Digital Citizenship: the key to a successful digitally fluent classroom

Digital Citizenship: the key to a successful digitally fluent classroom

By Martha Bowden, Computer Teacher

Privacy, Safety, Security, Communication, Digital Footprint, and Copyright are all elements of Digital Citizenship. Common Sense Media leads the way in provided research based resources to classroom teachers in order to assist them when integrating digital citizenship principles into lesson plans.

In addition to resources, CSM offers an educator certification and a signature school designation for those teachers and schools who place great emphasis on implementing intentional digital citizenship skills into existing lesson plans.

Common Sense Signature School Digital Citizenship Certification requires the following:

“Teach five lessons (one full unit) from the curriculum (or all of Digital Passport) to students in two separate grade levels (e.g., 6th grade and 7th grade).

Teach three lessons to students in three separate grade levels (e.g., 6th, 7th, and 8th grade).”2.

The program offers a comprehensive Scope and Sequence to ensure the teacher matches skills in an age appropriate manner. They also provided a web based program called Digital Passport. This web based platform provides five activities for students to master via an online game format. Each activity has at least three levels and each increases in difficulty as students develop proficiency.

CSM also asks teachers to share the activities with colleges and to encourage parents to register and utilize the parent resources they provide.

Common Sense Media also provides additional resources at no cost to teachers and schools: Posters, Toolkit, Assessments

This past year my school completed the requirements to be listed on the CSM website as a Signature School.  Next year, our goal as a school is for every grade to complete a unit each quarter. In addition, my goal is to incorporate some aspect of ISTE standard #5 during each class period. This standard asks teachers to:

a. Advocate and practice safe, legal and responsible use of information and technology.

b. Exhibit a positive attitude toward using technology that supports collaboration, learning, and productivity.

c. Demonstrate personal responsibility for lifelong learning.

d. Exhibit leadership for digital citizenship.3.

Completion of the Digital Passport activities yields a certificate of completion for each students. The activities themselves spark discussions and talking points in class and among students. One idea I hope to implement is to incorporate word studies of key terms connected to digital citizenship and create a choice of activities to coincide with each term. The younger students will focus on a new term each 2 - 3 weeks, but the older students should grapple with a new term each week. This will allow for the conversation to remain open and the reinforcement of these concepts with each lesson should translate best practice into action in the lives of our students. The goal is to make sure it sticks.

Works Cited

2. "Common Sense Media Certified School." Reviews & Age Ratings. Web. 14 July 2014. <https://www.commonsensemedia.org/educators/certification-school>.

3. “ISTE NetS” Web. 14 July 2014.

http://www.iste.org/docs/pdfs/20-14_ISTE_Standards-S_PDF.pdf