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"Mastering digital communication is much more than just about being safe and courteous online. It's also part of being a great Global Digital Citizen-the kind of citizen we must begin cultivating in our schools. digital At the Global Digital Citizen Foundation, we believe the role of an effective digital communicator is to show courtesy, integrity, and respectability in all forms of technology-based interactions and associations. Moreover, their role is also to model this behaviour for the rest of us. It makes sense to cultivate our learners to become such empowered individuals that are aware of their responsibility both for and with the power of the Internet, for the lasting well-being of our global community. Moving forward, then, how can we help them realize the meaning of a truly exemplary digital communication? What does such a practice look like in action?"

"You can create a safe space for your students to engage in conversation about digital topics with though-provoking images and a variety of activities. Students of all ages can use the image/discussion cards I've created in a variety of ways. Asking students to group images and assign groups a label will force them to engage in discussion and analysis of the artwork in front of them. The questions on the back of the image cards can make great journal prompts, debate topics, and launches for research and inquiry projects."

"As an elementary school science teacher, I find this not easy to admit, but some of my students' most rewarding and meaningful classes over the years have happened when I have taken a back seat and let my students "tinker." Whether they want to dam up a stream during a water study, build nests with mud and sticks while investigating local bird populations, or, after completing a set of Lego models, independently design and build spinning Lego tops from which energetic battles ensue, students love having time to explore and investigate independently. This fall, for example, I let a third-grade class have a "free choice period." I gave them a list of things that they could do, such as making crystals, handling pet rocks or having a dance party. Instead, they came up with their own idea: they wanted to make boats. So, I gathered materials and allowed them to use handsaws and hot glue guns (which they'd already been taught how to use safely). Of course, many teachers allow and encourage students to engage in creative play: we know that young children need the chance to explore, daydream, imagine, play and build without an outcome or even a product in mind-a place free from failure, because failure is not even part of the equation. But this often takes place outside the classroom."

The dangers of making learning so safe and so easy it lacks any real sense of challenge. When we do this we deny our learners the opportunities they need to learn from mistakes and grow their minds. 

"With the release of the film Bully and daily news reports about the devastating impact on students who have been relentlessly bullied, teachers find themselves on the front line in addressing bullying. It is time to move into action. Not In Our School offers solutions-based strategies and tools for change to a network of schools that are working to create safe, inclusive and accepting climates. The core ideas and actions of Not In Our School include: "

"Part of the purpose for student usage of technology in the classroom is to allow students to become creators not just consumers. A large part of this creative process for our learners is the resources that they find to put into their product. In this case we are talking about visual resources, or images. Many students and teachers go directly to Google and search images. They then copy and paste away. As many of us know, this can rise several issues. Two of them being: Inappropriate images appearing within the search. The use of pictures without permission of the rightful owner. These issues (and several others) have created the need of safe searching creative commons photos for educational use. Luckily there are several websites that students can go to for that very purpose!"

"Before you begin your meditation, find a quiet space to walk. It could be outdoors, or in a hallway, or even a large room, walking back and forth. Walking meditation can be a formal practice, like watching the breath. Or it can be informal, bringing awareness to this everyday activity, whenever you need to travel from point A to point B. Walking meditation gives us an opportunity to gather our awareness which so often becomes distracted or even stuck when the mind is left to its own devices. Whether moving between floors of a building, on a city street, or in the woods, it is an opportunity to guide ourselves out of the distracted autopilot we live in throughout so much of our day. Paying attention in this way, we stay safe by remaining fully aware of whatever is around. On any walk, hike, run, or other physical activity, without effort we may mentally check out-or we can practice awareness instead."

"The internet can be an ugly place, but you won't find bullies or trolls on Stuart Duncan's Minecraft server, AutCraft. Designed for children with autism and their families, AutCraft creates a safe online environment for play and self-expression for kids who sometimes behave a bit differently than their peers (and who might be singled out elsewhere). Learn more about one of the best places on the internet with this heartwarming talk."

