Opinion
Classroom Technology Opinion

Even ‘Digital Natives’ Need Digital Training

By Erin McNeill — October 20, 2015 4 min read
  • Save to favorites
  • Print

Imagine a 5th grade sleepover party where, inevitably, someone gets left out. So far, a typical elementary school experience. Because it’s 2015, the children post photos of the party on Instagram, and the child sitting at home gets her feelings badly hurt. On Monday, the principal receives a call from that child’s parents about a cyberbullying incident, and teachers and administrators spend the whole week responding to parents and sorting out the children’s experiences. But this isn’t cyberbullying; it’s just poor etiquette in the digital realm, and it all could have been avoided if the kids had practiced safe and respectful online behavior.

Young people urgently need guidance on thoughtful, ethical, and responsible digital-media use. For the most part, we as a society are not providing educators—who are feeling the fallout from new media—with the resources and the support to take up the challenge. What’s needed is policy change to ensure that the resources are there.

Children are handed powerful, connected devices by parents and schools at younger and younger ages. The messages and media that children are consuming, creating, and sending connect them to their friends and the world, and allow new opportunities for self-expression, but can also have negative and sometimes life-changing consequences.

BRIC ARCHIVE

In most states, the policy approach has been to criminalize cyberbullying and require schools to install filtering tools to ensure children aren’t seeing harmful or unsavory images or prevent the use of potentially troublesome social-media apps. Simply blocking these apps rather than actually preparing children for this new world is shortsighted. Meanwhile, blocking and filtering is just ineffective: Schools experience breaches, and kids access media via smartphones and tablets outside of school.

Lawmakers in Utah have taken the lead in this new world by enacting a law earlier this year that requires schools to provide opportunities to learn safe technology use and “digital citizenship.” The legislation builds on laws requiring internet safety and social-media instruction in Illinois and New Jersey. Lessons on digital citizenship help youths learn norms of appropriate, responsible, and healthy behavior, such as: what’s appropriate to share online and why privacy matters; how comments on anonymous social-media apps may hurt others; and what message youths are sending to a potentially worldwide audience when they post videos of bad behavior. This digital citizenship is a key subset of the comprehensive media-literacy skills that students need today.

State Rep. Keven Stratton, a Republican from Provo, introduced the Utah bill out of concern that schools in his state are handing out digital devices without also providing the tools to use them appropriately. “This is an all-hands-on-deck issue,” he told me by phone just after the state Senate gave final approval to his bill. “We need to wake up.” Implementation is still to be seen, of course, but by having already secured funding, Utah has ensured this important issue won’t be regarded as another burdensome unfunded mandate.

Simply blocking these apps rather than actually preparing children for this new world is shortsighted.

We know that digital-citizenship education works. The Journey School in Aliso Viejo, a small Southern California city, is an example of a digital-citizenship success story. Since instituting a three-year middle school series on digital citizenship, information literacy on evaluation of online sources, and media-literacy courses to teach critical-thinking skills around media texts of all kinds—music videos, film, print advertising—the school has nearly eliminated bullying and behavioral issues and significantly boosted standardized-test scores. “What has been a small investment has paid off tenfold,” says Shaheer Faltas, the Journey School principal who instituted the program.

Certainly, parents also have a role to play here. But many parents are overwhelmed by the digital devices in their families’ lives and the constantly changing landscape of social media. Parents lack digital-citizenship skills, too. To return to the sleepover example, parents allow a group of 10-year-olds to use their smartphones without supervision, and then other parents escalate the problem by reporting cyberbullying to the schools. In another example, parents might post photos or information about their own children publicly without considering the long-term ramifications for a child’s grown-up digital footprint or sense of privacy and autonomy.

The potential positives from our interconnected world, and access to information, are far-reaching and exciting. But there are consequences to the mistakes that children will make, and it’s neither fair nor right to leave them on their own in this new online world. It’s time to stop just letting the digital wave happen, but rather take an active, engaged approach to the 21st-century education of our children and ourselves by teaching media literacy in all its forms, including, most urgently, digital citizenship. Let’s follow Utah’s lead.

A version of this article appeared in the October 21, 2015 edition of Education Week as Digital Citizenship Matters for All Ages

Events

This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Artificial Intelligence Webinar
AI in Education: Empowering Educators to Tap into the Promise and Steer Clear of Peril
Explore the transformative potential of AI in education and learn how to harness its power to improve student outcomes.
Content provided by Panorama Education
English Learners Webinar Family and Community Engagement: Best Practices for English Learners
Strengthening the bond between schools and families is key to the success of English learners. Learn how to enhance family engagement and support student achievement.
This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Mathematics Webinar
How an Inquiry-Based Approach Transforms Math Learning
Transform math learning with an approach that empowers students to become active, engaged learners.
Content provided by MIND Education

EdWeek Top School Jobs

Teacher Jobs
Search over ten thousand teaching jobs nationwide — elementary, middle, high school and more.
View Jobs
Principal Jobs
Find hundreds of jobs for principals, assistant principals, and other school leadership roles.
View Jobs
Administrator Jobs
Over a thousand district-level jobs: superintendents, directors, more.
View Jobs
Support Staff Jobs
Search thousands of jobs, from paraprofessionals to counselors and more.
View Jobs

Read Next

Classroom Technology From Our Research Center How Students Are Dodging Cellphone Restrictions
Schools’ efforts to restrict cellphone use have set up a battle of wits between teachers and students.
1 min read
A ninth grader places her cellphone in to a phone holder as she enters class at Delta High School, Friday, Feb. 23, 2024, in Delta, Utah. At the rural Utah school, there is a strict policy requiring students to check their phones at the door when entering every class. Each classroom has a cellphone storage unit that looks like an over-the-door shoe bag with three dozen smartphone-sized slots.
A 9th grader places her cellphone into a holder as she enters class at Delta High School in Delta, Utah, in February. The rural school has a strict policy requiring students to check their phones at the door when entering every class.
Rick Bowmer/AP
This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Classroom Technology Sponsor
The Top 5 Ways Generative AI Increases Student Creativity
Focus: Whether generative AI will increase or decrease students’ creative thinking tools.
Content provided by Adobe Corporation
Classroom Technology From Our Research Center 'Mom Is Texting': Teachers Say Parents Are a Daily Distraction During Class
Many parents feel the need to be in constant contact with their children.
4 min read
Close up of student's hands on their desk in the classroom and holding a smartphone
iStock/Getty Images Plus
Classroom Technology Most Teens Believe Conspiracy Theories, See News as Biased. What Can Schools Do?
Teenagers—like adults—struggle to recognize accurate, unbiased information in a chaotic digital media landscape.
6 min read
Fake News concept with gray words 'fact' in row and single bold word 'fake' highlighted by black magnifying glass on blue background
Firn/iStock/Getty