Internet Safety
Internet safety and digital citizenship has definitively been a talk in our district lately. We recently discovered that we can no longer use Quizlet as an online tool with our students. The reasoning behind this comes on an agreement the company refused to sign for our district. According to our director of technology, Quizlet wanted for our students to sign up with a personal account, which could not be their county email account that is provided to the students year after year. Asking for our students to sign up with a personal account would put personal information to be collected, and do other things such as provide advertisement to our students. Some of Quizlet’s terms and conditions violate the state and our local county policies. For all these reasons, the district has decided to not agree with Quizlet and it is now a blocked website in our school district. One thing that our technology director how it has been recommended by the district lawyers to obtain software agreements on all of the web tools that the staff and students of our district use on a daily basis. This was definitely a learning experience for everyone, especially for me. Many teachers raised questions and concerns regarding the agreement and in the end, we just want to to ensure our students are being protected while using the internet.
I always try my best to promote digital citizenship with my students, but have to admit that I have not been taken it as seriously as I need to. This is one area I plan on discussing with our instructional technology coach this month. It is very important to teach our students how to safely use the internet without putting their privacy at risk. Technology is continually advancing and it is at the tip of the hands of our children. It is the caretakers, parents and teachers responsbility to teach them the rights and wrongs of internet safety.
Resources for Teachers
One resource that I found helpful for teachers comes from Google Education. I found the following youtube video from Google Education discusses different tips for teachers and students can follow to ensure how to stay safe online. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25G4tLVH1JE Some of the tips recommended by Google Education are ensuring you have a strong password by using lower and uppercase letters. According to Google Education the password should not include favorite things such as pets, or name of the student;s school. Google Education calls for teachers and students to create a “passphrase.” A passphrase is a sentence that is easy to remember. I found this video to be helpful for teachers because I am sometimes guilty of not creating a strong password or reusing the same password for various sites. The tips could also be applied for older students that are in high school and even college. The next resource that I found for teachers is an article from Edutopia: https://www.edutopia.org/blog/internet-safety-younger-elementary-mary-beth-hertz . The article, written by Mary Beth Hertz shares helpful tips that teachers can follow when teaching students about internet safety. Mary Beth also shares a lesson she uses with her own students where students can learn how to protect themselves from the dangers of the internet. One the main key points the author of the article shares is helping students understand how “stranger danger” does not transfer online, automatically. The lesson can be used from students in Kindergarten all the way to high school.
Resources for Students
The next two resources can be used with students. The first one comes from Flocabulary. If you have not heard about this website, it is absolutely one of my favorite to use with my students! Flocabulary uses hip-hop to create engaging videos for all grades and subjects. It is one of the best tools that my students love! The video from Flocabulary shares password tips and strategies for students to use when using the internet. https://www.flocabulary.com/unit/internet-safety/
The other resource that I found for students comes from Brain Pop. If your students are like mine, they love any video that comes from this website. This Brain Pop video also shares information that students can think and consider when it comes to internet safety. The article that I shared from Edutopia earlier also mentions this Brain Pop video for teachers to use with students. https://jr.brainpop.com/artsandtechnology/technology/internetsafety/
Strategies
One of the most important strategies to use is to always model… model, model, model our students how to appropriately use the internet. Our students are constantly watching and learning from us. It is important for them to see the right way to use the internet. I model this a lot when my students begin to do research online. However, I know it needs to be done all year long. When it comes to research time, I always make sure my students have a list of sites they can safely search, without having to worry about ads (which are not everywhere!) and will provide them with kid-friendly information that will will be safe to browse. One strategy that I found helpful is having the students help you create rules when it comes to using the internet. It is always important to involve students into anything they are expected to use. The following resource I found offers different rules for students to remember and also provides additional information on how students to help create their own: https://education.cu-portland.edu/blog/classroom-resources/exploring-the-internet-safely/
The final strategy can work for both teachers and parents; actively monitor what students do online. My school is 1:1 in Chromebooks in grades 3rd-5th, so our students are constantly using the computers. One drawback to this is thinking we can trust them while they are suppose to be working on an assignment given online, however this is not always the case. I have caught several of my students doing other things online such as playing games, instead of completing their work. It is very important to actively monitor what our students are doing while they are behind the screen. The previous article that I shared includes this on their tips for families to use if their children are using the internet at home.
Global Collaboration Projects
These are the type of projects I have always wanted to do with my students. We actually got to do pen pal writing with another class that was from South Korea. It was very fun for my students to realize that students, the same age as them can have the same taste in music, even if these students are thousands of miles away. The first tool that I browsed through was Sci Starter. Sci starter is a place where teachers can find science projects for their students to collaborate in. The website can at first be a bit overwhelming with the amount of information it has, however searching for a project to join is simple. You can easily find a science project by searching with a phrase, location, which can even be local, topic and age group. During the search, you can also choose if you want to do only projects where your students can use class materials, can be done online, can use smartphone device or tablet app. This one option could be challenging for teachers that may have limited technology in their building, however it may still be done by putting students in small groups. I see this project helping develop digital citizenship and global awareness. Science is all around us and can help students bring awareness to local and global environmental issues that are currently happening. https://scistarter.org/ The following is one project I found where members of the project get to observe trees and use a mobile device to take height measurements.
*Due to currently using an older computer, I am unable to screenshot and save an image, so I am adding a link to an example of a project I found for this tool: https://scistarter.org/globe-observer-clouds
The second project I looked into was Sky Collaborations. Skype Collaborations can help teachers connect with other classrooms around the world to learn about different cultures, or to work collaboratively on a project. Skype Collaborations also offers virtual field trips and even have guest speakers that can talk to your class in real time. Several years ago while teaching third grade, my students go to do this. Our STEM teacher conducted a sea turtle project with the entire grade and our students go do Skype with a sea turtle center down in Florida. It was very neat skyping with the sea turtle center and having the students hear from marine biologists that are on the field, working with turtles. It was a very neat experience for them. I see this as a great opportunity for classrooms to connect across the globe to learn about other cultures and just to simply form relationships and collaborations with other students. It would definitely take learning to another level. I love this collaboration project because it is aligned to ISTE standards and the age ranges, as well as the type of collaboration you want for your students to do. One barrier I would see with this project would be not having a webcam, however most computers come with a webcam embedded. Another barrier I see is not being able to access Skype or other online tools needed. Some school districts may have Skype blocked. Overall, I think this is a great idea to implement in the classroom. https://education.microsoft.com/skype-in-the-classroom/skype-collaborations
The following are online tools that students can use when completing one of these Global Collaboration Projects. One that immediately thought about was Flidgrid. Flipgrid can be used for students to reflect on their learning after completing a project. Students can do a short summary over the main parts of the projects, or to just simply share their favorite things about the project. Another online tool that students can use is Adobe Spark. With Adobe Spark students can work collaboratively to create an online presentation over what they learned from the project. Lastly, students can also use Prezi to form a presentation to share with others in the school or with their classmates. There's a wide variety of online tools that students can use to produce a final presentation over the project completed or during the project if data needs to be gathered. For these type of projects, students can use G-Suite,
References:
Google for Education. (2017). Teach Students About Internet Safety and Privacy. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25G4tLVH1JE
Hertz, Mary Beth. (2017). How to Teach Internet Safety to Younger Elementary Students. Retrieved from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/internet-safety-younger-elementary-mary-beth-hertz
The Room 241 Team. (2018). Exploring the Internet (Safely!) in and out of the Classroom. Retrieved from https://education.cu-portland.edu/blog/classroom-resources/exploring-the-internet-safely/