Tag: digital kids

Posted in 21st Century Learning, digital citizenship minute, digital learning, digital world conversations, parents and technology, teaching digital kids

The Digital Citizenship Minute: Digital Digressions in the Classroom

Posted on by Marti Weston
Read the piece at NetFamilyNews.org.

A year ago I asked my fifth-graders to write podcast scripts. They wrote about teasing, cyberbullying, gossip, intention vs. consequence, advertising, digital footprints, and the lack of facial cues in electronic communication. Working mostly in collaborative groups, my students recorded complete “’casts” in our informal laptop studio.

As always when it comes to 21st Century learning, a few students improved upon my lesson plan and asked to write podcasts for their other teachers. The resulting efforts helped students refine their digital citizenship perspectives. One student noted, “When an electronic problem [like cyberbullying] becomes a ‘big problem,’ teachers talk about it at school. How come we don’t talk about these things when they aren’t [big] problems?”

Continue reading “The Digital Citizenship Minute: Digital Digressions in the Classroom” →

Posted in 21st Century Learning, collaboration, digital learning, parents and technology, social entrepreneurs

SOccket! Collaboration, Creativity, and Tech Create an Energy-Producing Soccer Ball

Posted on by Marti Weston

Jessica Matthews, a co-creator of the energy-producing soccer ball, SOccket, visited my school today, taking the place by storm with her stories and engaging presentation.

A collaborative, 21st Century learning team working together for an undergraduate college class project, envisioned a soccer ball that might create clean energy as it moved around, while still being a ball for playing soccer. Their SOccket invention is astonishing and inspiring, creating enough energy to plug in a lamp or charge a mobile phone. Now, several years later, two members of the team have become social entrepreneurs, and SOccket is in production.

This CBS This Morning report gives lots more background. Two of the students, Jessica and her former classmate Julia Silverman, formed a start-up company, UnCharted Play and you can watch company’s introductory video, with an intro by Bill Clinton.

Continue reading “SOccket! Collaboration, Creativity, and Tech Create an Energy-Producing Soccer Ball” →

Posted in 21st Century Learning, Bookmark It!, cyber-bullying, digital citizenship, digital learning, hate groups on the web, information freedom, parent child conversations, parents and technology

The Teaching Tolerance Website: Use It-BookMark It!

Posted on by Marti Weston
Visit Teaching Tolerance!

It’s a privilege for me to write occasional posts for the Teaching Tolerance blog. However, years before I ever wrote a word for the Tolerance website, I used it as a reference and information source to develop my teaching skills and expand my understanding of the world.

You should too.

If you don’t know about Teaching Tolerance, an arm of the Southern Poverty Law Center, or if you don’t visit the website on a regular basis, you are missing an ever-expanding information universe focused on human rights, diversity, anti-racism, community-building, acceptance, tolerance, inclusion, and much more. In the digital age, with information and misinformation moving at lightning speed, we cannot learn too much about these topics.

Continue reading “The Teaching Tolerance Website: Use It-BookMark It!” →

Posted in 21st Century Learning, digital devices and gadgets, parents and technology, social networking, when kids make mistakes, when to give children email

Your Brain is the Final Spell Checker!

Posted on by Marti Weston

The process of spell checking is a two-part endeavor, and it’s an important digital world lesson for everyone — kids and adults — to master.

Part one features the work of the computer or website, as the spell check program goes to work. But after the digital spell check process a bigger responsibility lies ahead.

Each time a person writes and rewrites, he or she must spell check the spell checker — an important 21st Century skill. And while a commitment to differentiated instruction requires teachers and parents to recognize that some writers will be better at this second step than others, all students need to understand that the digital editing process cannot identify every mistake.

This poem always makes the point effectively with my students. Use it as a great conversation piece (and also to review homonyms) — over 2012 Easter and Passover dinner tables or any other time.

And if you put the words of this poem into Google search, you’ll discover that there are many other versions.

Human Brain Not Yet Obsolete

I have a spelling checker.

It came with my PC:

It plainly marked four my revue   Continue reading “Your Brain is the Final Spell Checker!” →

Posted in cell phones, digital learning, digital parenting, electronic communication, online communication, parent child conversations, parents and technology

Sherry Turkle TED Lecture-Connected but Alone?

Posted on by Marti Weston

The TED Talk site just posted the most recent lecture by MIT professor and psychologist Sherry Turkle. It’s embedded below.

In her presentation, Professor Turkle illustrates several of the most compelling issues from her recent book, Alone Together. She points out that technology may give us an illusion of togetherness with others, but she challenges us to understand that digital connectedness is not a substitute for person-to-person interaction.

  • Are we hiding from each other even as we are connected?
  • With fewer face-to-face conversations with one another are we less able to learn how to have conversations with ourselves?
  • Do feelings that no one is really listening to us make us want to spend more time with machines that make us feel like these devices are listening to us?
  • Are people increasingly willing to settle for the pretend empathy of devices and robots?

Continue reading “Sherry Turkle TED Lecture-Connected but Alone?” →

Posted in digital parenting, online databases, parent child conversations, parents and technology, social media, supervising kids

Effectively Guide Your Digital Kids-10 Tips for Grades 4-6 and Beyond

Posted on by Marti Weston
My design with images from the Apple website.

1.    Save Facebook, Google+, and other big-time social networking experiences for high school.

2.    Know your child’s passwords.

3.    Keep online computer activities out of the bedroom. Also, plan on no-screen wind-down time during the last half hour before bed. (Yes, even those bedtime friendly Kindles – why not use bedtime-friendly books?)

4.    Set up an overnight charging area for cell phones and other gadgets outside of the bedroom, preferably on another floor or part of your home.

5.    Consider writing up digital device contracts and using these agreements with your child. Feel free to take away privileges, or even the device, if your expectations are not met.

Continue reading “Effectively Guide Your Digital Kids-10 Tips for Grades 4-6 and Beyond” →

Posted in cell phones, digital devices and gadgets, digital parenting, gadgets and sleep, parents and technology, teens and technology

Is the Price of Privilege too Little Sleep?

Posted on by Marti Weston

I’ve just finished re-reading The Price of Privilege, a 2008 book by Madeline Levine. Last week at a professional development event at my school, I heard Dr. Levine speak, while taking nearly three pages of notes and recalling some of the parenting strategies my husband and I  used when our daughter, now out of graduate school, was in middle and high school.

Almost every concern that Dr. Levine raised — perfectionism, discontent, and insecurity — is familiar after years of parenting and teaching. I especially like her descriptions of effective parenting. Most importantly, when I read her book four years ago and reread it again last week, I thought about sleep and how much of a priority it needs to be for parents and children.

After the lecture my husband and I thought back to our daughter’s middle and high school years, considering all of the things we did well or could have done better. In the process, we remembered the emphasis our family placed on getting enough sleep and eliminating computer screens each evening — sometimes to our daughter’s chagrin. Continue reading “Is the Price of Privilege too Little Sleep?” →