Tag: digital parenting

Posted in 21st Century Learning, 21st Century parenting, 21st Century teaching, digital world conversations, parents and technology, starting the school year

The Annual Beloit College Mindset List Is Out!

Posted on by Marti Weston
Check out the Mindset Lists of American History.
Check out the Mindset book!

Want to learn a bit about the students who are entering college right now and infer a bit about digital kids at other ages? Check out this year’s Beloit College Mindset list for the class of 2017.

Started in 1998 by two faculty members at Beloit, the list was originally created as a way for faculty and staff at the college to learn more about how easy it is for adults talk about things that they take for granted but that their students don’t know.  The website includes past years’ lists.

As parents and teachers, we gain far more credibility with digital-age children when we understand that many of the things we refer to are not a part of their mindset, and when we make an effort to understand the context of their young lives.

A Few of My Favorite Items from This Year’s Mindset List

(But there are 60 items out students on the list.) Continue reading “The Annual Beloit College Mindset List Is Out!” →

Posted in 21st Century Learning, 21st Century parenting, brain, parents and technology

Multi-tasking May Be a Myth Says John Medina

Posted on by Marti Weston

brain-rules-cover-172In today’s always-connected world we feel proud of our ability to do several things at once, and many adults are even more amazed as they watch their children managing multiple tasks at the same time.

It turns out, however, that we may need to rearrange the way we work, reconsider our understanding of multi-tasking, and rethink how we supervise children when they are attending to learning activities. According to Professor John Medina, a respected molecular biologist and author of the 2008 book, Brain Rules, the brain cannot multitask efficiently. Multi-tasking during homework times may decrease a 21st Century student’s ability to learn efficiently.

Medina’s book, an entertaining read, discusses 12 important brain rules and devotes one chapter to multitasking. Addressing the widely accepted view that in the digital age we all multi-task effectively, Dr. Medina explains why the brain has trouble with multi-tasking and why this practice can cause difficulty for learners, workers, and especially for pre-teens and adolescents. Many entertaining video explanations of the 12 brain rules are posted on his website.                                                          Continue reading “Multi-tasking May Be a Myth Says John Medina” →

Posted in digital kids, digital parenting, kids' advice for parents, parent child conversations, parents and technology

Advice from Digital Kids to Parents

Posted on by Marti Weston

Given the chance, kids can offer remarkable insight — good ideas for their parents to consider.

I’ve heard many kids reflect thoughtfully, and not so thoughtfully, on their parents’ digital skills. I often hear my students wonder aloud about why parents don’t always model the digital citizenship expectations that they want their children to learn and apply.

I wish my parents wouldBelow are the nine most common “I Wish” statements expressed over the past several years by digital children that I teach.  Two of them, I’ll admit, were even mentioned to me by my daughter some years ago. Mea culpa…

Kids Wish Their Parents and Other Adults Would

  1. Try to learn a lot more about computers in particular and technology in general.
  2. Stop saying they don’t know much about technology (mom’s especially)
  3. Not use Blackberries and phones at sports games and school events.
  4. Don’t talk on the phone so much in the car.
  5. Learn to play some of the kids’ online games.
  6. Understand more about helping with searches on the Internet.
  7. Understand how hard it is to learn the technology rules and regulations and not always threaten to take away technology access when there’s a problem.
  8. Stop automatically saying that new things like Wikipedia are questionable.
  9. Try not to act dumb about technology. Even if you don’t understand something, please act like you want to learn new things.        Continue reading “Advice from Digital Kids to Parents” →
Posted in digital citizenship, digital devices and gadgets, digital kids, digital learning, digital parenting, parents and technology

Back-to-School Digital Parenting Tips – 2013

Posted on by Marti Weston

The back-to-school season is a great time for adults to think about what they can do to help children avoid some of the typical online and social media mistakes and difficulties.

backtoschool cyber rules

These adult strategies can help elementary and middle school children develop safe, secure, and disciplined digital life skills.

Teachers can also share this list with the parents of their students.

Posted in 21st Century Learning, 21st Century parenting, image evaluation, parents and technology, to share or not to share

Common Sense Questions to Ask Before Posting Photos

Posted on by Marti Weston

csm?small

Twenty-first Century learners are great when it comes to intrinsically understanding how to easily use resources and share information in the digital world, but they often need assistance making careful judgments about what is appropriate to share (and what is not). When a problem occurs, it’s often because a child makes an instantaneous decision to send off an image — and it turns out to be the wrong decision. It’s just so easy to share!

Check out this terrific poster, with questions to ask before sharing a photo, easily used when you discuss social media and digital common sense issues at home or in a classroom. We all make digital errors from time to time, but this graphic can help us develop a visual memory that assists with decision-making.

The image is available at Common Sense Media, and I discovered it on the Edudemic blog. It will serve as a great jumping off point anytime image-sharing issues arise.

Continue reading “Common Sense Questions to Ask Before Posting Photos” →

Posted in digital citizenship, digital footprints, digital parenting, kids and privacy, privacy

Privacy Matters So Talk With Kids About It

Posted on by Marti Weston
Privacy spiral
Created with Festisite

After recent news reports about the National Security Agency (NSA) and its data collecting, we adults are thinking much more about the lack of privacy in our lives. We need to remember, however, that including children and adolescents in the conversation is important if they are to become competent and confident digital citizens.

With our online profiles, social media accounts, mobile devices, and files saved to the cloud, almost no one doubts that we have less privacy; however, what is an ideological or big discussion issue for adults is far more complicated and abstract for children. For most adults the sentinel issue — how much data collection intrudes on a family’s or individual’s personal life — is a primary focus. The issue for children, on the other hand, is that without a basic understanding of privacy concepts they lack the information and the skills that they need to recognize and avoid potential problems.

Many years ago my parents designated important topics for dinner table conversations — broad subjects that we recycled again and again as the four of us shared family meals. When one or the other parent said, “We should talk about that at dinner,” my brother and I knew it was something that Mom and Dad wanted us to take seriously.

Today children and adolescents need to experience this same type of dinner table conversation to help them learn about privacy and develop strategies for maintaining as much of it as possible.   Continue reading “Privacy Matters So Talk With Kids About It” →

Posted in 21st Century Learning, attributing sources, digital kids, digital learning, digital learning resources, parents and technology, plagiarism

Thoughts About Plagiarism in the Digital World

Posted on by Marti Weston
Designed with Wordfoto!
Designed with Wordfoto!

Originality matters when digital children write and learn, but many 21st Century students have considerable difficulty understanding what the idea of original content really means.

Check out How the Internet Affects Plagiarism at KQED Mindshift, a blog post that describes how plagiarism is evolving in today’s digital world. According to the article, students today do less looking for “unoriginal content” at sites that sell papers or other pre-written documents (compared to the past), and they use lots more content from the almost unlimited digital resources that are available on the Internet.

Mindshift’s post is based on a recently published white paper published by TurnItIn, one of the most well-known plagiarism detection software tools. The paper points out how today’s students tend to discover and share work via social media, use Wikipedia regularly, and continue to copy content from encyclopedias. Read the article for a more thorough summary.       Continue reading “Thoughts About Plagiarism in the Digital World” →