Posts Tagged "Cybersafety"
Switched On and Connected…
I am a Geek… I don’t hide it… I like my Sci-Fi, I like my computer games, I like my online community and I hate to say it but I have more virtual friends than I do real friends. I like being switched on and connected.
As a mother I am raising 3 Geeks – my children also like Sci-Fi, computer games and being switched on and connected. This morning as I switched on and read my email one of my online communities had a survey about Social Media which included a video about how to prepare your Tween for Technology.
Now I don’t agree with everything Mia Freedman says however for the first time in a long time I felt that someone was giving SOME good advice about online communities and Social Media. Everywhere else you look the solution for Teens and Tweens is to block Twitter, Facebook and anything else that the kids are using. Lets face it. Our Schools all seem to block Social Media. But maybe we need to rethink Social Media. I know that I get most of my information from Twitter. I couldn’t live without my Twitter feed helping me to sift through sites, articles and information. And If I need something that is usually the first place I head to find what I want. So why are we stopping students from accessing a legitimate source of information. Crowd sourcing is becoming more a part of life – how else do we sift through the millions of google responses to our search query. So why are we not teaching them how to use it correctly and safely?
Recently I read an article titled What Schools are Really Blocking When They Block Social Media where S. Craig Watkins discussed the issue of schools and social media. I have to agree with him if someone told me that I have to switch off and stop communicating with my virtual networks I think I would be lost and lonely. My learning wouldn’t stop as I have a natural curiosity about the world and would find other ways to find the information but for our students when all they have ever known is the Internet and being switched on and connected I think it would stop them from investigating.
Mr Watkins went on to outline …
By blocking social media schools are also blocking the opportunity:
1) to teach students about the inventive and powerful ways communities around the world are using social media
2) for students and teachers to experience the educational potential of social media together
3) for students to distribute their work with the larger world
4) for students to reimagine their creative and civic identities in the age of networked media
I think that we need to embrace Social Media in schools, we need to teach students how to use it to find information, to connect with experts and to encourage students to learn for themselves. We also need to teach them how to stay safe and to verify the information that they find.
Related articles
- What Schools are Really Blocking When They Block Social Media (dmlcentral.net)
- Twitter – my virtual staffroom (maggiehosmcgrane.com)
We Still Block Content in Schools?
I’ve been spending my summer break catching up on my favourite PodCast Classroom Geeks and even though the episodes I was listening to were from way back in 2009 it was interesting to note that there were discussions occurring about blocked content in schools. When I was next close to my twitter feed I noticed a number of articles come through about websites which should be white-listed on school content filters. I have to ask what exactly is content blocking teaching kids?
Granted the educational institution I work for also filters content (though the restrictions are not too bad we do have access to facebook, twitter, and YouTube). I do want to know what are we teaching kids if we don’t let them access the big bad world. I have three children and at home we do not filter the Internet. Instead we teach our children what to do instead and trust that they know how to handle it. Ms 10 certainly does a number of times she has come to us about questionable content her friends have sent her or she has stumbled across and we have the appropriate conversation and alert who we feel needs to be alerted. I don’t think we need to shelther her from it. Perhaps educational institutions need to take the cotton wool off their eyes and have a good look at their content policies. I guess the problem is there is always someone who objects and makes waves. And schools need to protect themselves from this. I guess this goes back to my earlier post Time to Pop the Bubble Wrap We need to teach the kids cyber safety.
Read MoreTime to Pop the Bubble Wrap
I was reading a blog post tonight about what is the best age to teach Social Networking. Royan makes many good points. The main one I agree with is
Everywhere I turn I see a lot of time and money being consumed warning parents, children, and teachers about the dangers on the Internet. It’s getting to the point of absurdity. The problem with most of these initiatives and campaigns is they usually implicitly suggest that proverbial abstinence is the best policy. -The Spicy Learning Blog
I think that cybersafety has finally gone too far. Blocking kids from the Internet, chat, social networking and web 2.0 does not help them later in life from the big bad world. We need to teach kids to be smart from the start. Teach them how to protect their privacy. Teach them to talk to you as a parent or teacher. Teach them to make their own mind up about right and wrong. Encourage kids to use technology in open areas.
We used to teach kids (when I was a kid!) about stranger danger, we offered safe houses for kids walking home from school. Perhaps we should transfer this to the Internet.
Lets stop wrapping our children up in bubble wrap and teach them to be safe.
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