school into college and how freshmen perceived bullying. The survey used the cyberbullying definition provided in Kansas' anti-bullying law, which took effect in January 2008 and was revised in July to include cyberbullying. The law requires schools to develop anti-bullying policies, plans and preventative measures. Cyberbullying is the use of any electronic communication device, such as e-mail, instant messaging, text messages, blogs, mobile phones, pages, online games or Web sites, to create an intimidating, threatening or abusive environment.

American Association of School Administrators, Education.com and Symantec have launched a Special Edition on Bullying at School and Online reflecting new evidence-based, peer-reviewed content to dispel common myths about bullying.

The Internet has changed the playground bully into the in-my-bedroom-bully. It's true; the line between school life and home life is gone. Kids can no longer leave the social pressures, cliques, bullies, snootiness and the other highlights of adolescence at school.

AOL has unveiled a new online safety education Web site, SafetyClicks.com, and introduced an improved version of its free, downloadable parental controls software (parentalcontrols.aol.com). To develop content, SafetyClicks.com worked closely with ConnectSafely.org, a non-profit safety organization. For organizations and Internet safety experts that have direct contact with parents, educators, kids and teens, AOL continues to build relationships with them to promote awareness of online safety. "Friends of SafetyClicks.com" includes organizations such as ConnectSafely, ESRB, Enough Is Enough, Family Online Safety Institute, GetNetWise, Internet Keep Safe Coalition, iSafe, LOOKBOTHWAYS, NetFamilyNews, NetSmartz411, ParentDish, WebWiseKids, WiredSafety, WorkingMother.

The Center for Safe Schools in Pennsylvania has produced this 22-minute Internet safety video: Protecting Kids Online. This Internet safety resource speaks to parents and caregivers on topics from understanding the serious repercussion of cyber-bullying to learning how to safeguard our children from online predators. There are many first-person accounts and real stories told here that would be helpful in generating a discussion.