Category: digital citizenship

Posted in digital citizenship, digital parenting, parent education, parents and technology

Collaboration and Technology on the Maryland Eastern Shore

Posted on by Marti Weston

I have just read a colleague’s post, Lessons of a Broken Window, over at The Learning Curve blog. The author, Chris Shriver, describes her son’s persistence as he practices throwing a baseball, even though a few of those pitches have broken windows. He has not let the occasional problem or temporary roadblock keep him from learning and fine-tuning his throwing skill as he seeks to become more expert at pitching.

Picture from NOAA.gov website.

I am spending three days with technology colleagues from a wide range of schools, and all of us are learning more about the ever-increasing technology tools in our lives. At a conference, held on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, the goal is to discover, share, and learn as much as we can. We are continuously modeling appropriate behavior, discovering and exploring new technology devices and websites, mastering new skills, and figuring out how to manage our online social media personas rather than letting those personas manage us. All of this information will return to school with us, helping students learn and supporting parents as they confront complex and confusing digital parenting issues. Continue reading “Collaboration and Technology on the Maryland Eastern Shore” →

Posted in digital citizenship, digital devices and gadgets, family conversations, parent child conversations, parents and technology, setting technology limits

7 Constructive Comments: Digital Kids to Parents

Posted on by Marti Weston

With more than 30 years in teaching including more than 20 in the educational technology field, I’ve heard many kids reflect thoughtfully, and not so thoughtfully, on their parents’ digital skills.

Here are the seven most common “I Wish” statements that I’ve heard expressed by children over the last 16 or 17 years. Two of them my daughter expressed directly to me.

Kids wish … Continue reading “7 Constructive Comments: Digital Kids to Parents” →

Posted in digital citizenship, digital parenting, online security, parents and technology, when to give children email

Giving Kids E-mail this Summer? 5 Tips for Parents

Posted on by Marti Weston

What is the right age for children to get personal e-mail accounts? Most of us discover, usually in hindsight, that a child’s independent e-mail account changes the context of many childhood experiences and complicates our child-rearing concerns.

E-mail connects a child to the world in ways that we parents may want to postpone. Chain mail, spam, the occasional unkind note, crazy stories, and the appearance of strange links — all are experiences that cannot be avoided, even with the best parental monitoring and regular family discussions.  Complicating the situation are the regular and age-appropriate conversations children have with one another, talking about odd and unusual electronic encounters. It’s wise to chat with teachers at your child’s school because they observe digital interactions that are different from what parents see.

Hundreds of digital options — e-mail is only one of them — are available and waiting for your child to discover them, so in the final analysis, you cannot prevent digital access. You can, however, make decisions help you focus on educating your child about digital citizenship.

5  Options to Consider When Your Child Asks for E-mail Continue reading “Giving Kids E-mail this Summer? 5 Tips for Parents” →

Posted in digital citizenship, digital parenting, parents and technology, privacy, social media

Do Your Kids Take Online Surveys and Quizzes?

Posted on by Marti Weston
A Quick Google Search for Quizzes

For sometime now I’ve considered writing a post on the problems with web surveys and quizzes. These tricky techniques use old-fashioned fun, emulating the magazine quiz features of the past and encouraging web users to happily divulge all sorts of personal information. Each of these activities is a small privacy invader using a “have fun and learn more” guise.

Instead of writing more on this subject here on MediaTech Parenting, I suggest your head over to visit the I Look Both Ways blog, where Linda Criddle has posted Online Quizzes and Surveys and the Real Risks These Represent. Linda’s post offers a comprehensive overview of the subject along with supplemental images.

Continue reading “Do Your Kids Take Online Surveys and Quizzes?” →

Posted in acceptable use, digital citizenship, digital parenting, leaving comments online, online education, parents and technology

If Every Family Had a Blog…

Posted on by Marti Weston

How would digital literacy and behavior improve if more families saw blogging as a way to communicate, connect with extended family members, and teach their children the basics about global communication? Would they be thrilled that their children had a big head start developing digital citizenship skills? Would they be delighted at all of the writing taking place and take pride as they watched children develop stronger writing skills?

Blogging is safe and easily managed. While we’ve all heard the scary stories, such as people going online and writing mean comments or nasty rumors that go public or even viral — in truth just about all blogging is safe and fun. Blogging teaches people to write, revise, write more, and publish for a community of readers.

Imagine, for a moment, if a family with two children, age five and seven, along with a bunch of relatives, starts a blog.

  • Family members, including grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins write, post, and comment. Parents are editors and managers, at least at the beginning, modeling and demonstrating how to use technology (social media) appropriately. Gradually family members share responsibilities.
    Continue reading “If Every Family Had a Blog…” →
Posted in American Academy of Pediatricians, cyber-bullying, digital citizenship, digital parenting, parents and technology, supervising kids, teens and technology

Pediatricians, Parents, and Digital Kids, Part II

Posted on by Marti Weston

Last Monday I read three powerful articles, and they fit together like a puzzle. They illustrate how a generational digital divide accentuates adolescent virtual world problems — a result of the contradictory digital perceptions of teens and adults.

POISONED WEB: A Girl’s Nude Photo and Altered Lives, appeared in the New York Times. The article describes how small, teenage misjudgments in the unsupervised world of instant web, smartphones, and cyber-bullying, can magnify hate and cause terrible pain. Reporter Jan Hoffman quotes adults who wish they had supervised more carefully and pledge to do more in the future. I wondered, as I often do when I read these articles, what leads adults not to supervise in the first place? Reading about the teachers, administrators, and officials who attempted to create opportunities for growth and learning out of the senseless hurt and cruelty was a highlight of the article.

 

Are We Ready to Stop Labeling Ourselves Digital Immigrants? — an amazing and thoughtful post at A Space for Learning, gets to the heart of the digital divide issue. The author writes: Continue reading “Pediatricians, Parents, and Digital Kids, Part II” →

Posted in acceptable use, American Academy of Pediatrics, digital citizenship, digital parenting, parent education, parents and technology, social media, social networking

Pediatricians, Parents, and Digital Kids, Part I

Posted on by Marti Weston
AAP Media History Form

This morning I was thrilled to read the newest American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) policy focusing on social media and children. The Impact of Social Media on Children, Adolescents and Families, written by a group of pediatricians and led by Gwenn Schurgin O’Keeffe (also the author of CyberSafe: Protecting and Empowering Digital Kids in the World of Texting, Gaming and Social Media), provides a set of social media guidelines for physicians to use with teen and tween patients as well as with parents. Published in March 28, 2011 edition of the journal Pediatrics, the social media statement describes the benefits and risks of the digital world, avoids judgmental comments, and suggests strategies that can make is safer for children.

Continue reading “Pediatricians, Parents, and Digital Kids, Part I” →