"When 11-year-old blogger Malala Yousafzai began detailing her experiences in the Swat Valley of Pakistan for the BBC, she had no idea what momentous changes were coming in her life. Her father, Ziauddin, a school founder and dedicated teacher, was outspoken in his belief that girls, including his beloved daughter, had a right to an education. As they continued to speak out against restrictions imposed by extremists, Ziauddin received constant death threats, so many that he began to sleep in different places. But it was Malala who was almost killed, shot in the head by a gunman on her way home from school. Her survival and recovery have been little short of miraculous. Instead of being cowed by this horrific attack, Malala began to use the international attention she attracted to advocate for the cause of girls' education worldwide. Through her speeches, her autobiography I Am Malala, the work of her fund, and her travels to places where girls' education is in crisis, she has continued to focus on the effort to give all girls safe schools, qualified teachers, and the materials they need to learn. The film He Named Me Malala both celebrates her dedication to this cause and gives the viewer insight into her motivation. It begins with an animated portrayal of the teenage folk hero for whom Malala was named, Malalai of Maiwand, whose fearlessness and love of country turned the tide of battle for Afghan fighters. From those opening scenes, live action and animation tell the story of Malala's life before and after the attack. We see her at various times of her life: severely wounded in the hospital, teasing her brothers in her new home in England, giving a speech to the United Nations, teaching a class in Kenya, and more. Her efforts are ongoing and they are realized through her organization, the Malala Fund, which "empowers girls through quality secondary education to achieve their potential and inspire positive change in their communities.""

It's interesting how threads emerge from the books we read. An idea springs out at you from one book and then occurs again in another or a link is found between the two. When it turns up a third time in a different place and from an alternate perspective you really take notice. I have had this experience with the concept of emotional or psychological safety.

Learning is a social endeavour. Schools need to understand that for our students the social landscape has changed. Rather than turning away from this reality we need to understand what it means and what our children need to know and learn to safely maximise the opportunities it brings.

"If you'd asked farmers a few hundred years ago what skills their kids would need to thrive, it wouldn't have taken long to answer. They'd need to know how to milk a cow or plant a field. General skills for a single profession that only changed slowly-and this is how it was for most humans through history. But in the last few centuries? Not so much. Each generation, and even within generations, we see some jobs largely disappear, while other ones pop up. Machines have automated much of manufacturing, for example, and they'll automate even more soon. But as manufacturing jobs decline, they've been replaced by other once unimaginable professions like bloggers, coders, dog walkers, or pro gamers. In a world where these labor cycles are accelerating, the question is: What skills do we teach the next generation so they can keep pace?"

"Create your own DIY lighting around a LED light bulb hanging on a wire. This resourceful video from The Lighting Channel shares 10 ways to change a lightbulb: with paper, crochet, a bottle, a bowl, paper mâché, ducting tube, stencils, a metal utensil can, a pentagon tower made with construction paper, and a soft box. Remember to use LED lights for safety-they don't burn as hot as other kinds of light bulbs-and give them lots of room to breathe. As always, be safe, be smart, be sure to test your creations, and don't leave them unattended. And for an up close look at these ideas, check out this playlist. Here are two we want to try:"

"No one learns without making mistakes. Quite the opposite-we learn when we make mistakes. But in the classroom, making mistakes and taking risks can be at best unrewarded, and at worst ridiculed and unnecessarily penalized. I asked my 21-year-old son the other day what high school class had made him feel safe to make mistakes. He said that he never made mistakes. Really? He explained that he only did the work if he knew he was going to succeed. That made me think about my own teaching: Do I create a classroom where students will be risk takers?"

"Regardless of whether you think every infant needs an iPad, I think we can all agree that technology has changed education for the better. Today's learners now enjoy easier, more efficient access to information; opportunities for extended and mobile learning; the ability to give and receive immediate feedback; and greater motivation to learn and engage. We now have programs and platforms that can transform learners into globally active citizens, opening up countless avenues for communication and impact. Thousands of educational apps have been designed to enhance interest and participation. Course management systems and learning analytics have streamlined the education process and allowed for quality online delivery. But if we had to pick the top ten, most influential ways technology has transformed education, what would the list look like? The following things have been identified by educational researchers and teachers alike as the most powerful uses of technology for learning. Take a look. 1. Critical Thinking In Meaningful Learning With Technology, David H. Jonassen and his co-authors argue that students do not learn from teachers or from technologies. Rather, students learn from thinking-thinking about what they are doing or what they did, thinking about what they believe, thinking about what others have done and believe, thinking about the thinking processes they use-just thinking and reasoning. Thinking mediates learning. Learning results from thinking. So what kinds of thinking are fostered when learning with technologies? Analogical If you distill cognitive psychology into a single principle, it would be to use analogies to convey and understand new ideas. That is, understanding a new idea is best accomplished by comparing and contrasting it to an idea that is already understood. In an analogy, the properties or attributes of one idea (the analogue) are mapped or transferred to another (the source or target). Single analogies are also known as sy